Losing The Front Sight

shadow · Post by **shadow** » Tue Jul 11, 2006 8:39 pm

This may seem like a simple question but what are the causes of "losing the fromt sight"? This happens more often with my Free Pistol (Hammerli 162) than with my Air Pistol (LP1). Is it due to the weight of the pistol, overholding, improper grip fit etc.

Thanks to all who reply!

ColinC · Post by **ColinC** » Wed Jul 12, 2006 1:54 am

In free pistol it has more to do with concentration. I would suggest that instead of focussing on that front sight, you are letting your focus wander out to the target which is a long way out at 50m. I have heard that some shooters actually develop a bad habit of being in mid focus, that is, with neither the target or front sight being clear.
When you lift the pistol, focus on the back of your hand, a freckle or the grip of your pistol and only move your focus to the front sight when you get near your aiming area. If is only a short shift of focus from your wrist to the front sight and you can do it easily.

If you are focussing on the target as you lift the pistol it is a big move to shift focus to the front sight and hence you may lose your sights
Hopefully this is of some help.

F. Paul in Denver · Post by **F. Paul in Denver** » Wed Jul 12, 2006 8:37 am

Shadow,

This is another reason why dry firing and live firing on a blank target is such a great drill.

I suspect that ColinC is right in that your problem may be related to difficulties staying focused on the front sight. Even though many shoooters believe that they are completely focused on the front post - their focus has actually shifted to the target or somewhere in between. This is referred to as optical hopping.

Next time you're at the range, turn the target around so you have nothing but white to aim at. Now see if this improves your ability to keep the front sight in view as you dry fire and then move on to live fire.

My bet is you wont be losing the front sight anymore while working on the blank target. If that's true, the logical conclusion is that the appearance of the bull is a distraction for you.

You didnt mention what type of sight picture you use - center hold, six, sub six or something else. I mention this because some sight pictures make the distraction caused by the bull easier to deal with for certain people. Dont hesistate to experiment with the different sight pictures to see what will help you ignore the bull to the greatest extent possible.

F. Paul in Denver

shadow · Post by **shadow** » Wed Jul 12, 2006 7:58 pm

I use a 6 o'clock hold.

I thought that the 162 might be the problem since I read comments that it is heavy. It really does not feel heavy to me.

I appreciate your comments and Colin's as well. After reading them I think that the distance may be causing me to loose focus on my front sight. I use the same prescription glasses for Air and Free. The sight looks the same since the bbl lenght is pretty close. So something else is happening.

F. Paul in Denver · Post by **F. Paul in Denver** » Wed Jul 12, 2006 10:36 pm

Shadow,

My own experience is that the six o'clock hold was the most difficult of all. The difficulty arises from the tendency to focus on the relationship of the sights to the bottom of the bull INSTEAD OF of the sights in relation to each other. There goes that damn bull causing distraction again!

If you try the blank target drill, I would be very interested to hear about your results and observations.

Of course, having the right vision correction is an absolute must.

Fred · Post by **Fred** » Thu Jul 13, 2006 10:09 am

shadow wrote:I use a 6 o'clock hold.

I use the same prescription glasses for Air and Free. The sight looks the same since the bbl lenght is pretty close. So something else is happening.

I'll go out on a limb here and agree with all the previous posters ;-)
Actually for a slightly different reason. The "something else" is that the distance to the target is different between AP and FP, and it is much easier to see the AP target. What I would guess is happening is that, because you can see the AP target easier, you can refocus on your AP front sight easier, and don't perceive that you have "lost" it, as you do with the FP.

It's GOOD that you have noticed the "loss" of the FP sight, because that has told you that you are shifting focus back and forth between front sight and target, which is harder to do in FP, but poor technique in any case. The 6 o'clock hold is a strong incentive to do this, and is the worst possible sight picture to use, IMHO.

HTH,
FredB

Gwhite · Post by **Gwhite** » Thu Jul 13, 2006 11:35 am

One technique I've found useful is to acquire my sight picture above the black. I get everything lined up and sharply in focus on the target with the black just below my sights, and then lower my sights to my sub-6 hold before squeezing off the shot. I've found that I can ensure my focus is where it should be much better this way. I still have a tendency to let my focus drift towards the target, and I have to be careful not to hold too long. When I have time to really practice this, it helps me learn to acquire the correct sight picture and focus, even when starting below the black, which is a little less wearing in the long run.

bruce · Post by **bruce** » Thu Jul 13, 2006 4:24 pm

Gwhite wrote:One technique I've found useful is to acquire my sight picture above the black. I get everything lined up and sharply in focus on the target with the black just below my sights, and then lower my sights to my sub-6 hold before squeezing off the shot. I've found that I can ensure my focus is where it should be much better this way. I still have a tendency to let my focus drift towards the target, and I have to be careful not to hold too long. When I have time to really practice this, it helps me learn to acquire the correct sight picture and focus, even when starting below the black, which is a little less wearing in the long run.

That pretty much describes my process as well. Although, I've recently had a new corrctive lens made which has improved my sight picture and reduced the aiming mark to a soft blur, making it much easier to hold the focus on the foresight

RobStubbs · Post by **RobStubbs** » Fri Jul 14, 2006 9:00 am

One thing that may affect things is indoors v outdoor shooting. The light level will be massively greater outdoors than in and your iris will contract outdoors. A side affect of this is that the depth of focus increases and it is therefore easier to focus on further away objects. This can make you switch focus subconsciously to the target and even flit between sights and target, without realising it. You may therefore need to try much harder to focus on the sights and some people find it better to never focus on the target at all and focus on the back of their hand and switch to the foresight during the raise and settling phases.

Rob.

