Solving Sight Picture Problems in an AR Shell Catcher

For too long, owners of sporting rifles have had to settle for less than the best that the shooting industry could have provided in AR shell catchers. While the same industry has poured countless resources and tons of money every year into researching and developing better optics, lights, lasers, reflex sights, folding stocks, bipods, handguard rail systems, and more, brass catchers have fallen by the wayside.

No longer will shooters have to settle for a flimsy mesh bag that loosely covers their ejection port and nearly insults the best-in-class optics and other accessories mounted around it. The Brass Goat has solved all that.

The worst part is, many of the problems with common brass catchers could have been solved, and easily at that.

Common Problems in AR Shell Catchers

While there’s no shortage of problems associated with the most common AR brass catchers, some of the worst of them have to do with the fact that these brass catchers are made of somewhat ineffective mesh or similar materials. While they work as intended most of the time, hot brass can cause them to catch fire or even melt. Depending on what the brass catcher is made from, hot spent brass could potentially even cause them to catch fire - even though some catchers claim to be made from heat-resistant materials.

While they are highly convenient for some shooters because they can be emptied via a zipper at the bottom of the mesh bag, they are impractical because the mesh bag can hang up on brush and twigs in the surroundings. They’re also typically not made from high-quality materials, such as thin mesh and a thin wire frame that holds everything together or at least keeps a rigid opening over the ejection ports.

But these are only some of the problems that many shooters face. One of the worst of the weaknesses of most brass catchers comes from the fact that some of them obstruct your sight picture.

The Sight Picture Issue

Not all brass catchers are created equal, as anyone who has ever spent time cleaning up a shooting area can well attest. One of the biggest issues that arises with common brass catchers comes from attaching them to the top of the rail. This is less of an issue with rail-mounted brass catchers that attach to the side of the quad Picatinny rail, but for top-mounted brass catchers, there can be a serious conflict surrounding the sight picture.

While shooters that use optics like scopes or reflex sights might not have an issue, shooters that utilize their iron sights might have a problem with the mounts or a part of the bag obscuring their sights.

Even if the brass catcher bag or its mounts don’t directly interfere with your iron sights, fogging up your sight picture can increase your time-to-target acquisition and make it so much more difficult for you to connect effectively. In the worst cases, they can make your groups grow.

If the brass catcher or its mounts actually get in the way of your ability to line up your sights, there’s almost no chance that you won’t notice an adverse effect on your performance. Anything that interferes with your ability to do so or obstructs your sight picture is something that must be removed.

This scenario is a shame, considering the fact that there are so many high-performance shooting accessories for sporting rifles that can stabilize the rifles, improve the ergonomics of the platform, and improve the ability of the shooter to get on target.

The sight picture problem was one of those issues with AR shell catchers that we directly solved with the development and production of the Brass Goat.

Enter The Brass Goat: A Better AR Shell Catcher

The Brass Goat actually solves the sight picture problem in a very innovative way. It doesn’t attach to your rail system at all. In fact, the Brass Goat easily and quickly attaches to your lower receiver Magwell in mere moments, all without the need for tools.

It’s low profile, so it will not only stay out of the way of the area around your firearm, but it also lies well below and to the side of your sight picture. It will not interrupt your ability to acquire a target and leaves your iron sights completely free if you intend to use them.

That’s not even to mention the fact that it solves a whole host of other problems with mesh brass catchers. Made of hard, extremely tough molded ABS resin, the Brass Goat will not melt or catch fire, and since it’s rigid, it won’t catch on twigs, branches, foliage, or thorns in the field.

It’s also compatible with a wide range of cartridges, including but in no way limited to the ubiquitous .223 Remington. To learn more about the cartridges with which you can pair it, or the firearms with which it is compatible, please see our page on Brass Goat firearm and cartridge compatibility - or contact us at 1-833-MAGWELL or at admin@magwellmounts.com.