Romeo 4

[buckey]

Not wanting to step on someone else's thread so I thought I start another, I to have been thinking about a red dot sight and was looking at a Sig Romeo 4 and was wondering can a guy trust red dots in this price range? Not everyone has $4oo. plus to drop on a Aimpoint PRO so what is the best bang for the buck when you consider that when you pull it out to use you may really need it to save your bacon! I'd love to have a PRO but at the same time I wonder how much real difference there is in Sigs, Vortex and PA sights. For you guy's that are hard on stuff tell me how your Non PRO's have held up and what you would trust.
Thanks,

[turtlehead]

Hard to beat this for the price and lifetime wartanty. https://www.primaryarms.com/primary-...-base-md-rb-ad

[ADIDAS69]

Primary Arms put their Romeo 4s and 5s on sale i bought 2 of each and have 2 of the bushnell trophy red dots. I’ve used them on shotguns and ARs and have discovered no fatal flaws that would make me not buy another of any of them. I have looked through the higher price point and used ones in a higher price point. The primary advantage to the higher price point optics is fidelity of the point of aim adjustment and temperature durabilities for both extremes. If you’re not a full time door kicker the R4 will work great.

[ADIDAS69]

Side note the red dots are on sale again at present. Mine were purchased a fair few months back. My experience is based on just shy of 8000 rounds fired.

[buckey]

Looked at the Romeo 4 Thursday at a police supply shop and thought the price was $179.00 with a dot and quick detach mount, add another $30. and you get a dot and a circle. $409 would get you a Aimpoint PRO, so the question I keep asking my self is by doubling the money do I get twice the sight?

[DPI7800]

If it is going to sit in a safe 99% of the time I’ll say that it will be 99% reliable. If that gun with the red dot spends most of its life bouncing around in the back of a vehicle then your reliability is probably going to drop dramatically if it is not a an Aimpoint or equivalent product. My Aimpoint PRO has been bouncing around in the back of a vehicle for over 2 1/2 years now and no issues, it turns on every time and has not lost zero or loosened up.

I’ve been running Aimpoints for over 20years now and only had one crap out on me. That one I that crapped out was the very first one I bought and it was used off of someone else’s race gun. That person put god only knows how many tens of thousands of rounds through it and then I did the same thing on my race gun, put tens of thousands or rounds through it. So I got my monies worth and have no complaints for how much it got used.

I always apply the buy once cry once theory and I have not been upset by doing that yet.

[marine6680]

The Sig Romeo 4m was approved for use by the FBI, but that sight was close to $400.

A lot of the PA stuff is made by the same people that make the holosun and Sig optics.

Sig supposedly had a different design for their nicer stuff, but the basic Romeo 5 is pretty much the same as a holosun and the older PA red dot model on the inside.

The new PA model with rotary knob control is not made by the same factory. It has some internal strengthening and reliability enhancement done to it.


For home defense use, the PA with rotary knob will be more than enough for that role. It may be able to handle some light duty roles, but no track record or testing to show that it can. PA stuff is generally pretty tough though.


I would trust an Aimpoint PRO for hard use, so if you want a hard use optic that is the lowest cost option that I have full faith in.

Glass clarity, general toughness and solid build quality are one aspect of a nicer optic, but you also get less parallax error and a more refined dot projection system.

There are tangible gains with spending the extra money.

[ADIDAS69]

https://youtu.be/Fuq_N129SAI

[ADIDAS69]

Whatch the whole vid or skip to the end he shoots it with a shotgun and the sight still works and holds zero. The sig Romeo 4 or 5 will do just fine

[ADIDAS69]

And he froze it in a block of ice

[buckey]

Wow, Not to bad! What a great place to come if you need help. Still not sure what I need but I'm learning fast.
Thanks

[Skadoosh]

Originally Posted by turtlehead

Hard to beat this for the price and lifetime wartanty. https://www.primaryarms.com/primary-...-base-md-rb-ad

I would buy the PA Advanced Micro before the Sig Romeo. The PA MD-ADS is a great optic: has 50K hour battery life, is plenty tough and costs less than $200 including the mount.

[marine6680]

Here is the thing about those kinds of torture testing.


They are not scientific, they are a sample size of one, and the biggest downside...

They look more impressive than they are.