ColinC · Post by **ColinC** » Sat Jul 15, 2006 1:40 am

It is a different issue but not sure I agree with you on light levels between indoors and outdoors.
Light level indoors if shooting with correct level of lighting (I think it is 300 Lux in ISSF rules) The bright lights at our club actually makes the white of the target quite bright. It is enough to start to darken my light sensitive glasses.
I never have such flare back problems with outdoor targets even when they are in full sunlight.

Fred.Mannis · Post by **Fred.Mannis** » Sat Jul 15, 2006 9:30 am

ColinC wrote:Light level indoors if shooting with correct level of lighting (I think it is 300 Lux in ISSF rules) The bright lights at our club actually makes the white of the target quite bright. It is enough to start to darken my light sensitive glasses.

You must have quite an electric bill :-)
We are in the process of redoing our 10M AP range. How are you lighting your targets? Would appreciate info on type of bulb, wattage, and distance to target face.
Thanks,
Fred

Steve Swartz · Post by **Steve Swartz** » Sat Jul 15, 2006 12:14 pm

Fred and all:

PArt of the problem is not the "total amount of light" (still a problem re: lens effect of small iris) but also total amount of light in combination with bright target & dim ambient light.

The worse possible situation (for me) is relatively dim OVERALL light, aggravated by dim ambient light and a brightly lit target.

So for me, my personal recommendation would be a well lit target (300 lux or whatever is legal) combined with an *equally bright* range overall . . .

Steve Swartz

[I think outdoors, even though the targets are incredibly brighly lit, generally the rest of the range area is brightly lit as well. Making outdoor shooting *better* even though the total light is *more* / too bright.]

Andy Osborne · Post by **Andy Osborne** » Sun Jul 16, 2006 8:18 am

The minumum light levels for 10m are 1500 lux on the target and 300 lux for the range measured at the firing point and midway to the target (Rules 6.3.15.4 - 6.3.15.4.3).

Andy

ColinC · Post by **ColinC** » Sun Jul 16, 2006 6:10 pm

Thanks Andy, I knew the 300 lux figure was relevant somewhere. We have a "sparky" in the club and when we upgraded our lights to correct standard, most shooters picked up their average scores by about 20 points. A couple of guys who rarely shot higher than 480 got to join the 500 club and the 530 shooters made it up into B grade. Didn't seem to make much difference for the higher performers who can perform well no matter what the conditions.

For Fred's benefit, we use double tri-phos tubes to highlight the targets. They would be about 40cm above the targets and give an extremely even light. Of course they are shielded from shooters. We also put tri-phos tubes just behind the firing line and several longitudinally between the firing line and targets.

It was a lot of work but for a small country club we have lighting on a par with the Commonwealth Games venue in Melbourne (I think slightly better after having shot there post Comm Games).

Fred.Mannis · Post by **Fred.Mannis** » Sun Jul 16, 2006 8:23 pm

ColinC wrote:
For Fred's benefit, we use double tri-phos tubes to highlight the targets. They would be about 40cm above the targets and give an extremely even light. Of course they are shielded from shooters. We also put tri-phos tubes just behind the firing line and several longitudinally between the firing line and targets.

Colin, could you translate 'double tri-phos tubes' into American English for me? How many watts? Thanks.

ColinC · Post by **ColinC** » Mon Jul 17, 2006 6:30 pm

Err... Starting to show my technical deficiency here.
The tubes we are using are 4 foot (yes I can talk in the old language for US and UK readers) and are 38 watt tri-phos which I believe stands for triple phosphorus tubes. We have 240 volt electricity in Australia but I do not think that makes a difference when it comes to fluoro tubes. However, I am willing to stand corrected by an American sparky.
The tubes are mounted in pairs hence the "double tri-phos" comment.

Tri-phos tubes give a bright, clear white light. The old original fluoro tubes which have been around for 40 years or more give a yellow tinge, then we had the tubes marketed as "cool white" which were a soft white light. In the past few years tri-phos has taken over and is used in most offices to give best possible lighting. That's why we have gone that way at the pistol club. They have triple the amount of phosphorus as the old fluorescent tubes. I believe that there are also such things as Quad-phos but have never seen one in action.

Hope this clarifies rather than confuses.

Fred Mannis · Post by **Fred Mannis** » Mon Jul 17, 2006 8:45 pm

ColinC wrote:.

Hope this clarifies rather than confuses.

Yes it does. Thank you Colin

Elmas · Post by **Elmas** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 7:02 am

When the eye focuses on objects at different distances... it usually, with age, has an optimal focussing distance determined by the shooters visual acuity.

If one can get correction lenses that make the front sight the "sweet spot" of concentration i.e. the distance at which the eye is happiest and relaxed the most , then it will be fairly easy to keep the front sight in focus provided of course the other requisites of good shooting are there.

I went to the Optician with my pistol and had a lens made to the distance of my front sight ... and thanked Laszlo Antal who has a pic of himself at the opticians being fitted with a lens for his Knoblochs in his book.

shadow · Post by **shadow** » Thu Jul 20, 2006 9:37 pm

I too took my pistol to the Optician. She was VERY helpful. She made me a pair of lenses which included a TINY bifocal so I can see the pellet. I just shot some Air Pistol in my basement. I kept thinking of Lanny Basham. I looked to my left and saw that 10.9 target that I shot in the finals and framed. This became what I thought of before I raised the pistol. I could actually visualize it quite well including the area where there was a LITTLE more black than a dead center shot. I shot well. As soon as I know that I am pleased with these glasses I will get a set of lenses for the Champion frames that I just bought.

Does anyone use a different prescription for Free Pistol AND Air Pistol?

Thanks for the help!

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