TargetTalk

Does anyone have experience of or opinions about 30 mm foresights for smallbore rifles? I know they are intended for fullbore shooting but I wonder if it would be a good idea to use one, plus eagle eye, at the end of a 10 or 12 inch extension tube, especially for someone with nearly 68 year old eyes. For purely club shooting in the UK, I currently have a 22 mm foresight set at 5.2 plus a 0.5 eagle eye, which works well for me, but I am thinking about what I might need to do in the future.

I have used 30mm front sights and prefer the 22mm for two reasons: 1) I can align my frontsight using the outer rim of the front globe in the rear aperture with a smaller rear aperture (.9mm to 1.1mm) and I can't with the 30mm and 2) I like using fixed apertures. But many people love them. Mike Barron

I like 30mm sights, for their field of view, so you can see the number boards, but they will not help your eyes. What I recommend is that you get a rear sight lens, or shooting glasses that are a slight positive diopter.

By far the most common problem old eyes have is the loss of ability to focus up close. The solution is to add a lens to artificially shift your focus up close, like reading glasses. The only difference is that reading glasses shift your focus much too close, and you lose the target. You need to do the optical math to figure out the proper lens power to shift your focal point so if gains as much front sight clarity as possible, while giving up as little target as possible.

I studied optics as part of my engineering degree, so I did the math.

For a smallbore, the answer is that you want to add +0.50 diopters to your distance correction (if any) if you are NOT using a foresight lens. If you are using a +0.50 foresight lens, then you only want +0.25 diopters in the rear.

As an aside, I do sell 30mm smallbore components, and if you want a fixed aperture, I can make those.

Art Neergaard
ShootingSight LLC

Being able to see the number boards isn't nearly as important in smallbore as it is in big bore. The targets are so far apart that crossfires between firing points are very unlikely, as long as your NPA is adequate.