I received these back-up iron sights (BUIS) to test and review, which was quite timely because I was looking to add iron sights to my Ruger Precision Rimfire which I’ll cover in another article. These are pretty generic AR-style flip-up iron sights. You’ve seen these BUIS designs sold under a variety of US brands including Troy Industries, Midwest Industries, etc. I believe the design originated from Heckler & Koch, though I can’t be certain of this?
This design has been copied by Chinese EOMs and sold under countless brands like Feyachi, CVLife, Marmot, and many more brands you’ve never heard of, like Nelahol. Despite not knowing anything about this brand, I went under the assumption that they’re all made by the same handful of factories using the same copies of CNC milling specs. The only difference is the quality of the screws and aluminum stamped components. Plus, they were fairly inexpensive and covered the Amazon no-fault return so I figured I had nothing to lose trying it out.
The BUIS came in a thin black plastic case. Inside were the the front and rear sights and an allen wrench. No instructions and no branding.
On close inspection, they seemed well machined. No blems on the finish, pits or unfinished edges of the parts. The spring loaded flip-up sights deployed without issue. The front was an A1 AR-style post and the rear was a 2-position CQB and small aperture peep sight. The rear windage peep sights are finger adjustable with tactile positive indexed clicks.
Like most HK-style BUIS, the sights and spring loaded and lock in the elevated position, when flipped up. A small side pun near the hinge is pressed to unlock the sight. The sights may be pushed down flat against the hand guard/receiver providing a very low profile when not in use (hence the their use as ‘back-up’ sights to red dots and other optics).
The bases mount to Picatinny rails with enough clearance to rock them onto a slot. They required a bit of extra finger torque to clamp down solidly on my rail. I suspect the screws could use a bit of lock-tite to keep them from loosening.
I zero’d and tested them at 25yrds and found the sights were repeatable and didn’t lose zero in a limited sample of 50rnds. My only issue was that the front sight pin’s screw lacked sufficient clearance around it to use my AR sight tool to seat them below the base of the screw well. The need for that depression was specific to my Ruger RPR and may not effect most AR users.
I was fortunate that this brand put out very workable BUIS that do the job for an affordable price. Are they as durable or rugged as German-made HK sights or similar US made sights; probably not. But for your average home owner who wants a BUIS for their home-defense gun that will probably only see range use, this should work.
These sights are available on Amazon through my Affiliate link: https://amzn.to/3z7swYH
Nelahol Flip up sight 15% discount code: IAPVCX7K
