Burris AR-F3 Fast Fire III AR15 3 MOA Red Dot review
Way...
way back when I first started this crazy MajorPandemic.com testing
endeavor, one of my first reviews was the Burris Fast Fire II and loved
it. At that time it was the only quality automatic brightness red dot on
the market and it has continued to deliver flawless functioning in all
lighting conditions even today on my Mega Arms ultralight build. The
problem was that it did not come with a co-witness height riser and the
sight needed to removed from its base to change the battery. The result
was some pain to find just the right riser height and occasionally
rezeroing with a battery replacement.
Burris
had its ears to the ground and listened to customer feedback. A large
majority of customers were mounting the previous Fast Fire II to AR15
rifles and liked the extra armor “wings” the AR mount provided, but
hated the battery replacement thing and also not having a rise included.
Burris went one step further beyond curing this issues with some
creative solutions that no other manufacturer has offered on a red dot
projection sight.
FIT, FINISH, FEEL, FEATURES, & FUNCTION
Burris
updated the Fast Fire II with the new Fast Fire III 3 MOA version to
now include all the things users were asking for plus a few surprises
they did not know they needed. Burris fixed the bottom loading battery
with a top loading unit, but kept a lower cavity under the sight to
house a last ditch spare battery. Sure accessing it will require sight
removal from the base however at least you have a spare carried on
board. Burris also engineered the sight to key into the base, so even if
you do remove it to access that spare, you will still return to zero.
The
new AR-F3 mounts right up to either Weaver or Picatinny mounts. Burris
also integrated an AR15 specific co-witness height mount with the
armored protection wings everyone liked, so you not only get a perfect
height rise you have built in protection for the sight. Burris even went
one step further and provides a slip-on UV/Polarized sight cover which
offers further sight protection along with a sight hood that prevents
glare during very bright sunlight situations - many of the military
refer to this now as a sand shield.
Along
with the 3-MOA auto brightness red dot, Burris added three manual
levels on off-mode to assure you can tune the right auto-brightness
range and of course actually turn the power off when not in use.
Other
extras are on-board stored wrench to secure the sight on the rifle and a
combo Torq wrench/screwdriver tool to remove the Fast Fire III sight
and adjust the zero. You will never find yourself in need of the right
tool to tune your AR-F3. Carried over are the rugged steel body
construction, 100% waterproof case, and 1-year warranty.
I
mounted the Burris Fast Fire II AR-F3 sight to my Houlding Precision
Custom AR15 and set about zeroing. This is where another enhancement
surfaced - zeroing adjustment now also have detents. The old Fast Fire
II was painful to zero… really painful, like you wanted to throw the gun
down range painful. Thankfully the AR-F3’s zeroing adjustments now
gleefully clicks into each position which made zeroing as easy as
zeroing any scope. Once zero’ed at 25-meters and verifying zero at
100-yards, I was able bang away easily on the 300-yard 12” steel gong.
Over in a secluded tactical training bay I was able to set up left,
right, and forward targets and give the Burris AR-F3 a workout at short
distances. The biggest advantage I saw was that the sight offered far
more peripheral vision and field of view than typical tube red-dot
sights.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Burris
has answered the original complaints of the still extraordinarily
successful Fast Fire II with the updates delivered on the Fast Fire III
powered AR-F3. It has
SPECS
Style: Reflex
Magnification: 1x
Sight Window: 21mm x 15mm
Adjustment Range @ 100 yards: 190"
Reticle: 3 MOA Dot
Reticle color: Red
Housing material: Steel
Recoil resistance: 1000 G's
Battery Type: (1) CR1632 3V or (2) CR2016
Length: 1.8"
Weight: 0.9 oz.
Warranty: 1-year factory warranty
$299 Street Price
Burris Optics - http://www.burristactical.com
Houlding Precision AR15 As Featured - http://www.majorpandemic.com/2012/08/houlding-precision-custom-ar15-review.html
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