Sight - front lens protection

[LeekSausage]

Hi All,

 

New to airsoft again after a 15 year hiatus. Seems the sport and equipment has evolved.

 

I've noticed people use a glass / perspex attachment that sits in front of their sight to protect the front element.

 

I come from a photography background, we use UV filters screwed into the lens itself for protection. The 2 sights ive got appear to have threading at the front to support this.

 

My question is - why arent people using these and why do they opt for the standalone picatinny attachment? I think aesthetically they look rubbish.

 

Am i missing something glaringly obvious?

[Shamal]

Not all sights have threaded ends.

Red dot sights for instance. I use the flip up sight protectors after loosing a couple of units.

 

Welcome back to the sport 👍

 

Regards

[RostokMcSpoons]

There's a company called Red Dot Engineering who sell better front sight protectors on eBay. 
https://www.ebay.co.uk/str/reddotengineering
 

They use pellet-proof plastic, rather than the sacrificial stuff on those flip-up ones, and they'll 3D-print stuff to specific dimensions (to slip over the outside of the sight)
I ordered a custom one for this Walther red dot, and apart from the fact it was a stupidly tight fit (I'd recommend adding 1mm to the required diameter), it's pretty damned good for £9.   Very fast turnaround on it too.
Also pictured the standard one they sell for the Amazon-special 'Coyote' sight.  That's fits a bit loose, recommend gluing it in place or it'll get knocked off.

 

 

[Lozart]

2 hours ago, LeekSausage said:

Hi All,

 

New to airsoft again after a 15 year hiatus. Seems the sport and equipment has evolved.

 

I've noticed people use a glass / perspex attachment that sits in front of their sight to protect the front element.

 

I come from a photography background, we use UV filters screwed into the lens itself for protection. The 2 sights ive got appear to have threading at the front to support this.

 

My question is - why arent people using these and why do they opt for the standalone picatinny attachment? I think aesthetically they look rubbish.

 

Am i missing something glaringly obvious?

 

Welcome back.

 

As for sacrificial lenses, in photography where neutral filters are cheap and available and designed to fit in the threaded lens housing, you're basically buying a thing that is not designed as a sacrificial item to be sacrificial because it's cheap. In airsoft there's loads of killflash fittings that slide into or over the lens tube so it makes sense to pursue that avenue for sacrificial lens protection as opposed to making a threaded fitting which would be more expensive. In terms of the rail mounted ones, I agree that they are ugly AF but again, the rail space available makes it easy to fit and forget.

[Adolf Hamster]

3 hours ago, LeekSausage said:

My question is - why arent people using these and why do they opt for the standalone picatinny attachment? I think aesthetically they look rubbish.

 

Am i missing something glaringly obvious?

 

ease of fitting.

 

it depends on the particular optic, some it's not too difficult to press/glue/blu-tac an acrylic disc into the existing housing to act as a sacrificial protector with no asthetic issues.

 

the rail mounted options are easy and work for sights where doing the above isn't easy/possible.

 

some folks (hello) really dislike the external protectors, and if they can't do a subtle method of protection just run without and accept that the occasional broken optic is gonna be a thing. that said i've so far only had 2 optics lost to getting shot out so far and both of them were amazon specials.

[Badgerlicious]

I highly recommend getting a sheet of 2mm lexan and cutting yourself a protector. You can either slot it in behind a lens cover, or glue it in with some clear silicone sealant. It works for the aesthetically minded out there and it's not sacrificial, it will repel bbs with ease. It even works with weird shapes like reflex sights.