Last year, Burris was kind enough to send me one of their Speedbead sights to test out on a demo Remington 1100. I liked it, and I thought it was a cool little doodad to have on a gun. Unfortunately, I didn’t own the 1100 that was the test bed, and Burris didn’t make a mount for my Yildiz. In fact, reader Totenglocke summed it up best; “It just sucks because this is something I would buy, but if you have a limited range of what shotguns you can mount it to, that definitely decreases it’s usefulness.” The folks at RedRing apparently agree . . .

RedRing’s designed their sight to fit almost any shotty out there. Simply put, if your shotgun has ribs between 5 mm and 11.5 mm, it can accept a RedRing. And that’s absolutely awesome. To make things better, instead of using a red dot like the Speedbead, the RedRing uses a, well, you guessed it, a red ring that corresponds to your shot burst diameter at 20 meters.

The whole body is made of anodized aluminum with weatherproof buttons and a general feel of quality craftsmanship. All of the buttons (both of them) are within reach while you have both hands on the gun. All you’ll really need to do with them, though, is change the brightness of the ring if the autosensor doesn’t do it to your liking. I never had issues with the sensor, but for the sake of testing, we can confirm that the buttons change the visibility of the ring.

The biggest question I had when I put it on my gun was, “Does that damn thing work?” And yes Virginia, it appears to work just fine. Now keep in mind that I’m an occasional clay buster who has gone bird hunting twice in my life. So when I go shoot a round of skeet with my coworkers, it usually takes me a few rounds to get warmed up before I start to get in the rhythm. And some days, it doesn’t happen at all.

 

I took 20 minutes to mount the RedRing (it can be done in 5), walked out to my private range, missed two or three and then started busting clays. When I actually focused on fundamentals, I was unstoppable. It didn’t matter what Nick threw out of the launcher, I was going to hit it. So does it work? Hell yeah. It works great.

Specifications: RedRing Shotgun Sight

  • Battery: AAAA 1.5 V
  • Battery Life: Approximately 300 hours. Auto shutoff after 4 hours
  • Weight: 4.7 oz without mounts, 6.8 oz with mounts
  • Length: 5.3 in.
  • Width: 1.7 in.
  • Height: 1.8 in.
  • Material: Anodized Aluminum
  • MSRP: $899 ($749 promo price)

Build Quality * * * * *
The RedRing is really a sight to behold. Absolutely beautiful build quality, solid controls, and a pleasing aesthetic appeal.

Instructions * * *
I scratched my head a couple times during the installation, but once I figured out the message, I got the RedRing installed in a matter of minutes. Once installed, things are solid and stayed that way through heavy 3” loads.

Overall Rating * * * *
I was pleased as punch about the RedRing. I’d like to see future revisions a little slimmer if possible, and the, ahem, price could certainly come down. But, from a pure performance standpoint, it works. And it works nicely.

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21 COMMENTS

  2. Purty nice, but $750?

    Might be better if you could adjust the ring for spread at various ranges, but still $750?? Think I’ll stick to the plain old bead on end of the barrel.

  4. I just literally recoiled in horror and made what can only be described as a guttural chocking/vomiting noise at the price.

    I mean sure, it’s cool, but not $749 cool.

    • I’m with Jeff. Not too often that reading something induces an actual physical reaction, but getting to the price made me cough a little.

  5. I manage to bust 20 or more clays out of 25. Most always shoot my limit on dove and quail…..think I will spend my $750 on a new firearm.

  6. You had me at “Hell yeah. It works great.”

    You lost me at “MSRP: $899 ($749 promo price)”

    I guess that makes me fickle. Or maybe just thrifty.

    • I’m right there with you. I really dislike the notion of “pay twice as much for your optic as you did for your gun”. Or, in my case, three times the price.

      • Well, twice is much makes sense in certain cases. A $1k Leupold on a $500 rifle when I’m trying to reach out and touch something at 350-500 yards? Maybe.

        An $800 holo-sight on a sub-$400 shotgun with a double-digit max range? Nah.

    • It’s not just you, Ralph. For $800, one can get a new gun… there’s some quality red dots that are $300 are less.

      So does making it a ring with an “auto sensor” make it worth $800? Hrmmm…

    • I just can’t spend 50% more on a red dot sight than I did on the Weatherby 20-gauge I’d be mounting it on. No matter how awesome the sight might be.

  8. Ive shot trap for years and never use the sights. On my trap gun the front sight was removed. True clay bird slayers know how to aim the gun without having sights interfere/

    • This. I shot skeet once and found the sights to be a hassle.
      I can see it being useful for turkey though; let’s you see what you’re looking at.

  11. Spend the $750 on a whack of clays and a few cases of shells to bust ’em with. After that much practice, who’d still need a scope?

  12. As someone who is used to spending high-dollars on optics, it’s not the price itself that is the issue. It’s the price relative to very high-quality, similarly made products like the Aimpoint Micro’s for my assault rifles. I.e. the same technology. Sure, $900 for an S&B Short-Dot would be a hell of a deal. But $900 for this is is flat-out insane.

    Let’s agree. The future is RDS. And the future is now. The younger and younger generation will grow up with RDS. And the older guys benefit greatly from it with aging eyes. But if I was inclined to put a RDS on a shotgun, why spend double on this? I could just figure out a how to get a micro on something and then have the ability to use it on other firearms. Why? Because the average shotgun owner shoots a couple times a year.

    Sure you can make the argument they are appealing to the rarefied market of the $25,000 Perazzi crowd. And those guys could buy a $900 RDS dedicated for their shotgun. But they won’t. Those guys won’t put a battery operated laser on their 25k and show up and The Grand American. And even if they did, how many would be sold? I guess few.

    The maker needs to seriously step-back and look at their business model here. Drop the price to a competitive level with the industry standards, and sell more of them. If not, they are doomed.

    Regards,
    Tacticaltshirts_REP
    http://www.tacticaltshirts.com

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