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Since you aren't using the irons to co-witness; just zero the scope as normal and don't touch the irons.

Carry-a-Kimber wrote:Since you aren't using the irons to co-witness; just zero the scope as normal and don't touch the irons.

Exactly. However, with the center of bore of the scope mounted that high above the center of bore of the barrel, you're going to likely use up a good chunk of your available range of elevation adjustment just getting it to zero at 100 yards.

TxLobo wrote:ok.. input desired..

since I'm fairly new to the AR platform, I started used.. then the sucker grew.. I now have 2.. (thanks Old Cannon) ..

so my question is this.

I have an A2 (carry handle upper) and I want to put a scope on it. I have an older Bushnell that was on my mini 14 for years and harvested many deer and critters.. so I know the scope is good enough..

I purchased one of the bars that sits inside the handle and allows the scope to be mounted on top, but how do you sight it in? ..

Iron sights are good.. the scope is 8 to 10 inches high.. just use Kentucky windage?

Here are some other suggestions:

Finding somebody who will let you use his laser boresighter will save a lot of time if you can do that.

If not, most gunsmiths will do that for you for a reasonable fee.

From that point, you should be able to fine tune it with live fire pretty easily.

Another alternative would be to take it to a range that offers live fire sighting in. It's a bit more expensive, but a very simple turnkey solution that gets you real close to where you need to be .

TxLobo wrote:ok.. would you recommend going with a red dot on the A2 style instead of a magnified scope?

Actually, I don't recommend mounting a scope or a red dot on top of a carry handle. It just puts the sight too high above the bore. If your carry handle were removable, I would just take it off and mount your optic and some flip up sights on the top rail. If it is NOT removable and you are dead set on adding an optic of some sort—"red dot" or otherwise—then I would swap out the plastic handguard for a cheap UTG rail (about $70 or $80) and mount a red dot forward of the carry handle, at a height that would allow you to co-witness the red dot with the iron sights.

But truthfully, I don't think that is a better solution than mounting something way up high on top of a carry handle. If this were my carbine, I would swap out the rear peep sight and the front sight post for units that have a tritium insert, and I would leave the rest of it alone. My guess is that a set of tritium inserts for your existing iron sights would cost you a lot less than the combined cost of mounting a scope up high, or swapping out the handguard for a rail, and then adding a red dot sight..........which may or may not work (I've never actually tried that).

There is a place in this world for fixed carry handles on AR15s, and they have very useful and accurate sights. People shoot matches with them for heaven's sake. But, their very obvious shortcoming is that they don't lend themselves well to other types of sighting system add-ons.....except for tritium replacement parts which are designed for that specific use and are very well received.

If I were to ever buy a carry handle AR, it would be a removable one mounted on a flat top A4 receiver. I honestly don't know if that represents a price point increase or not. There is definitely a market for fixed carry handle receivers, but my opinion, such as it is, is that they are not as useful for the civilian market as an A4 receiver precisely because of these types of limitations.

Don't take this as a slap at your gun. I'm sure it is a perfectly fine weapon for what it is designed to do. MY answer, which might or might not sit well with any significant others in your life ( ) would be to use this as the perfect excuse to buy another AR with A4 receiver, and use the current one as the perfect truck gun.

Here is some info about tritium replacement parts for A2 sights: http://www.midwayusa.com/find?userSearc ... +AR+sights

I'm rseearching scopes now as well.

I'm looking at the following brands

Vortex
Nikon
Leupold

If you replace the hanguards with rails you could offset a large red dot on the rails. I have a scope mounted on my SCAR offset to the left so the BUIS is not blocked. I dont like the scope to sit high enough to clear the BUIS, too far from the bore. One semi wild option is a handgun scope mounted offset on the front rails, they have a long eye relief so that might work. I agree with the others that handle mounted is simply too far from the bore.