Women’s Outdoor News and Avery Skipalis share tips on how to care for your pistol optic. This is the final video in our four-video series, which covers the benefits of, how to mount and zeroing in your pistol’s red dot.
Sponsored by GLOCK
It’s extremely important to care for your pistol optic by performing periodic maintenance, just as we do with our vehicles.
A pistol red dot is a piece of equipment that you may have to utilize to save your life someday. Therefore, you want to guarantee that you are taking the appropriate steps to ensure that it functions properly if you need to use it. This article will cover checking your optic mounting fasteners, products to use to clean your optic and changing your optic’s batteries.
A loose optic is not a reliable optic. If your optic becomes loose, it will not hold a zero. That’s why it’s important to inspect your optic mounting fasteners to verify that they’re still secure. An easy way to accomplish this is to visually inspect your witness marks to ensure that they’re still properly aligned. If they’re properly aligned, this confirms your fasteners have not backed out. If you’re not sure what witness marks are, please check out our video on mounting a pistol red dot.
Next, you’re not able to effectively engage a target if you’re not able to see it, right? This is why you want to always make sure that your optic lens is clean. When cleaning your optic, you should avoid harsh chemicals. Harsh chemicals can damage the optic coating. Instead, opt for a product designed specifically for cleaning optics, eyeglasses or a camera lens. Use a clean, soft cloth to avoid scratching any surfaces. Q-Tips are great for getting into those tough to reach areas. You can also apply an optic antifog treatment to your lens to prevent fogging.
Another area to keep clean and free of debris is the emitter area. If this area becomes blocked, you will lose your red dot.
Finally, you should periodically change out your optic battery. Although battery life varies depending on the optic, it’s a best practice to swap out the batteries annually. Batteries are fairly cheap and this is an added, low-cost insurance policy to ensure your optic is always ready to be deployed. It’s best to swap out your batteries on an important day, such as your birthday or a holiday. This will make it less likely that you to forget to change them. You could also set a reminder in your phone.
Following the tips that we shared can ensure that you keep your optic in great shape.
Avery Skipalis is the owner of Skip’s Tactical Solutions, an organization that focuses on empowering women, men and children to make sure that no one else becomes a victim. She gained her firearms experience from the military where she’s been a military firearms instructor for 10.5 years. She’s also a certified NRA rifle and pistol instructor and Glock Advanced Armorer since 2015. She’s attended Sig Sauer Academy, FNH, Special Operations Command Armorers courses as well as multiple Advanced Shooting Schools across the United States. She resides in Florida with her husband and 2 kids. She’s currently serving in the United States Air Force and loves sharing her passion with others. She thinks it’s important that women also feel like they’re in control of their own safety. View all posts by Avery Skipalis
