Bad vision - sights are blurry

Iowabucks said:

I see EyePal makes it a kit, but it's $30.

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Those look kind of similar to the Clear2target one's I was talking about mine are smaller in diameter and different shape so I can look along side them instead of through them if I want to, and plain black with no logo all over them, since it looks like mine are no longer available the eyepals would be worth a try it very surprising what a difference having a small pin hole can do removing fuzzyness from your view, it's like night and day difference, $30 is a bit steep looks like they give you 2, mine had 8 of them in 2 different size pin holes.

I bought my Merit aide many years ago but it is a great sturdy piece of equipment. Worth every penny. The other very large step I took to get me shooting well again was to have the extra set of glasses made which focus exactly at the distance the front sight is from your eye when shooting.

I have Fuchs as well as bifocals. I am a number of years out from a cornea transplant.

I have made a shooting iris from a target paster and a paper clip, used a Lyman suction cup one, but broke down and got a Gehman adjustable:

http://www.champchoice.com/prod-GEHMANN_IRIS___DISC_FOR_REGULAR_GLASSES-1088.aspx

When shooting indoors, I turn off the light over my bench. Seems to help.

I only use readers but I use 3.25 strength. If I take them off (as if I were awakened in the middle of the night) I can barely see the muzzle- much less the white dots. I practice sometimes with safety glasses on just because of that. I also put a TLR-4 on SR9 bedside gun- if I can get the laser on when the SHT, I should do ok.
I'm considerin XS BigDots- but someone told me the dots are SO big, it can actually hurt accuracy- maybe that's just for bullseye stuff? not center-mass?

I have diabetic retinopathy in both eyes so I can relate to everyone's eye problems. I am right handed and was right eye dominate but my right eye has pretty much had it. My left eye is a little better but not much. My brain has now made my left eye the dominate eye but I still shoot right handed. Eye doctor told me to prepare myself for eventual blindness. I tried shooting with my glasses on but they actually magnify the blurriness so they are a no go. This was really pissing me off because I love to shoot firearms and have all of my life. Anyway, a friend of mine showed me a little trick about looking through a tiny pin hole made by making an OK sign with my thumb and forefinger, squeezing it down to a tiny pin hole and looking through it with either eye and it clears up my vision enough to read. So I got to thinking about it and transferred the idea to shooting. So, I tried a peep sight with a large aperture and it has helped me tremendously. .094 works for me. I still do as much shooting as I can and can hit the black part of the target most of the time. With practice my brain has learned to compensate for the blurriness. Sorry for the long post but maybe it will help someone.

Think a red-dot would be similar? sorta? They make little ones now, I've been thinking about finding one for my SR9.

I thought about a red dot and it may work for some. I think what the peep sight does for me is it blocks out what I call visual background noise. If I look through any type of scope or open sight the blurred colors and lines in the open field of vision overwhelm the target. The peep sight alleviates all that background noise of blurred lines and color and force my eye to concentrate on just what I can see through the peep. After practice my brain has learned to do this pretty quick. It works well enough for me to hit in the black at 50 yrds. but that is my limit. I am just grateful I can still shoot.

Amen- glad you found something that works. 50 yards is plenty for self-defense, isn't it. My hands shake so much when I try and hold them TOO still, so 50 yards is out of the question for me anyway- at least with a pistol.

It was a lot easier for me to get used to pistol shooting. A rifle was a little tougher. I just don't want to give up shooting right handed. That is were the peep sight really came in handy.

If you want to try out something similar to EyePal, you could always cut up one of those press on/peel off mirror stickies.
The hole size to drill or punch is .063 or 1/16".

Taterman said:

If you want to try out something similar to EyePal, you could always cut up one of those press on/peel off mirror stickies.
The hole size to drill or punch is .063 or 1/16".

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That sounds like it would work pretty good. Same principal as I mentioned above I believe. Thanks for the measurements.

Iowabucks said:

I can lift my head and look through my bifocals and make the pins clear but it then makes my target blurry. It's one or the other, I can't get both focused. I run into the same problem shooting my bow.

So are there any suggestions anyone may have for me to clear up my sight picture?

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I'm 55 and got damned bi-focals as well, you can go to your eye doctor (find one that's gun friendly) and tell him your problems and they can fit you with some perscription "shootin specs"

OR, as I do

Take a dry erase marker (to test it before you make it permenant) and blacked the rear sights so there are no dots, this will help your eyes focus on the front sight instead of switching back and forth between the rear and the front. I know it sounds stupid but that's what works for me without spending a couple hundred on "shootin specs"

I switched to a shotgun and shoot from the hip.
Actually I have started to open up the rear sight notch with a small chain saw file which leaves a u notch with a little more light on each side of the front sight. So far its the best I've come up with.

The easiest way is to go to your optometrist and tell him/her what the problem is and the distance you need to focus at. For me that's about 34". If you have had your eyes checked and a corrective prescription in the last 2 years they will usually just write yous a script. Haven't seen them in a couple years they will usually want to do a check up.

Glasses are relatively cheap and you can get a single vision set for shooting and computer etc at Costco or Walmart at a very reasonable price.

The aperture sighting assistants you can stick on or clamp on to your glasses work fine for slow fire but are not so easy to use in rapid fire or any timed event where you have to re-acquire your sights with the limited field of view they offer. Bright sunlight reduces your pupil size and these types of sighting aids work the same by increasing your depth of field just like a smaller aperture does in a camera.

Excellentn discussion, many workable ideas. I am 72 now with a host of problems, i.e. cataracts growing, tri-focals, and that just my eyes. The one comment I wish to add is this, beware, Mr. and Mrs. Murphay!

Please practice with and without your glasses of any kind, for when the time comes, you may not have them on your face. So, try for center of mass at twenty to thirty feet, your not shooting for groups, you are shooting to survive.

Mid 40's vision blurry 0-3 feet and it oh how I once had beautiful close up vision. I took a pair of bifocal safety glasses and stuck a 1.5 magnifier in the upper inside corner also. The post is where I put it on the GLOCK forum.

http://www.glockforum.net/forum/optics-glass/6023-safety-glass-lens-magnifyer.html

You don't have to buy these items from Grainger but I was there and they had exactly what I wanted to use. Item #2MU10 for the peel away and Item #5PA83 for the glasses themselves. Works extremely well for a person who uses 1.5 magnify reading glasses. Good luck building your own solutions.

OldSarge, I'm 67, have cataracts, wear reading glasses for computer work and bifocals for TV and reading street signs. I've said it before and can't stress it enough - that red laser dot shows me exactly where the bullet will hit whether I'm wearing either pair of glasses or none at all.
I do, however, practice with the bifocals because they are safety glasses The range is kind of funny about having some.

Blackhawk: Totally agree, have lasers or red dots on most of my guns. However, batteries die, sun washes out the laser. Train for the worst.

i'm 55, and have the classic presbyopia going on. i got back into shooting a few years ago, and WOW, the sights are a mess. i can't even get close to focusing on the front sight. i decided to try focusing on the target, and just do the best i can with the sight picture, and, i'm still deadly with a pistol, it turns out. i'd rather be able to focus on the front sight, but i've found that in my case, it's a non-issue. personally, i think focusing on the sights and leaving target blurry is asking for trouble. practice without corrective lenses, and "see" what you think.

I almost always wear my glasses at the range, but on occasion I switch to plain old, cheap safety glasses. The dofference is amazing- everything is blurry. I really need to do that more often- at 3:00 in the morning when some BG pops in- I doubt he will let me have time to put my glasses on. I have a laser on my bedside gun but as said- batteries die.