Aimpoint Observations

[The_Count]

CAUTION: This is not another, "I see a blob not a dot thread"!

I recently procured an Aimpoint R-1 through the Midway USA Sale.

I have corrected vision, and I have an astigmatism. When viewing the dot while focused on the target I see a dot ( A little blurry, a little misshapen,. etc.). However when viewing the target through the rear sight I see a crystal clear dot. Now I know this has something to do with an object being introduced to my field of view at a very close range. I can not, however, replicate the results. I have an upcoming optometrists appointment. I will have him "dial" my new glasses to the dot, and ask him about this observation.

My real question is if this is how I should be using the dot at longer ranges, at least for now.

First of all I am curious if any other forum members have noticed this "Phenomenon"?

Second, Should I sight the rifle in using this method?

Best Regards,

Count

[Travelingchild]

48 years old with artificial cornea's, which have a set focal distance, so I wear progessive glasses for reading I simply shoot/wear them all the time.

Layman's theory, with the sight down you have a large light transmission through the front of the red dot and bleed through from around the tube/and sides.

With the sight up, the "side ways light " is basically being blocked by the sight because your eye is close to the rear sight,
Resulting in a sharper dot.

[The_Count]

48 years old with artificial cornea's, which have a set focal distance, so I wear progessive glasses for reading I simply shoot/wear them all the time.

Layman's theory, with the sight down you have a large light transmission through the front of the red dot and bleed through from around the tube/and sides.

With the sight up, the "side ways light " is basically being blocked by the sight because your eye is close to the rear sight,
Resulting in a sharper dot.

Sounds logical. I appreciate your response.

[Rhutch]

The rear sight is acting as an aperture and it increases your depth of field.


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[Vic303]

I wonder if that would work for me--I'm wearing multi-focal gas perm contacts, and it is really distorting the dot--worse than usual, due to the multi-focal properties of the lens. It's not so bad in bright light, but if it is dim, it gets more like a chrysanthemum than a dot.

[Hmac]

Bear in mind that there can be wide variations in the quality standards that optical labs adhere to. An optometrist can spend a lot of time (and your money) figuring out your astigmatism correction only to have the optical lab fudge on parts of the actual grinding, leaving your glasses a little short of your actual prescription. As you might anticipate, cheaper labs might be more likely to put you in that situation. Be careful about those super-cheap eyeglass deals.

[The_Count]

I wonder if that would work for me--I'm wearing multi-focal gas perm contacts, and it is really distorting the dot--worse than usual, due to the multi-focal properties of the lens. It's not so bad in bright light, but if it is dim, it gets more like a chrysanthemum than a dot.

I will say that the difference is startling, when going from regular cheek weld to my Backup sights. There is a lot less "Flash" around the dot, even at higher power. The visual effect of this is a "Shrinking" in Dot size. This could really be a benefit at Long range. In fact it has me thinking of going to a fixed rear over the flip-ups I'm currently running. I will try to flesh this out on Friday, and report back.:big_boss:

Count

[zacbol]

I was going to post an identical question, but found you beat me to the punch.

I also purchased an R1 from Midway and mounted it in an ADM mount (absolute co-witness) on my SR15. When the BUIS are folded, the dot appears blurry, almost if there's more than one, and/or it has trails. The seems to diminish if I turn the brightness up but then I get a red halo around the edges of the glass. If I put up *just* the rear sight, the dot becomes crisp. My problem with this solution, is my field of view is significantly obscured with both the rear sight AND the Aimpoint in the way so I don't much like that.

I am left-eye dominant and the vision in my right eye is not great (I had a lazy eye as a child, which was corrected, but the vision in that eye has always been a bit worse). However, even mounting the gun left-handed and using my left eye, which has nearly perfect vision, the phenomenon remains.

In contrast, I have an EoTech XPS on my Colt 6940 and that reticle appears bright and crisp.

Did you find anything else out? The answers given by TravelingChild & Rhutch sounds plausible but neither really provides a solution. I have not yet shot the gun with the R1, but I think I can still be sufficiently accurate, but it's still pretty annoying. Did you find anything out, either via this board, others, or from your optometrist?

[The_Count]

Zac,

I have not been to the doctor yet, but I will report back after my visit.

I have been shooting with the R-1 a lot lately. I zeroed at 50, and set up targets from 100-300 yds. Shots at 100 yards were easy, just put the dot on the target. I dialed the brightness down as low as possible, and had great results at all distances. At 300 yds I was able to hit a man size target 9 out of 10 shots. With a little work I think I could reliably make head shots at that distance. I think the trick with this optic is keeping the brightness low, and knowing your holdovers/offs.

I don't know where you located the R-1 on your rifle, but you might try moving the sight back on the rifle to increase your field of view.

All of the shots were made using Walmart - Federal bulk pack 223. (Which, by the way they have stopped selling) I am really excited to try this out with match ammo.

So, in summary, it appears that you have not shot your rifle with the R-1. I would recommend you get a good set of bags, and dedicate 200 rounds or more to the sight before you make any decisions about the sight. Try the 50 yd zero, and walk your targets out. What I learned about the sight is that any target from 0-300 yards can be hit with enough practice.

I hope this helps.

TC

[zacbol]

Thanks a ton for the detailed reply. I'm definitely not writing it off or selling it and will be testing it out today actually. Sounds like you've largely worked through the issues you had. I'm reading your answer as meaning your BUIS are folded down and you fixed it *solely* by dialing down the brightness, am I. Correct?

[The_Count]

You are correct BUIS were down. Dial down the brightness to the point you can barely see it. That will take the bulk of the "flash/flare" away. I have attached several images. The round and silhouette targets were shot at 100 yards. The three sheets of paper were shot at 300. Keep in mind I was not going for precision on these targets, I just wanted to get some rounds down range using dot. I shot targets using the 3, 9, 12 & 6 edges of the dot. These are just a few of the ones I did shoot. The head shots on the silhouette targets were called shots. At 300 I used the top two sheets of paper for a reference point. I placed the right edge of the dot on the upper left corner of the paper.

Finally there is a single sheet of paper I indexed one dot high and one dot left and fired three rounds. Two of those rounds hit the target.

Please remember I am very new to the AR game, as you can see from my targets I have a long way to go. I am only posting the images so that you know what the optic is capable of in a beginners hands.



Have fun at the range!

TC

[zacbol]

Thanks! I actually used the R1 for the first time today, and oddly didn't actually have the issues with bluriness. It was only at 25 yards but I'm guessing having my focus further than a few feet away is what solved things. I've have to use it a bit more but I think I still prefer the reticle on the XPS but the R1 is still a very nice piece of kit.

[JSantoro]

The rear sight is acting as an aperture and it increases your depth of field.

Taking this a step further....

Guys that do photography will have more to say about this, but having an aperture in between you and the dot is the same effect as dialing down the f-stop on a camera iris.

With a camera, the tighter/narrower the aperture, the less light gets let in....which usually means that one needs a tripod and a longer shutter speed to get a blur-free photo, but that's neither here nor there in this case...but the photo you get will have objects from the lens to the focal limit fully in focus vs. only the specific item focused upon being clear with a wider iris opening under the same conditions.

Either that helps, or muddies the waters quite nicely. :(

[scootle]

Blobby dots aside... I think the preferred method to sight everything in is to first sight in your BUIS as you see fit, then with both sights up, dial the RDS to touch the front sight post while sighting through the irons. Then, fold down the rear and make fine tuning to the RDS as needed.

This gets everything sighted in together all at once.

As for the optical tricks with the aperture making the flare and halos go away... I always like to think that other than RF, optics are another form of black magic. ;)