Recommended iron sight alternative to red dot for aging eyes?

[Joe Mac]

Meanwhile, I selected the Ameriglo Spartan sights and like them a lot. Might favorite iron sights for my vision. Orange front sight with tritium center, blacked-out tritium at rear. Ample notch at rear provides good sight picture and makes finding/centering front sight easy.

This, for me. And as Clusterfrack mentioned, I have no trouble shooting with target focus inside of 15 yards or so -- my eye tracks the big orange dot as if it were an optic.

[Chris17404]

Thank you for the recommendations so far. That's a lot of good stuff to consider and think about.

Also; and I'm just curious, when you say you want to "see the technology mature a bit more before investing in them", what exactly are you referring to, in today's pistol red dot marketspace, that is falling short for you?

Mainly waiting to see if a standard mounting footprint comes about and if sealed emitters become the norm.

[Elwin]

My current preference is the HD XR you're already familiar with, or alternatively a lot of orange paint on a black sight.

On my previous set of carry guns, I had fiber optic sights with green fiber installed and then the face of the sight housing painted orange. I really liked that setup as well. If light is getting to the fiber, it looks kindof like a square HD XR with daylight visible tritium. What I liked about it was that if the light was right, the fiber was very visible (green works better for my eyes than red), and in other light, that orange paint was doing the job. It basically worked to give me a useable sight picture in everything but total darkness.

I picked that idea up from someone here, I forget who. It's worth a try if you like the HD XR but think fiber may be an advantage for you.

[Wondering Beard]

The 10-8 Performance fiber optic front sight and low profile rear have drawn my interest as well.

I'm in my late 50s and clear front sight focus has been gone for a long time now and the 10-8s pretty much what I run. Easy to see (even in light where the tritium is not yet showing) and focus on even though that focus isn't sharp. Only a gold bead (as on the Wilson Combat Glock sights) shows up brighter in all lights.





The photo on the left is pretty much what I see whether I focus on the front sight or on the target, so a black rear and something shiny up front is what I want.

[revchuck38]

I'm 70 and I've gone with Ameriglo Hackathorns on my M&Ps, another Ameriglo set on my PX4s which I think is only available through Langdon Tactical, and Night Fision front/Dawson .145 plain rear on my Walther P99Cs. What these sights all have in common is a big, fat orange front sight with a tritium insert and a plain black rear. The revolvers I carry all have two coats of white paint under a coat of bright orange on the front sight.

[BN]

https://warrentactical.com/product/2...p-front-sight/

I use these sights on all my Glocks. I use the .245 tall front sight and use drive the dot sight picture. The front sight is .140 wide and the rear notch is .150 wide and my old eyes see this better than anything else I've tried.

Glock with Warren on the left and an XS big dot on a Jframe to compare.

[CraigS]

If you decide to try Dawson FO sights be sure to get one of each color tube. I use the green/yellow tube because to my eyes that color is brightest when the light isn't so good. My wife saw the Dawson and immediately asked if hers was on the way yet. When I did get hers installed, I grabbed the 4 different color tubes, handed them to her and asked her to hold them up w/ the ends pointing to her and the same length of tube exposed beyond her hand. Her eyes said the red was brightest so that is what she has. Also tubes come in two widths, .040" and .060". The .060 makes a larger brighter dot so any FO sight I buy that has the .040, I drill out. A common 1/16" drill bit is .062" so it is perfect tool to enlarge the hole. I also usually take 3-4 tries at melting the end of the tube so it swells to a littler larger diameter for a little larger and brighter sight. Hold the tube vertically over a lighter flame to get it to swell. If you hold it sideways it will usually swell fine but also sags downward so your visible dot is not centered in the sight.

[CSW]

I'm 58, and have been trying to avoid jumping into the RDS world.
Up until about last summer, a black rear sight and a fiber front was all I needed for sight alignment.
I'm wearing trifocal glasses now, and in order to get a good sight picture, I have to use the "reading" part of the glasses, which means that I have to tilt my head waaaaaay back.
Very unproductive and uncomfortable.
I just found and ordered these :


SSP Eyewear Top Focal Tactical Safety Glasses Kit with Assorted Interchangeable 1.75 Top Focal Lenses, TF175 AMZ KIT

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08K4H4HSK...ing=UTF8&psc=1.

Hopeful that they will be an asset in finding the front sight, before taking the plunge into the RDS world.

[19852+]

I've had good luck with Dawson F/O front and
blacked out rear, prior to getting hooked on dot's.

Eat healthy for healthy eyes. But Trijicon HD XR or plain black rear w/ Trij XD XR front work for me and my late middle age eyes.

[blues]

I'm in my late 60's and have a bit of astigmatism but only wear 1.25x cheaters when reading or using the laptop indoors or in dim light. (No glasses outdoors or for driving, etc.)

I find the Trijicon HDs and the Ameriglo Bolds fine for me...but this is obviously something which will be different for different folks.