Frag Out! Magazine
Issue link: https://fragout.uberflip.com/i/1086092
HS403B (HS403B-GR) It's done! After all the red tape stuff, you are firearms license owner. No more jealous look to your friends' toys or paying for a gun on the range. Soon you will have your own gun. In perfect world, the weapon setup should start with clear and precise as- sessment of needs and requirements and possible use scenario. In real life, the budget is the major factor. Good rifle is not a cheap thing. Pro- ven Aimpoint or Trijicon optoelectro- nics aren't free too. You need to spend couple hundred bucks for them. Well, not everybody can afford these and to be totaly honest, not everybody really needs them. Is there an alternative? Yes, there are plenty of budget-friendly optics, with Vortex as unquestionable leader in this market. Vortex sights are not expensive and backed with lifetime warranty. Few years ago a new brand appeared on radar, a California-based Holosun. I was lucky to get one in my hands. Holosun HE403B-GR is from Elite series. It's compact and lightweight micro red dot sight like Aimpoint T-1 or Vortex SPARC AR, the latter being the close competitor. One of the main features is the slick tube with just two adjustment turrets on the body. It's slick, but it causes consequences and here it is the power source. Sight is powered with single CR2032 placed in the tray on the right side. To replace battery, you need and key. IMHO this makes the sight usable on the range only. For field use, the lack of quick bat- tery replacement is a big NO GO. Ho- losun declares 50,000 hrs runtime, but the battery might be faulty, but for sure time will pass (most probably way qu- icker than expected). Since we are tal- king battery, I see some lack of logics in the design. One of biggest advanta- ges of Aimpoint T-1 or T-2 optics over the EOTech holosights is the fact they are always on. Thousands of runtime hours make me sure that the dot will be there when I will need it, especially in combat situation. Holosun features the automatic switch which will turn off the sight after eight hours. Yeah, I know it is motion activated, but this can be another thing which could fail (remember Murphy's Law…). The HE403B-GR is an Elite series sight and comes with Green reticle. It's still a red dot sight but with green dot… According to scientific resear- ches, the green color is somewhere in the middle of the visible light spec- trum and seems to be "more friendly". The human eye sees the green color better and it improves the accommo- dation process. If someone tells you that green reticle is invisible on the trees, grass or other natural backdrop, he's lying. Green reticle is exceptional- ly clear. I wasn't too careful when playing with the sight. It got dirty, it got wet. It was cold and snow. It was attached to the rifle in the bag, stashed between other guns. No damages, no malfunc- tions in real life use. Holosun 403B-GR is pretty good si- ght with a nice price tag. For soldier, contractor or someone else preparing for war zone or high-risk zone I would go with different weapon sight. If you need sight just for shooting on the range, replacing battery with hex key isn't a problem and the Aimpoint is out of budget, HE403G-BR might be your best bang for a buck. Street Tactics www.fragoutmag.com