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Thread: Target focus, a paradigm shift

  1. #11
    Site Supporter Totem Polar's Avatar
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    I’m looking forward to seeing (heh) where this thread goes. Good stuff for those of us with declining vision.

  2. #12
    Site Supporter Erick Gelhaus's Avatar
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    Took a couple McNamara classes a while back. One of the takeaways on sights, sighting, eye sight was "put close blur in the center of the far blur." That concept has been beneficial.

    From limited experience, when the RDS technology is proven reliable I think there will be some interesting benefits. Better overall view will be one.

  3. #13
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    Quote Originally Posted by Angus McFee View Post
    Took a couple McNamara classes a while back. One of the takeaways on sights, sighting, eye sight was "put close blur in the center of the far blur." That concept has been beneficial.

    From limited experience, when the RDS technology is proven reliable I think there will be some interesting benefits. Better overall view will be one.
    Nothing else we can do I guess but how does it affect accuracy?

  4. #14
    Site Supporter 41magfan's Avatar
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    Your experience pretty much mirrors my own.

    Even when I had good vision (20/15) I embraced the fact that sight use was really nothing but a continuum dictated by the common variables of lighting, time constraint and the size and/or distance to the target. Even when I could see the front sight clearly, it often just wasn't necessary.

    Now that I don't see well at all (+3.50 of correction for reading) the transition to never seeing a clear front sight has been very aggravating but it hasn't practically hampered my ability to defend myself. As a general rule, the hardware that works best for me is plain black sights with lots of light around the front sight, i.e. .156 - .160 rear notch with a .115 - .125 front post. I have a few front sights with tritium inserts, but I have never found them to be an absolute necessity.

    As for red-dot sights, I've been using them on my hunting handguns since the mid-80's, so I have some idea of their limitations. Just last week, I played around a bit with a Glock 17 topped with a Leupold DP and for small targets or targets at distance (50-100 yards), a RDS is the bomb. But, small targets at long distance just doesn't resemble a defensive shooting parameter I'm likely to encounter.

    Clearly, the benefit of having a single aiming point (vs iron sights) isn't open to much intelligent debate with regards to precision, but I personally have not experienced a practical advantage for their use on a general purpose defensive handgun.

    YMMV
    Last edited by 41magfan; 10-22-2017 at 08:56 PM.
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  5. #15
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    Quote Originally Posted by Redhat View Post
    Nothing else we can do I guess but how does it affect accuracy?
    I’m shooting 4” groups standing off-hand without my glasses. I’ve shot better but 4” is pretty much the limit of my vision without range glasses.

  6. #16
    Site Supporter JSGlock34's Avatar
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    I've been having some interesting discussions with @Gio lately about target focused shooting. Interestingly, I was recently listening to a Ben Stoeger podcast when he talked about improving target focused shooting as an important ingredient in breaking out of USPSA B class.

    I'm a hard front sight focus shooter, but I've been trying to experiment with target focus lately. Today was a mixed bag - I had one target focused Bill Drill which was fantastic - and another which was disastrous.

    Red dot sights certainly change this equation.
    "When the phone rang, Parker was in the garage, killing a man."

  7. #17
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    Quote Originally Posted by Angus McFee View Post
    Took a couple McNamara classes a while back. One of the takeaways on sights, sighting, eye sight was "put close blur in the center of the far blur." That concept has been beneficial.
    Totally agree. Once I quite trying to do what was no longer physically possible (focus on a front sight), I made some significant improvements. It also improved my aggravation factor.

  8. #18
    I've been playing with the target focus for some time now. I am no Gabe and can't dissociate my convergence and focus so I thought I try to learn aiming faster in a more conventional way. One observation that it is semi-obvious but took me some time to make, so I'll share just in case.

    Quote Originally Posted by LSP552 View Post
    As a result, I’ve been experimenting with a target focus out to 25 yards. What is surprising to me is I’m pretty much staying in the A zone all the way out to 25.
    A zone implies the USPSA target. Unless one is shooting Area 3 match, all USPSA targets are relatively high contrast. I was cruising in practice shooting target focused at the A zone one day, and then for whatever reason decided to do the same on a bullseye. Indoors, fiber no good, black sight on black target, I found TF impossible.

    The moral of that for me was that I'd need a different high visibility in all conditions on all backgrounds front sight before I could adopt that aiming technique with a carry gun.
    Doesn't read posts longer than two paragraphs.

  9. #19
    Shifted to target focus several years ago and haven't looked back (probably couldn't see what's back anyway). Caught a good deal of flack from some idiots with superior vision but I didn't and don't give a shit what they have to say about it. It works for me. It works extremely well. Adapt as necessary and rock on.
    You will more often be attacked for what others think you believe than what you actually believe. Expect misrepresentation, misunderstanding, and projection as the modern normal default setting. ~ Quintus Curtius

  10. #20
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    Quote Originally Posted by YVK View Post
    A zone implies the USPSA target. Unless one is shooting Area 3 match, all USPSA targets are relatively high contrast. I was cruising in practice shooting target focused at the A zone one day, and then for whatever reason decided to do the same on a bullseye. Indoors, fiber no good, black sight on black target, I found TF impossible.

    The moral of that for me was that I'd need a different high visibility in all conditions on all backgrounds front sight before I could adopt that aiming technique with a carry gun.
    I’ve been doing well indoors with the Trij white outline front on my Wilson BT and the Trij HDs on my P239. I was predisposed to paint the BT front bright red but so far, it’s been OK.

    I remembered Gabe’s epic sight thread and that white was pretty visible under a lot of different lighting conditions. I’m sure I will end up painting the BT front, just haven’t gotten to it yet.
    Last edited by LSP552; 10-22-2017 at 09:50 PM.

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