Freezing the optic show that it can handle water and winter... Put that optic in water that is sealed in a metal container, with little or no air, and well... Ice can break open solid steel sphere containers with walls that are very think. In an open container, the expanding nature of ice outs less strain on the optic than some think it does. But it does put a little pressure on the optic.

I look at those tests as simply showing the ability to handle a few feet of water, and winter time conditions.


Next the shotgun... These tests use birdshot... This stuff has relatively low energy and momentum per pellet, it is the combined effort of all the pellets spread out that make the optic get moved any significant distance.

When you calculate out the energies involved, the gforces that the optic survives is basically the same as a decent fall on to concrete.

So yeah it all looks impressive, but it's just visual entertainment.

What you can learn from such a test is that the optic in question can handle falls into a hard surface, water and cold... At least once.

So yeah... The optic is probably tough enough to handle most situations you can throw at it.

Now... If the electronics inside can tolerate the abuse repeatedly... That is the question. How many times smacking the optic into a barricade or wall will it handle before it fails.

So I do look at these optics in the $150-200 price point to be fine for home defense needs. They won't get banged around constantly, and can handle a drop or knock against something hard in the home no sweat.

For duty use... Or other hard use .. or even speculative hard use... I want something with a proven track record.

[buckey]

I guess the real question is will the Sig Romeo 4 stand up to including SHTF? I don't have a clue and have 0 time looking through a red dot, I don't plan on leading a charge just plan on keeping what's mine mine and my family safe.

[marine6680]

The Romeo 4?

Depends on what you consider SHTF.

A temporary loss of law and order due to a natural disaster, so you have to worry about a couple weeks of lack of relief efforts, which leads to some people getting desperate enough to try to steal from others... Sure.

Zombies, nuclear winter, asteroid end of world type situations where you are under long term threat under harsh conditions... Maybe not.


Really it's hard to say, as the Romeo 4 series are supposed to be higher end models over the Romeo 5.

But there is no track record or serious testing to show what it can handle. The specs are not as favorable as the Aimpoint PRO, as far as environmental hazards are concerned.

If I had to choose to spend $350 on the Romeo 4, and $425 on a PRO... I would choose the PRO. The PRO is based on the COMP 2. An older model of the current COMP 4.

If I could get the Romeo 4 for $200, and I wasn't looking for war zone rugged... Sure.

The PA red dot that has been mentioned before, that would also fit that use case as well.

[buckey]

That's kinda what we're looking at about 2 bills, half of what the PRO is.

[Jagrbomb]

I had a Sig Romeo 4c before. I had gotten a PS90 again in the summer of 2016, and I thought the the on/off feature on the Romeo was pretty cool. And, I loved the reticle. Reminded me a bit of the Eotech....

First, it had bad reflections off the red coating on the glass.. I hated it. I had it all the time. It was basically caused whenever there was light behind me (reflecting off the red coating on the glass or reflections in the tube). It also had an odd shape that kept changing. Then, I finally figured out that is was the light coming past the side/back of my head, when I had the gun shouldered.So, depending on how I held the gun, the red splotch would change.

Even outside, I got it. Didn't matter if the sun was up above in the sky, and not behind me. It happened ALL the time. I called Sig - I was told that it depended on the specific specimen I had - some suffered from reflections off this coating more than other ones did....

Also, the damn mounting screw snapped when I used the smaller (included) mount to put it on my PS90. Now, I have bought tons of cheap scope rings over the years - I used them to secure flashlights to carbines. I NEVER had a mounting screw snap like that. I ha dnot even tightened it very much...

I ended up returning the optic and bought an Aimpoint Micro T1. After all that mess, I decided to just get something I could trust and be done with it...

[buckey]

Starting to think that a Leopold 1X4 scope might be a better choice? Other then low light when a shotgun might be better? Trying not to over think this and was told at the police Supply store that LEO's were buying the Romeo 4 for duty use. Too many choices and way too much time on my hands (I shoot at the range 4 times a week) to figure out what will work.

[agtman]

Have the Romeo5 mounted on a 16" .308 and so far it's held up.

I did keep the factory mount in the box in favor of installing the unit on an ADM low-pro Q.D. mount. After about 400-rds fired the 200-yd zero is still good.

[Fishbed77]

Not everyone has $4oo. plus to drop on a Aimpoint PRO so what is the best bang for the buck when you consider that when you pull it out to use you may really need it to save your bacon!

