G36 - Bundeswehr Hensoldt Dual Optic

thank you for tuning into an episode of in-range you see on the table in front of me today at t 36 tommy built g36 clone this one is on loan to us from a very generous viewer Steven and this one is built from an actual German parts kit German barrel German internals henselt dual optic sighting system and that's unusual most of the time he built guns now are completely American parts unless they're specifically contracted to be built off of German parts as a result this gets me the ability to test what is the closest to a true German g36 that I could here in the United States right now we've already done some videos on this with the mud test in which the rifle platform itself was formed more than admirably in the in range mud test which was superb and I did do a heat stress test in which I believed proved that the gun under heat stress does not lose its zero as some of the lore and claims have asserted but let's get into the history of this a little bit and we're gonna have future videos where I'm going to dissect that gun closer but really what I want to talk to you today is about the Hensel sighting system which is actually part of the more interesting part of the adaptation project project of this rifle so in 1996 West Germany and East Germany was United at that point and the reality was that East Germany had significant financial needs after being under the communist regime for a long time and the g11 project was scrapped by what was originally West Germany due to the cost and expenditure involved to be able to help support what was now a reunited Germany and out of that came the g36 project it's a very forward-leaning design mostly polymer very lightweight and more futuristically leaning than anything on this particular design was the hensoldt optic which we have right here it's a dual optic the idea being a red dot sight above and a 3x scope below and we've seen this before with things like Trijicon ACOG Zander arm are on top but this is an attempt by the Bundeswehr to supply this sighting system to every soldier with the rifle not the DMR is not the specific individuals but to everyone and that was very forward-leaning and what we one of the things i've said here on in range is that as long as you have a decent service rifle which by the way the g36 is absolutely a superb service rifle has a platform or like an ak74 and m4 really the the sighting system on it matters in many ways much more than the rifle itself and little economic differences don't differences don't apply much as long as your sighting system is good robust and consistent and in 1996-97 this was very forward-leaning and now in 2020 this is beyond out-of-date but here's the challenge the reality is this I finally got the chance to take this rifle out on the clock at a to gun action challenge match and and that's an environment where I believe you don't find things out that you will find out at the square range unless you're under time stress and duress but putting this gun on the clock continued to prove to me that the service rifle itself the g36 platform is excellent no problems with the trigger ergonomics the handling was superb however the sight leaves a lot to be desired and I wonder if this site and some of the things around the site are the actual origins of the lore and problems but our problems received with g36 in the field but first of all let's go ahead and get into the scope itself so let's take a closer look at the hensoldt dual optic for the g36 this is the red dot this is the 3x magnified optic if you do not have a battery you can actually open this lid and you can use ambient light for fiber-optic fulfillment of the red dot sight so this will work without a battery as long as there's sufficient ambient light to charge it open close very much Trijicon influence in that regard this is the switch to turn it off it is currently at 0 4 off and then the line is on you get to settings on or off there are no brightness settings no rheostat nothing like that you either have a red dot or you don't and it's on or off that said if the red dot is not bright enough for your current situation you actually push the button in and that up powers powers up the red dot a little more for 30 seconds which gives you a brighter red dot for 30 seconds when you press that button in if you need it to be at that brightness setting for the entire duration of your engagement I guess you just have to keep pushing that button turn it off battery compartment is right here on the left all we do is turn this well thought out is captured and it uses a double a lithium battery zero adjustment is as follows elevation windage there are no clicks you merely turn it it just turns so pretty much the best thing to do is to put this in a vise shoot at a target and then move the dock to where you actually impacted elevation on the top when did you on the right the 3x magnified scope has no other settings besides elevation adjustment and windage adjustment so why don't there is a mini ipsec steel target at 50 meters and we're gonna move behind the site and you can see how much this site obscures your view in general it's huge absolutely huge so when you're behind this trying to use both eyes open is very difficult and it absolutely clouds your ability to see what you're trying to aim at let's see if we can actually see through the red dot sight and this is the view through the red dot with the mini IPSec in field of view so you can see how tiny that field of view actually is and you can see the blue hue as well which is indicative of very early red dots in general and cheap ones by modern standards all right let me see if we can get a picture through the magnified optic for you you and for comparison here's the same view through an ACOG pretty a big difference a big difference indeed all right that's all fine so before I go out to the to gun match I get this thing out to the range and I zero it it not bird per the Bundeswehr specifications but for what I wanted to do it to gun a zero the red dot at 50 meters and I zero the 3x optical sight at 100 meters because my range is that my match are typically 50 meters and in and 200 meters in in and I didn't need a 100 meter zero a red dot and a 200 meter optical it shouldn't shouldn't matter the idea was I'd use the red dot for the closed targets snap targets and the optically or the 3 X enhanced sight for the longer range smaller targets and I get out there on the range knowing that I have done a perfect zero and the first stage that we shoot is the 200-yard stage with some of them little mini up 6 at 200 yards and at 100 yards and initially everything starts going fine and then things start going not fine and I start losing the ability to hit the target with well-placed clean shots that I knew I called properly something was going awry so I have to learn to hold off pretty much to the right of the target it was like windage drift occurred and I had then had to aim somewhere in the dirt they hit the target to the left of