Diopters and old farts vision

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PGinsandiego

PGinsandiego

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Nov 24, 2019
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CA, United States
So, I have been saving up for along time and It looks like I am going to finally get a FWB 300 and it comes with the Diopter. I have never used one before. I am farsighted and wear corrective lenses. So before the FWB arrives, I wanted to check my vision at 10M. I put a 10M target up and basically at 10M, I can barely see the circle in the 1" square target, let alone trying to find the center of the bulleye! 😂 Im thinking a diopter would be useless for me unless there is something I can do to magnify the diopter like a 1-4X scope. Is there hope for me or is this yet another thing this old fart needs to give away to waste on the youth? Maybe my vision will improve after a couple of whiskey tumblers? 😂

Seriously, any advice?

~Phil


 
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I would try a nice compact low power scope like you mentioned. I've just started getting into red dot sights and found they work well on close range shooting so that would be another option.

And no you don't have to give up. I'm also older and have found that it's just a matter of finding what works best for you.

BTW congratulations on that FWB 300. Those are nice.
 
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Use a LEUPOLD EFR 3-9x AO VX Freedom or find a used 3-9x EFR and a $59 1 piece BKL .007 drooper mounts.

1597626209_3514261125f39d7616880d1.07795966.jpg

 
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I am far sighted as well. Depending on your eyes, the size of the hole in the diopter and the lighting conditions things can be horrible or excellent with a diopter. A different sized diopter may be all that you need. Merit used to make an adjustable Diopter that suction cupped onto your glasses. As well as some for rifle sights as well. I found it to be perfect for 10 meter shooting with my open sights and old eyes. Being able to adjust it for lighting conditions really made it worth the money. I looked around but I can't find anyone with stock at this time. Looks like they may be discontinued? 

http://meritcorporation.com/


 
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for shooting open sights on a 10. meter pistol I used this so I could see the sights and target. You may be surprised as looking thru a small hole such as a rear diopter you may see better than you think. Try punching a 1/16th hole in a dark piece of paper and look thru it while holding up to your eye. You may be surprised.





http://www.champchoice.com/store/Main.aspx?p=ItemDetailOptions&item=390
 
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The fact that you need corrective lenses will not keep you from using aperture sights successfully for olympic style shooting at 10 meters. I'm not even sure where this idea came from. I have always needed corrective lenses, for nearsightedness when I was younger, and now for farsightedness in retirement.

What target are you trying to use? The standard 10 meter target is an approximately 1 1/4" black bull printed on 4 X 4 card stock. It is designed specifically for use with aperture sights. In use all you will be able to see is a somewhat fuzzy black bull on a light background. To aim you only have to position the bull in the center of the front aperture.

The sight set on the 300s provides two apertures, one at the rear and another at the front. You look through the rear aperture, and center the bull in the front aperture. The standard rear disk is a 1.1 mm. The smaller the rear aperture, the sharper the apearance of the front sight and bull. The larger the rear aperture, the brighter the sight picture. A 1.3 mm disk works best for me. If you do use the 1.1 mm standard disk, I would mount the rear sight as close to your eye as practical.

The front aperture needs to be big enough to show a well defined white ring around the black bull. On the standard target at 10 meters, something around 3.6 mm should be fine, although some people prefer larger or smaller. It would seem that smaller would be better, but for shooting offhand you need to be able to see the bull as it moves into the center of the front aperture. The general guideline is that the front aperture is big enough that the bull stays inside the aperture ring during your hold. I don't know what front apertures came with your 300s, if you don't have one in the range of say 3.2 to 4.0 mm, you are going to need to find a set or buy an adjustable front iris. If the adjustable iris is more than you want to spend right now, the clear apertures in 18 mm size will also work with the FWB front sight.

That is all you need to get started with your 300s at 10 meters. If you find you enjoy that type of shooting, there are a whole host of accessories you can buy from places like Champion's Choice that promise to enhance your sight picture, including rear irises with both adjustable aperture and diopter correction to allow you to dial in your plane of focus between front sight and bull.

Good luck, and enjoy your new acquisition!
 
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for shooting open sights on a 10. meter pistol I used this so I could see the sights and target. You may be surprised as looking thru a small hole such as a rear diopter you may see better than you think. Try punching a 1/16th hole in a dark piece of paper and look thru it while holding up to your eye. You may be surprised.





http://www.champchoice.com/store/Main.aspx?p=ItemDetailOptions&item=390
Click to expand...

You can even do this right now with your finger and thumb. Make an OK sign and look through it. Works near or far. Start shrinking that circle. You'll see your vision getting better slowly until it gets much better.
 
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You can even do this right now with your finger and thumb. Make an OK sign and look through it. Works near or far. Start shrinking that circle. You'll see your vision getting better slowly until it gets much better.





Click to expand...

Thats how I look at my phone at night to see the clock or who is calling when I am in bed without glasses.
 
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Before you slap a scope on it try the diopter. Even before this take a card and poke a pinhole through it, maybe with a large needle or toothpick then take your glasses off and look at things through that pinhole. You will be surprized at how well that makes things focus. Now with a diopter you do not look at them but look through them. I learned back in college almost 65 years ago and I was nearsighted, wearing glasses, and made the rifle team. Been shooting diopters ever since . I have about 18 air rifles and probably over 3/4 have diopters, some like my FWB 300 have the double diopter, where the front sight is a globe sight with a disk with a hole that is usually sized for a specific target at a specific distance, later about that . What you do is look through the rear sight and center the target in the hole in that front sight, simple. I even use it for plinking, tin cans, knock down targets, ect, just center them in that front hole and shoot. I also had cataract surgery about 3 years ago and basically went from nearsighted to more farsighted. Both before and after I could shoot any kind of iron sights as well as optics very well, lucky I guess
I have gone a step further like a lot of dedicated match shooters and gotten adjustable diopters, the first was a simple iris type by a company called Gehmann, where you can simply adjust the size of the rear hole. I then progessed to one that has the iris feature, colored filters and a polarizer and finnaly a front diopter where you can adjust the size of that hole while shooting instead of having to physically change a sight insert.

Try the diopters, it may take a little getting used to, but you will probably enjoy them

I still have my first "adult" air rifle I got back in early 1975 after coming back from an overseas tour in the Air Force in Turkey. It is a FWB 124, a break barrel and it has a little Willians receiver peep sight, but it does have one of the Gehmann adjustable diopters mounted.
 
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I like using plenty of magnification when shooting small targets. But on a whim I used a 4-14 scope that was on the rifle I wanted to try on the 30 yard challenge instead of switching to a scope with at least 24X like I normally do. The PA scope also has a thick reticle. No way I could see the 1/8th inch 10 ring. But I could see the 1 3/8ths 5 ring so I could center the reticle on the target. I shot a 198 which is as good as I've done this year using scopes as high as 40X. I am not going to switch to lower magnification scopes but if you are careful you can shoot surprisingly well without being able to see the small target you are aiming at.
 
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