Optic Review: Primary Arms SLx MD-25 Red Dot

 

The panorama of “budget” optics has positive modified over the past decade or so, with many new corporations producing ever higher, higher-quality choices at reasonably priced costs. Primary Arms is a type of manufacturers that has established itself and earned a agency foothold available in the market by bringing good wanting, completely serviceable, usually fairly feature-rich optics to the plenty. One of the most recent is that this SLx MD-25 Microdot, and it’s fairly darn nice.

Included within the container with the SLx MD-25 is a low base (seen by itself to the appropriate within the picture above), a normal riser for centered/absolute co-witness with typical AR-15 sights (seen above put in on the optic), and two spacers: thick and skinny (not pictured). The skinny spacer offers a 1.535-inch height to middle, which I imagine is Aimpoint’s normal height, and the thick spacer nets a 1.64-inch height for that decrease 1/three alignment of your iron sights.

Along with the mounts and spacers is the required parts for every obtainable possibility. While most optics would have you ever buy mounts individually, the MD-25 comes with each conceivable possibility proper within the container. Plus instruments, a cleansing material, and a consumer handbook.

Quite the excellent equipment for its very cheap $169.99 MSRP. If you’re fortunate sufficient to pounce when one’s obtainable, there are generally even open box and blem units obtainable for about $40 much less. Either approach it’s a heck of a deal.

Mounts, by the way in which, match the Aimpoint Micro (T1/T2) sample so there are lots of other options on the market in case you wish to go QD or in any other case get fancy.

You might have seen that the SLx MD-25 isn’t a typical microdot. Rather, it occupies roughly the usual footprint of a microdot however in a bigger diameter format.

At the expense of weighing in about 2 ounces heavier than a similar-sized microdot, it offers the big discipline of view of a 30mm, full-size pink dot scope however does so in a smaller, lighter package deal than what you’d discover in that class.

Rotating the left-side knob in both path clicks between 11 brightness settings, together with two evening vision-compatible ranges, plus “off.”

The MD-25’s single CR2032 battery resides inside this knob, and the sight will run 50,000 hours off that single battery (at medium brightness). That’s fairly superb. That’s 5.7 years. From a $1 battery (if you happen to pay for a pleasant one).

Also visible within the picture above, the within of the MD-25’s ocular bell is threaded to simply accept flash hiders or different caps.

Under the properly knurled elevation and windage turret caps are easy-to-adjust turrets with clean, crisp, audible, half-MOA clicks with 50 whole minutes of adjustment every. The rectangular bar on the highest of every cap can be utilized as a software to show the turrets, however you aren’t prone to want it because the turrets themselves are serrated alongside the sides and straightforward sufficient to rotate by hand.

Thanks in a giant half to the simply swappable mounts, the Primary Arms SLx MD-25 instantly discovered a house in my testing rotation. Within the primary month I had run it with the low mount on a number of of our Pork Sword Pistols in varied calibers.

I had run it low mounted on a Radical Firearms RF/22 throughout the Franklin Armory 22-C1 Binary Trigger review.

I ran it on AR platforms in .22 LR, 9mm, 5.56, and 300 Blackout. Including machine gun use:

In all circumstances the MD-25 was simply what the physician ordered. It has a crisp 2 MOA dot (it could simply cowl a 2-inch diameter goal that’s 100 yards away) with a full brightness vary acceptable to be used from nightfall to daybreak, together with within the full Texas solar what place many dots actually wrestle to point out up.

Note that within the fourth picture on this overview — the one which exhibits the dot — 95% of that “starburst” look to the dot and the reflection inside the sides of the optic is one thing I couldn’t stop my digicam from displaying, nevertheless it’s an impact of the digicam, not truly one thing your eye sees within the optic. Unless you’re in a reasonably darkish surroundings operating the pink dot cranked as much as 11, the MD-25 has about as good and clean of a exact little pink dot as they arrive.

While totally multi-coated, the SLx MD-25’s lenses impart far much less coloration shift than most pink dots and supply an almost impartial, clear view that’s much nearer to bare eye imaginative and prescient than the norm.

Side observe: I’m carrying the identical hat and t-shirt in each movies and within the picture above, but all have been taken not simply on totally different days however in several months. I clearly must increase my wardrobe.

Speaking of wardrobes, the SLx MD-25 is fairly sufficient for any event. It has that high-end look to it with an interesting design, clean machining, and a good, deep, hardcoat anodized end.

Over many months of standard use on all types of various firearms, the MD-25 has been a rockstar for me. It retains zero with out fail (and has even confirmed its capability to return to zero after eradicating it and later returning it to the identical gun), has a exact sufficient dot for correct shooting out to a few hundred yards, is daylight shiny even in full Texas solar on a light-weight background, offers a really extensive discipline of view with practically no coloration shift, and comes proper out of the container with the entire mounting choices essential to work on nearly any firearm.

The Primary Arms SLx MD-25 is a no brainer, stable selection for a implausible pink dot at a killer value.

Specifications: Primary Arms SLx MD-25 Microdot

Reticle: 2 MOA Dot
Brightness: 11 settings (together with two evening imaginative and prescient) plus “off”
Dot Color: Red
Click Value: half MOA
Adjustment Range: 50 MOA
Battery Life: 50,000 hours at medium brightness
Battery Type: CR2032
Material: Aluminum
Finish: Hardcoat anodized
Weight: 6.5 ounces
Warranty: Lifetime
MSRP: $169.99

Ratings (out of 5 stars):

Utility  * * * * *
When you mix two mounts, two spacers, plus all of the parts and instruments essential proper within the container with a 2 MOA dot, wide-field-of-view optic you nail five-star utility.

Form Factor  * * * * 
Good appears with glorious machining and end. It appears nicer than its MSRP would recommend.

Optics  * * * * *
Clear glass and a crisp, cease signal pink dot with loads of brightness adjustment. At this value level the optics high quality is 5 stars for positive.

Durability  * * * * *
While I didn’t torture check the MD-25, others have and it’s clearly a stout, well-made optic. In my testing I discovered the turrets to trace true and the zero retention was flawless. All elements seem well-made and every part matches and capacities accurately and confidently.

Overall  * * * * *
I merely don’t have any gripes or nit-picks to stage on the SLx MD-25. While, positive, I might request enhancements akin to “off” clicks between every of the brightness settings, a QD mount(s), or flip-up lens caps, at an MSRP of simply $169.99 I’m totally five-stars pleased with this implausible, giant diameter microdot.