Dot sights are the thing on bullseye pistols and at the marksman level (scoring high 80’s to low 90’s) they definitely buy me points- I do a lot better with .22 and .45, still using the old UltraDots which are still going after 20 years. I think I change the batteries every 5-6 years. Both my bullseye pistols required a trip to the pistolsmith to accommodate mounts. That said, my pistolsmith shot High Masters and he could easily best all of us at Pistol League with iron sights. I think he said it bought him only a point or two until serious matches became hard work and the dots were less fatigue.
My bullseye pistol is a Norinco copy of the TT Olympia and the sight radius is very short. Too short for my skills. The dot makes all the difference.
I’ve shot a few squirrels with my bullseye pistol in the forest where it was bad lighting and the dot was fabulous. Rabbits in the snow and sunshine, the dot was gone- washed out.
One time a pal who shot iron sights said the only reason I was beating him at pistol league was because he was using Iron sights. I turned my dot off and tried shooting just by co-centering the Ultradot tube on the target and ALMOST beat him.. well, he beat me... but after shooting my Norinco he agreed that much of my advantage was having a great trigger. (See Pistolsmith, above). I knew that just natural point and a little guidance from the sight tube alone would do okay from shooting rabbits in the snow when the dot was washed out anyhow.
Of course ultradots are too big for you guys that want to hide your pistols but I have been thinking that since a good pistol will run for more than about a hundred years, manufacturers need something to get us to buy more stuff. Pistolsmiths are now as rare as record players, so ability to mount optics is worth a decent amount to me for my next purchase (unless I find that Single Seven I keep thinking about.)
Price of sturdy dot optics is still, to my mind, too high. I don’t want to pay as much for a little thing with a battery in it as I paid for my boom paddle. Prices on optics will go down.
Once upon a time I had eyes like an Eagle. As I got old I lost that. Finding the right glasses for shooting... well, I don’t compete any more and use a .22 rifle now in the woods. Scope solved my eye problem... but I do think that dot sights will greatly increase how people learn to shoot accurately.
When the variable of sight picture is removed I think people will see the effect that grip, stance, and trigger control have on their shooting. I think they will also see that lots of the popular handguns are simply far less accurate than others.
There are some really poor shooters at the range. I got coaching from a High Master and practiced hard since I was about 14. You can’t shoot a pistol well by a mandate of your manliness. There are also fellas with pistols that are just plain not accurate. You just can’t learn to shoot well without instruction, practice, feedback and an accurate pistol.
The dot sight gives feedback, it’s good in low light and indoors, rubbish in the snow (super bright conditions). It’s good for bad eyes. Most importantly, it’s relatively new to casual shooters and Marketing is going to push to sell them.
For hunting, optical scopes are still the way to go, except they are heavy and clunky to carry. For high recoil, the weight is an advantage. I expect weight is an advantage for race guns, too...
Anyways, I think mounting dots is the next wave of fashion and they make a big difference at the range and hunting for most conditions.
