LaserLyte Center Mass green laser

[Guest Lester Weevils]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GIauYF_f6k

 

I really like the idea of this product. I don't have a shotgun but am thinking this would be great for my bad eye, attached to the PLR-16 pistol, for short range up to 25 or 50 yards. Green lasers are much brighter for one thing, and a cluster of dots (with the center dot brightest) should be easier to visually acquire. I've never tried a green laser on gun, though have a nice green laser for telescope aiming. It would be easier to acquire a bright green dot than a dim red dot. I have to go "looking" for a red dot except at nighttime, which kinda defeats the purpose of having a no-brainer easy to acquire sight.

 

One review says that the Center Mass product's beam spread makes it dimmer than a single-dot green laser, which would make sense assuming all the good ones typically output no more than 5 mw. Now given a stronger laser, the cluster of dots ought to be brighter than a typical single dot 5mw.

 

From what i've been able to find of the product info, the cluster is apparently not adjustable. It would be great if the lens had a twist ring to adjust the cluster size to taste. Using it on a .223 pistol I'd probably prefer a "fist sized" cluster of dots at 25 yards, which would only be coin-sized close up, but even a coin sized dot at close range ought to be easier to acquire than a "less than BB" size conventional dot. From reading and watching some videos, it looks like the pattern might be larger than a paper plate at 25 yards, which makes sense for shotgun. But with a pistol, I'd hate for the cluster to be so big that maybe you light up the target with a couple of the peripheral dots and "in the heat of the moment" mistake one of the peripheral dots for the center dot, if the cluster is so big that "only a few of the dots" in the cluster will fit on a man-sized target at distance.

 

Supposedly this gadget is identical to LaserLyte's rifle green laser, except for the addition of a beam-splitter lens. I bet a beam-splitter lens could be added to about any green laser, except it might be difficult for a home amateur to make one small enough to split the "tiny width" beam when mounted immediately in front of the laser. Maybe for do-it-yourself it would be easier to build a beam spreader rather than beam splitter. Maybe a person could "get in the ballpark" getting ahold of a few hard plastic contact lenses and try grinding facets on the cheap contact lens? Or maybe find a sacrificial short-focal-length telescope eyepiece (which tend to use fairly small-diameter lenses). Cannibalize the lenses out of the eyepiece and see if one or two of the lenses could make a beam spreader.

Edited December 20, 2012 by Lester Weevils