MARS- No not the planet

[Dikinalaska]

So I just got an offer that seems great from a friend on a ITL MARS (Multi-purpose Aiming Reflex Sight) optic. It's a reflex sight with a built-in cowitnessed visible laser. Meaning there's only one adjustment that adjusts them both and they stay POA together. I'd kind of like to be able to sight them for different distances, but I'm sure I could get over it. Anyway, to the point, has anyone had any experience with it? I can't find many reviews as it's a little pricey. But I got an offer that's pretty good and I know him very well so not worried about being ripped off.

Just a little about it-
The ITL MARS (Multi-purpose Aiming Reflex Sight) is a gun sight that combines two sighting devices, a reflex sight and a laser sight, as well as a backup iron sight. It is designed and produced by ITL Optronics company, based in Israel. The laser may be either visible or infrared and can be activated as need via a pressure switch. (from wikipedia)

It has an "umbilical" cord switch that when pressed turns off the red dot and turns on the laser. It runs off a single AA battery with the red dot getting 200 hours of battery life and the laser getting 10,000 uses at 5 seconds per use so somewhere around 830 minutes. It has a 1 MOA dot. It does have a very high mount, making BUIS useless unless you take it off, but it has quick-detach mounts so I wouldn't mind. Plus I've been looking for a reason to get 45* offsets anyway lol.

Here's a link to it at opticsplanet
http://www.opticsplanet.com/fraser-volpe-mars-multi-purpose-aiming-reflex-sight-red-wpic-adr.html

And here's it on the ITL(the manufacturer) website
http://www.itlasers.com/pdf/mars.pdf

If anyone can give me advice on this thing it would be greatly appreciated. Even if it's not experience, if there's anything you see that are pros/cons or maybe something I didn't think about let me know.

 

[Gunslinger808]

Honestly, for the price of that thing and what you want to do, I'd just get a regular reflex like an Aimpoint and a seperate LASER unit.
If you're going to pay over a Thousand dollars for something, you shouldn't have to comprimise.

 

[BadKarmaZeroSix]

Ditto...1000 is a lot to spend on less than proven quality and great customer reviews from numerous sources...u wanna gamble on a sub-100$ optic, most people wouldnt fault the logic in that...but unless u have limitless funds to play around with, i would go with the brands that have a track record and warranty to support that record should somethin be faulty...

 

[Dikinalaska]

Well it'd be a trade for an XD that I just have sitting on the shelf. I haven't even handled it other than some letter coloring I was toying with. And since he's a close friend, he gave me the option of trying it out a bit before we finalize it. I paid just over 400 for the XD. I figure it would be a trade up, which is usually the only way I trade. I was more seeing if anyone had experience or could see anything about it from their experiences with other optics since in the grand scheme of things I'm still pretty new to shooting. Only got my first AR a few years ago and only have experience with my Vortex Strikefire.

 

[Dikinalaska]

And I figure at what it retails for, if I don't like it I could most likely sell or trade it for what I paid for the XD.

 

[oneyeopn]

Dik...if you can try it, heck try it. I know that the technology has got to be out there and just because we dont know the company today doesnt mean one of the major manufacturers isnt ready to snatch the company up. I dont really like how high it is, I just pulled a red dot off of my Mini 14 for the same reason.

 

[Dikinalaska]

Dik...if you can try it, heck try it. I know that the technology has got to be out there and just because we dont know the company today doesnt mean one of the major manufacturers isnt ready to snatch the company up. I dont really like how high it is, I just pulled a red dot off of my Mini 14 for the same reason.

That's one of the downfalls I saw potentially. Does it make zeroing difficult? By that I guess I mean if you zero it at, say, 75 yards, will it affect POI at 25 yards more than something closer to the barrel? My thinking is that since its further off the bore it'll have to be set for a more specific range, as something like an EOTech would have a wider range.