45-70- is big bore !! I hunt in the Catskill mtns and use a 1x4 leupold on my 1885 .works fine . I don't have experience with the red dot. I,ve used various 300 gr factory loads but now I'm using the Winchester 300 nosler partition which I am very happy with. It's a great cartridge and that's why it's still here after 125 years. BTW 100 years ago Winchester had a HV load 300@1825, worked then , works now !!

Post deleted by bigboresixguns

I have tried the red dots and they put your cheek too high off of the stock. I went with a leupold 2.5x for eye relief.

Bigbore
this is the wrong forum to ask these questions, you will likely be flamed for talking about 45/70 on this one.

You should repost your Q on the levergun forum on this site or go over to leversixgunner and ask there. Here are the links

Accurate loading levergun forum

Leversixguns forum