Going Green
A few folks have asked what the big deal is about CrimsonTrace starting to make LaserSights with a green laser. The big deal is daytime visibility. On a bright, sunny day, a red laser can difficult to see, which would make acquiring a target more difficult. The green lasers draw your eyes almost instantly in bright daylight.
The con of the green laser is battery usage. They go through them much quicker. I have four red lasers and they all still have the original batteries. Not sure a green one would have lasted that long. Also, tactical Tommies, operators and mall ninjas will say that the green laser is easier to track back to the source and the bad guys can figure out where you’re at. I can see how this would be of concern if you were operating covertly in some place ending in -istan. But for those of us who carry a gun for self-defense, people will already know where you are because it will be the spot the bullets are coming from.
Sadly, their green model won’t be out until next year. And I need one for my Buy A Gun day purchase, which I’ve been meaning to take a picture of.
April 17th, 2012 at 9:51 am
The visibility thing is one reason I have not got behind the crimson trace.
Batteries and switches being the other things.
I’ve shot some guns with crimson trace grips and seeing the dot in sunshine is difficult at best.
April 17th, 2012 at 9:59 am
“But for those of us who carry a gun for self-defense, people will already know where you are because it will be the spot the bullets are coming from.”
And the screaming.
I haven’t been as concerned as some about the daytime visibility thing because, statistically, most caps get busted into asses after dark.
April 17th, 2012 at 10:06 am
I would prefer the green laser. That way the mall-ninjas can trace it back to the bad guy who has shot me with my own gun…so I am told.
April 17th, 2012 at 10:23 am
Or, you could post the pics, and let us imadion it with a laser.
April 17th, 2012 at 10:25 am
g, I can’t type ‘fer shit.
April 17th, 2012 at 10:59 am
Who uses a laser in the daytime when you can see the actual sights? If you do not aim in the daytime, you should not be pulling the trigger.
The Ninjas will cry out, “But…but…the bad guy can SO CLOSE that you cannot get a proper sight picture and the dot on their belly will save you!”
To whit I say, “then you are close enough to see the red light on your gun.”
I got a CT laser or two and like them, especially for dry fire to verify a steady hand on trigger squeeze. And they are fun when it gets dark. Don’t get me wrong. Green is good, too. But I cannot imagine this being a big “tactical” upgrade. More of a preference.
April 17th, 2012 at 12:06 pm
As for the Mall, who can possible track-back the laser light with all the other Mall reflections and window displays and perfumes and the music blaring?
And how, with all that crap in a mall, unless you’re actually using the sights, do you *know* the laser-dot is actually touching what you’re pointing-at and not reflection off a sales-display off Blu-Ray/DVD’s or a shimmmering earring kiosk-collection, or a pile of MIRACLE-GREEN pots and pans?
April 17th, 2012 at 1:25 pm
The military has lasers that can only be seen with certain lenses. You could be staring directly at the point of impact on the target and see nothing, but the sniper 1000 yds away sees the dot on the target through his scope.
April 17th, 2012 at 1:26 pm
Green lasers got popular because the troops in Iraq found them useful.
Why did the troops in Iraq find them useful? Because a green laser beam on an AR pointed at a vehicle was a handy way to break through the communications’ problems with Iraqi civilians. The green laser said “Stop the car” in hundreds of different languages and dialects.
So the next time I need to set up a roadblock, I’ll use a green laser myself. Otherwise, I am happy without.
April 17th, 2012 at 1:35 pm
Just mount a Spyder Arctic III and be done with it. You can acquire the target quicker when it combusts.
April 17th, 2012 at 1:38 pm
Leapers has a $90 green laser I would like to try as a range toy on my .410 Saiga.
Oleg was explaining to some people at the NRA Con how lasers can be used to train new shooters.
(Let me pick that name up off the floor.)
April 17th, 2012 at 1:58 pm
If they aren’t coming out til next year, I would be they are working on size and testing different battery tech to find best battery life. Lithium of some sort maybe?
April 17th, 2012 at 3:16 pm
So in the mall, if the laser bounces… does the bullet?
😉
April 17th, 2012 at 5:05 pm
Only from a very highly-mirrored surface
April 17th, 2012 at 8:27 pm
The green laser was almost TOO bright… just my .02 worth…
April 17th, 2012 at 8:48 pm
Bearing in mind that I don’r know anything about laser sighting, I do wonder – we (like most vertebrates) learn quite early to associate red with blood/danger and are thus quicker to focus on it than other colors, so is there another advantage to green? Other than it seeming to be the laser-of-choice for the idiots who try to blind pilots, which may be because green lasers are brighter or cheaper.
April 18th, 2012 at 3:20 am
The human eye is most sensitive to light at 555nm for a given power level (capped at 5mW for this general-use class of laser), which is close to the 532nm of green lasers. Ergo, it’s dot is more visible.
April 18th, 2012 at 10:54 am
OK, one advantage to green over red is daytime education and trigger discipline practice. Taking new shooters out and showing them ‘the flinch’ before they ever fire a gun is something I like to do. The green would make things more visible on the bright days.