what I was aiming at using the 3x scope for the entire duration of that stage I was able to complete the stage but it was troublesome [Music] all right fine I'm not planning on using the magnified scope for the rest of the day the rest of the day is going to be a red dot sight for the other two stages I get out there and on one of the stages I'm not having a problem and pretty much clean it pretty well and interestingly during a VTEC stage which are all these interest difficult little positions to aim through I actually found the site height of this to be almost an advantage going on your chin when you get low under the barricade and have to turn the gun actually was a really easy way to get a sight picture and hit targets in these weird awkward positions so there is some advantage to some of that off that really high site red dot sight not enough advantages that I would want to keep it as my consistent solution however but that started that went pretty well but then the other stage which was at 50 yards and in started having problems hitting the target again with now the red dot and I have to aim at two o'clock to the right and above the target to be able to hit it once again aiming in the dirt to be able to hit a target below and left where the red dot should be hitting no problem with the zero that I have put on it and the gun was absolutely not under any heat stress these were relatively low round count stages the gun was kept in the shade throughout the duration of the day it was by no means the heat stress that this gun experienced in the heat stress test that I put on in range previously and it made me realize I wonder if a lot of the lore and problems that have been coming about about heat etc with the g36 has nothing to do with the heat or very little to do with it are very little to do with barrel flex and the reality is this sighting system was a little bit too ahead of its time and I don't think I'm wondering now this is a sample of one and by the way these dual optic henselt sights here in the US if you can get one go for fifteen hundred dollars they're collectors items and as well as the Bundeswehr has been pretty much getting rid of them and moving to more modern sighting systems I think they realized there's an issue here with this optic and while this idea was good in on paper and practice it is not the the eye relief is extremely short for the 3x optical about here which is a challenge especially when wearing shooting protection or maybe a helmet or glasses and the red dot sight the tube is so narrow that you keeping both eyes open which is how you should use a red dot or reflex sight for quick snap shooting I found to be difficult this gigantic blob of sight in front of you obscures so much of your peripheral vision that it I did not it was hard for me to look through the sight and just focus on the target I actually found it easier to use the red dot dot red dot sight on this pencil - dual optic by closing my secondary eye and using my prominent eye to aim through it as though it was a magnified optic so perhaps that's what they're looking for but that's not how I would want to traditionally use a red dot sight but more importantly was what happened with my zero I know that I had a perfect zero coming into this match and by the end of the match I had a problem and being at requiring to aim off to the target is not a good thing especially in the field where you're not getting people telling you hey you're missing to the left or missing to the right that's not how that works when you're snap shooting at an enemy combatant so if you're missing with the g36 with the original Bundeswehr dual optic configuration i'm gonna go ahead and say that i suspect but the problem had nothing to do with heat and I suspect the problem had a lot to do with the henselt dual optic sighting system Tommy built here in the US is building other clones of this made out of completely American parts and he did something that may have rectified the problem one of the things we looked at at the match was that this is a polymer receiver polymer carry handle fit and so this is not a Picatinny rail but think of it as such and this slides on and then is bolted down with these three screws which are tightened down to keep it tight but with polymer and polymer if you actually just use your hands and with this very heavy very tall optic you can actually flex the way the site sits on the lower receiver because the polymer moves and that's what polymer is designed to do it's flexing so so Carl focus on the the area between the receiver where the optic interface is in the charging handle you can see the amount of flex there and that is certainly enough to cause the deflection otago think about this every time the bolt slams home this is shifting there's a good chance that that's happening while you're shooting the gun what Tommy bolt did is he has he has a aluminum billet rail that makes the sight mounting system the same or nor height to what you would see on a traditional rifle it actually steps down and I have an EOTech on that one right now but it's a really tight fit you actually have to hammer it onto the rail and then screw it down in two separate places that doesn't flex at all I'm gonna test that later but I suspect that that probably mitigates the problem anyways in conclusion if you're interested in the g36 I would say it's a fantastic rifle and weapon platform and I would encourage you to continue your interest in it whatever that means if you are a collector and you need to have the henselt dual optic scope to have that original Bundeswehr configuration in your collection go for it however I'm going to tell you that this optic is a nightmare probably always was a nightmare and would continue to be and I work for anyone trying to use it in practicality in the field I would advise against it and I strongly suspect that a lot of the rumor and lore about the g36 rifle in the combat conditions has nothing to do with the rifle and everything to do with this right here guys thank you for tuning into an episode of in range it is a completely viewer supported project we do not take any funding from any advertisers and those sponsors really this is only spot funded by viewers like you the PBS model you get to decide if in rain stays alive or not if you already are a patreon supporter thank you it allows us to do testing with all the ammunition that we expended on this 2d 336 as well as purchasing a tee 36 for other testing all through patreon support and more videos to come on that if you could consider it please do if you can't I do understand in range is distributed across multiple platforms not just YouTube and you can find all of them at enrings TV slash watch thank you very much

Channel: InRangeTV

Views: 173,881

Rating: 4.9549127 out of 5

Keywords: G36, T36, heckler and koch, tommybuilt, bundeswehr, inrange, inrangetv, hensoldt, dual optic, carl zeiss, H&K

Id: 9J0psXVo5Uo

Length: 15min 11sec (911 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 02 2020