Well, like many of us I'm sure, my vision -
even corrected with eyeglasses - is NOT what it used to be. You may have seen these
Merit Company optical apertures that stick onto your eyeglasses or shooting glasses, like shown below. To me they have a few drawbacks, including that they are expensive, are tough to position or re-position and most importantly, they fall off in cccccccolder climates or in temp changes. like when you leave the cold range to go inside to a warmer environment.
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Here's my solution, and what I've done to improve my ability to "see the sights"!
One caveat - You may find better results with NON-progressive lenses, as neither of these pairs of my personal shooting glasses to follow are 'no line progressives'. On those, the optical center is soooooooo tight and narrow, that even without the attached aperture, seeing the sights can be problematic. With progressives of any higher stregnth, if you don't look straight on to a subject ... you can't see it clearly. If you yourself do OK with progressives ... then God bless you and consider yourself VERY lucky!
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Note I am left-handed, hence the aperture of electrical tape is placed on my left eye, my master eye. The modern pair above are a single-line bifocal and I use them shooting high-power shoots on SATs with an ... uhmmmmmm, an M1 Garand. My ability to see the sights now places me in the top 3 shooters each week, usually rotating who got the #1 spot only by the # of X's shot. The other pair is a set of fairly period correct (less the plastic nose pads) glasses from Avalon Forge that just have a single distance (I am near-sighted) Rx prescription in them.
I have never had one of my homemade apertures come off, but if they did, I also made a 'cheat sheet' template for each pair to allow me to quickly affix a replacement aperture right in the same spot. I just overlay my glasses to the template and position it so that the 'hole" is over the black dot as shown. This aperture goes on the inside of the lens and I've had no issues with movement or falling off, even when shooting in temps < 20-degrees F and going into warmer places, nor when cleaning the glasses.
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Note the
'red dot' on these other pictures. This is the optical center of the lens,
and whether they tell you or not, the optical house grinds the Rx prescription to this point for where YOU look through, when they take that measurement for 'how far' yor pupils are apart. However, whilst shooting
for the majority of the shooters, we do not and cannot, look through the optical center whilst shooting, due to how we cheek the stock. That is why the aperture once affixed is positioned closer to your nose, whether you are RH'd or LH'd.
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Tip - I make a smaller hole on the modern glasses I use for all shooting, less that strictly for my MZL events or those where I have period clothing on. The smaller holes improves my sight picture, but gives me a narrower field of view, but it is excellent for ‘fixed distance/open range use. I find the larger field of view via a little bit larger aperture hole works better with the round lens of the ‘old time' glasses and is much better for use in the woods, like whilst on MZL woodswalks, also where conditions could be shades to dark(er).
Anyways ... I sure hope this info helps someone else out!
Tight groups!
!