The Aimpoint PRO is still your best bang for the buck.

[buckey]

When's the last time there was a great deal on a Aimpoint PRO and where is the best place to look?

[marine6680]

If you go to Larue or American Defense Manufacturing, they sell the PRO as a combo with their respective QD mount.

Not likely the cheapest places, but you can get a superior mount for close to the same money as the average price online.

The factory QD mount works just fine, but the attachment knob is a bit bulky. Some say it can work loose with time, and that you should check it regularly. I never seen that, but I didn't like the knob sticking out so I replaced it.

Looking around at places online, like Midway, Brownell's, optics planet, PSA, and Primary Arms, you will likely find it on sale at some point for around or maybe even under $400.

Optics planet has 5% off coupons that are always good. Various YouTube channels have the codes in their videos they do on optics. The codes are easy to find with a search as well.

If you truly want duty grade reliability, the PRO is the lowest cost proven option.


The Romeo 4 is the nicer of the Sig micro RDS, but has no track record. If it is significantly different internally over there Romeo 5, then it very well could be a very rugged optic. And if it can be had for the $200-250 range with real duty grade performance, then awesome. It doesn't have the same high level of environmental resistance as the PRO though. The PRO can handle more extreme temps and much higher water pressure.

If the Romeo 4 isn't much different internally from the Romeo 5 series, then I am not sure why you would pick it over other options at the $200-250 price point. I suggest the PA advanced micro RDS with knob illumination control for $175 total w/ AR mount as a viable lower cost option. They have explained the upgrades and reliability improvements on other forums, seeing as their older model was already pretty rugged and reliable, the improvements only make it better. It has similar water protection rating as the Sig does... At the price, I don't think you will find a significantly better optic until you get to the PRO. So I look at itaseither spend $175 on the PA or jump to the PRO at $425... Anything in between falls outside of a sensible cost to performance ratio. They just don't have enough improvement in performance to justify the increased cost until the PRO.

The zero adjustments are well protected in the Romeo series. So it may be worth a bit more to you to have that. It is also entirely possible that the optical quality of the Romeo 4 is better than the PA and therefore worth the extra cost.

Unfortunately, there are no tests to show if that is the case.

[agtman]

The Romeo 4 is the nicer of the Sig micro RDS, but has no track record. If it is significantly different internally over there Romeo 5, then it very well could be a very rugged optic. And if it can be had for the $200-250 range with real duty grade performance, then awesome. It doesn't have the same high level of environmental resistance as the PRO though. The PRO can handle more extreme temps and much higher water pressure.

Huh?

Dude, focus. I paid like, $140 for the Sig Romeo5, and it's held up.

Am I jumping outta planes over Fallujah or Afghanistan? ... No.

Am I fighting Zombie hordes coming down my street, or sniping at those 'Falling Skies'-type aliens as they beam into my backyard and crawl up on my well-groomed deck? ... Well, not yet.

Get the Romeo5, and call it good.

Think of it as the working-man's/poor-man's H-1/T-1.

I'm sure Travis & Chris wouldn't fault you.

[marine6680]

You haven't been paying attention...

The OP wants an RDS. He has been a bit back and forth on exactly what he wants from the sight. With how much performance he wants.

The Romeo 5 is likely to handle most things just fine... But if you claim you want an RDS that can survive in harsh conditions serious training courses, preper end of the world conditions...

Well... I wouldn't trust the Romeo 5 for that.

As a civilian, most don't need that level of performance. The potential end of the world is a highly unlikely thing. At most a three day carbine course where you really bang around the rifle is the hardest use any of us will put a rifle and optic through.

But... If you want that level in an RDS, there is a minimum that you have to get to. Practical or not, likely to need it or not... The minimum is the PRO, anything less is questionable. Mostly due to not having any testing or track record of actual hard use.

Sure, the Romeo series and the PA option may work just fine in hard use... But we don't have a lot of data available to go by.

[buckey]

I have been paying attention and at the moment I'm thinking where in the heck can a guy go and get this much info to help make a good choice? A good point that's been made is the Sig Romeo4 doesn't have a long track record to judge it buy, does it mean it won't hold up, no clue. So what where does that leave us? ask a lot of silly questions and listen to what people have to say then take your chances. Remember at one time the Aimpoint PRO didn't have much of a track record too and we now know how that turned out. Sometimes you just have to pay the fiddler and take your chances.