Small, red dot finder for daylight?

[Rusted]

Hi,

I have never seen a red dot finder in the flesh. Let alone owned one.
So you may safely assume zero knowledge.
I need some quick advice from direct, hands-on experience.

I thought I'd get one to speed my aim without fitting a proper finder. 
Really don't want to fit one one right now.
[It means major dismantling, tailpiece and baffle removal, drilling main tubes and re-balancing.]

Do these things work well in bright sunlight? This is important to me.

How small do they go? This is also important to me.

Flash shoe fitting on a 4/3 mirrorless DSLR small?

How accurate are they? Moon's width or less?

Does quality vary much between makes and/or price?

Any strong recommendations from direct personal experience in the "bijou" category?

Grateful for any advice so I can put in an order ASAP.

Thanks. 
 

[Doc]

I've always used red dot finders, on my dobs I've had the telrad and on the refractors the Baader Sky surfer V. They now sell a night and day variety but even the night time one still works in the day but the smallest red dot is very hard to see in the daytime.

https://www.baader-planetarium.com/en/baader-sky-surfer-v-red-dot-finder.html

The smallest setting is pretty small I could not tell you how small but it's a very small pin prick of light about the same width as a small star. As for quality you pay more you get better quality, I've always used Baader as the quality is excellent.

[Tomatobro]

I only have two unbranded versions. One is just a plain red dot and the other I can change between a dot and a cross by turning a wheel.

Both can vary the brightness

In terms of visibility I always calibrate the finders in daylight as a first setup using the top of a tree which is about a kilometre away. I put a cross hair eyepiece in the telescope and position the cross hairs on the tree top. Using the left/right adjusters on the red dot finder I then position the dot onto the same part of the tree.

Further positioning calibration can be done at night on a star if required.

Depending on the quality of the shoe mount the repeatability from removal to reinstall is quite good

[RT65CB-SWL]

I use one of these. It shows either green or red. The green can be easily seen where as I lose the red in daylight.

Edited June 17, 2020 by Philip R

[Rusted]

Thanks for your helpful advice.

I was referring to the small size of the finder bodywork rather than the dot.

A green spot or cross sounded like a much better idea for daylight use.
Strapped to a spotting scope for digiscoping on featureless lakes.
Or homing in on planets in my 6" refractor once I have fitted a camera and/or a Barlow and completely lost focus.

More homework definitely required!

Thanks again.

 

[RT65CB-SWL]

I forgot to mention earlier that I made this handy 'bracket'...

from a spare TeleVue 'Qwik Point' mounting block; two 15mm pipe clips
and two short 5mm machine screws & two 'nyloc' nuts and clips to the
centre horizontal bar for use with my 20x80 binoculars and RDF.  

 

[Louis D]

I bought a cheap red dot finder off ebay for a small scope.  It is compact and can be made very bright for daytime usage.  After all, they started out as gun sights.  Make sure to get the correct foot/shoe for your mounting needs.

 

There's a vendor on CN Classifieds selling 3D printed camera flash shoe to Vixen finder mount adapters:

Edited June 17, 2020 by Louis D

[Rusted]

Great stuff!  Thanks!