Old Man Shooting Glasses

[Rik93]

With scopes I need distance glasses and with open sights I need mid-range like my computer glasses.

Anyone else found this - how did you work it out

Thanks

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[Pops1911]

This from another old man. Many years ago I had bi-lateral cataract removal and lens replacements. Right lens is now set for distance vision and the left is set for near vision. Problem is that I now need pistols with longer barrels like a Ned Buntline Colt. LOL I am right eye dominant and shoot right handed but I cannot focus clearly on the front sight anymore with my right eye. Front sight focus seemed better with my left eye so I had an idea I would re-educate my eyes so that my left eye would be made dominant for pistol craft. That was about 5 years ago now. Relatively successful BUT I could not focus clearly to see the target with my left eye! My different focal lengths makes it nigh on to impossible to shoot with both eyes open. So, I have returned to using my dominant eye with my dominant hand. Every corrective lens I have tried does not help but only frustrates the issue and me. Seems like I have as many "corrective" glasses now as I have holsters in "that" drawer. You know the one. I'll bet lots of forum members have a drawer like that. So, ... how am I working it out?
I have accepted the fact that I am no longer a consistent 10-ring shooter and will never be. [pause while I wipe a tear] My goal is to focus on what I can still do with my aging eyesight. I can still shoot the bubblegum out of an 8 inch paper plate out to 25 yards. Beyond that I am going for the rifles with optics. I love pistol shooting and will accept what I can do and NOT what I can no longer do. That approach has kept me from grumbling self-reproach after leaving a range session. Others will have their own adaptions. Let me just say that getting older is not for bubblegumsys or the faint of heart. Cheer up. We will all deal with our aging in our own ways. Pops

 

[Pete F]

With scopes I need distance glasses and with open sights I need mid-range like my computer glasses.

Anyone else found this - how did you work it out

Thanks

I haven't tried using my reading glasses for shooting, but have noticed that since I have stopped wearing contact lenses that the buckhorn sights that used to work great are hard to focus through lately. I have special prismatic lenses to help with a condition called meniere's disease - balance and sight disorder. They are prismatic lenses and unless I have my head totally upright, the front sight bends at the top. It also affects scopes and pissed me off when I bought an expensive scope and the reticle was curved at the top and bottom edges. I finally figured out that my glasses were causing it. I have asked my optometrist about it, but he didn't have any solution.

 

[albin25]

I don't wear glasses for anything other than long stretches at the computer but maybe you could give this a try...
I find that my "secret extra special custom made high-dollar" shooting specs that I made for pistols work pretty well....
…. How can I afford such cutting edge tech?? Simple, I just popped the left lens out of some $6 Walmart reading specs (1.25x) and continue to shoot with both eyes open.

 

[41mag]

I am no longer a consistent 10-ring shooter

....fellow members of the Geezer Plinker Brigade have asked for clarification of 'just what IS this "10-ring" you speak???

 

[Pops1911]

...fellow members of the Geezer Plinker Brigade have asked for clarification of 'just what IS this "10-ring" you speak???

Having not seen one clearly in years I am told it exists in the very center of a bullseye target. M'eh, I think it is like a Bigfoot .... rumored to exist but without concrete proof.

 

[Lilhigbee]

I haven't quite reached geezerhood yet, having just turned 50, but my eyes are definitely not what they used to be, and that wasn't great to begin with. The magic I just discovered is bifocal contact lenses. The center ~1/8" circle is cut for close focus and the outer ring is cut for distance. Your brain figures out what part to pay attention to. Truly magic. If the thought of contacts lenses doesn't scare you, talk to your eye doctor about this. I can actually SEE iron sights again, and the target, instead of averaging the blurred sights over the target.

 

[Flopsweat]

Seems to me if your dominant eye were the one focused close you might shoot iron sights better with both eyes open. I'm at the stage where to shoot pistols I take off the prescription lenses and use regular safety glasses. Can't see the target well but I can find the center of the blur just fine. For me seeing the sights clearly is more important. I do almost as well as I did when I was younger.

I also used to have a set of prescription shooting glasses that were deliberately dialed back from my ordinary prescription. They worked pretty well too, especially with a rifle where I needed a little help to see a target hundreds of yards away and the front sight was not as close.

 

[Redcoat330]

I've got old eyes as well (and some other "vintage" body parts to be truthful).

Now if they only made a little blue pill for eyes, but I digress.

I took the cheaters way out....just shoot with the target closer in. While I used to do everything at 15 yards or more, I'm now shooting at 10 or 7 yards and with new guns (or if I transition between really different pistols in one session at the range -- like between a Sig 250 and Browning HP) I reel the paper out to 5 yards for the first mag. That way most of what I shoot ends up somewhere near the middle of the paper.

What I am always slightly surprised at is how poorly a whole bunch of shooters do at even 5 yards (and there are lots of people who don't know the target goes beyond 5 yards.) And these are usually the guys with apparently a whole lot of money...as they empty 15 round mags in about two nano-seconds, spraying bullets all over the paper, slide in another mag and blow another 5 bucks in 5 seconds. But hey, if they are having fun, who am I to comment? They are having fun. I guess. Kinda. Maybe?