Bifocal Sunglasses?

Davecat

Davecat

Pre-takeoff checklist
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Davecat
I am progessing along with my flight lessons and one thing has consistently been a real pian in the a@* for me. I use and need some magnification for reading....my distance vision is fine. I am tired of fumbling around for my readers for checklist, chart reading etc and back to sunglasses. I have found some sites selling progressive reading sunglasses and others selling simple bifocal sunglasses. The price difference is pretty large. Progressives start at $160, whereas the bifocals start at $16. i know you get what you pay for. Not afraid of spending on progressives...just wondering if anyone has pros/cons of either.

Thx Dave
 
I've been wearing progressive lenses longer than I've been flying. They work fine for me. Transitions on my main pair, but I have a pair of sunglasses, as well. Can't say I've worn them as the transitions coating works fine for me.
 
I just got a set of Maui Jim's with bifocals, not cheap, but a $40 premium over non bifocal I can live with.
 
I tried progressive lenses and I just could not get used to them.
I had my optometrist make me a set of bifocals so that the bottom part was cut so that I could see the panel and the top part is for distance. It works quite well. The bottom part works well for reading charts or my Ipad too as well as the panel. There was no extra charge over the regular bifocal price. They just grind them for a slightly different viewing distance.
 
JOhnH said:
I tried progressive lenses and I just could not get used to them.
I had my optometrist make me a set of bifocals so that the bottom part was cut so that I could see the panel and the top part is for distance. It works quite well. The bottom part works well for reading charts or my Ipad too as well as the panel. There was no extra charge over the regular bifocal price. They just grind them for a slightly different viewing distance.
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That's fine for the third class medical which tests at two distances, near and far. I switched to progressives to pass a second class which tests at an intermediate distance as well as near and far. The progressives do take some getting used to as did the bifocals come to think of it.
 
I wear progressives, and have since before I flew.

I needed a change in lenses, and I cheaped it out and got new clear progressives, and bifocal sunglasses. It turns out that the distance from my eyes to the radio stack was right in between the focal length of the two lenses, and they were essentially useless for the cockpit.

I bought a pair of progressive dark glasses and am now a happy pilot!

-Skip
 
Witmo said:
That's fine for the third class medical which tests at two distances, near and far. I switched to progressives to pass a second class which tests at an intermediate distance as well as near and far. The progressives do take some getting used to as did the bifocals come to think of it.
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I used to work for a guy was a 747 capt for United, he had trifocals ground: bottom to read the FMS/console, mid for the panel and upper for distance.
 
Henning said:
I used to work for a guy was a 747 capt for United, he had trifocals ground: bottom to read the FMS/console, mid for the panel and upper for distance.
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What did he do about the switches on the roof?

That bit me hard when I attended adult Space Camp. The shuttle simulators had a lot of switches and circuit breakers on the ceiling. With my bifocals, I had to get my head way, WAY back to read them.

I've heard of guys getting the lower and upper part of a set of trifocals as near vision, and leave the center for distance.

Ron Wanttaja
 
Cheap reading sunglasses with near-vision insets are just fine for us older presbyopics who are contact lens wearers or have good distant visual acuity. Look for ones which are NOT polarized (unless you don't have any glass panels at all in your cockpit, as they're polarized, too) and have UV-A/UV-B protection. Talked this over with my board-certified optometrist, and she says it's fine -- in fact, she sells them in her very high-end vision operation.
 
A few years back I found a booth in one of the main hangars that had bi focal sunglasses.. That was about the time my vision went from 20-15 to... less then perfect..:sad::sad:.. All I needed was some low powered readers. I started out at 1.25 but as I get older I now need the 1.75 ones... Gettin old sucks..:yes:.. For cheap ones I hit Sams club and buy the 5 pack for 15 bucks but they don't sell sunglasses in bi focals.... The ones I got at OSH were 20 bucks or so and they work pretty darn good... Not as good as my regular Ray Bans..... These are similar but I don't think they are the same people as the OSH ones...

http://www.readingglassesshopper.com/aviator-bi-focal-reading-sunglasses.html
 
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wanttaja said:
What did he do about the switches on the roof?

That bit me hard when I attended adult Space Camp. The shuttle simulators had a lot of switches and circuit breakers on the ceiling. With my bifocals, I had to get my head way, WAY back to read them.

I've heard of guys getting the lower and upper part of a set of trifocals as near vision, and leave the center for distance.

Ron Wanttaja
Click to expand...

I imagine he used whichever focused best.
 
RotorAndWing said:
Sure beats the alternative..... ;)
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I had a call into Dr Jack Kevorkian last fall, but while waiting on hold, a government operator broke into the call and told me "productive citizens like me cannot end it all because they need my hard work to pay taxes to fund all the dead beats sucking cash out of the general fund...:mad2::mad2::mad:
 
The problem with any glasses for distance, progressives or not, is that you only see well through certain portions of the lens. If you look off to the side or over your shoulder you don't see squat, even if you think you do...
I always fly with distance correcting contacts and special sunglasses. Then no matter where I look I am seeing the best I can for traffic. My sunglasses are shaded on top with clear and readers on the bottom so I have some shading looking outside and a clear, unshaded view of the panel. Only one company makes these glasses and I never understood why that is. The others at the airshows just talk up their stuff but it's not the same. All others are shaded low and make it miserable to see anything in the cockpit - duh!
Just my 2 cents.
 
Goofy said:
The problem with any glasses for distance, progressives or not, is that you only see well through certain portions of the lens. If you look off to the side or over your shoulder you don't see squat, even if you think you do...
I always fly with distance correcting contacts and special sunglasses. Then no matter where I look I am seeing the best I can for traffic. My sunglasses are shaded on top with clear and readers on the bottom so I have some shading looking outside and a clear, unshaded view of the panel. Only one company makes these glasses and I never understood why that is. The others at the airshows just talk up their stuff but it's not the same. All others are shaded low and make it miserable to see anything in the cockpit - duh!
Just my 2 cents.
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So who makes your's?


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I went to my optometrist about the exact same issue. He had two pairs of custom glasses made for me, one pair clear for night flying and one pair tinted at the top half for daytime. They were not cheap, around $400.00 per pair.

He had me take the frames with just glass or plastic in them and told me to sit in my airplane and make a mark where the glare shield was on the glasses.

The end result was absolutely perfect. With the glasses I have 20/15 outside vision and 20/15 reading vision. Then another bonus, they seem to work perfectly no matter what plane I am flying. All I have to do is slide them slightly up or down my nose.

The nice thing about the split lens is I also have most of my peripheral vision as well.

There was no having to get used to them, like with bifocals or progressive lenses, they worked perfectly the very first time I used them. They were well worth every penny.

They do not work for driving my Jeep though, the split is too high. I keep both pairs in my headset bag. They are never used for anything but flying.

-John
 
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My wife (who got lasik'd for distance) uses bifocals with clear tops available from readingglasses.com. She has them both in clear and sunglass versions.
 
flyingron said:
My wife (who got lasik'd for distance) uses bifocals with clear tops available from readingglasses.com. She has them both in clear and sunglass versions.
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Thanks for the link! I have great distance vision but got hit with the mid life reading crisis. I got set up with progressives with the top clear and I absolutely hate them. Things are distorted at the fringes.


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I am told that progressives can distort your peripheral vision enough that it is difficult to judge the flare and land consistently. So, I wear progressives to give me a built in excuse.
 
I have bifocals, for flying only. They are BIG almost like the sunglasses celebrities wear. They look stupid but they give me a wider view. The lower third is cut for close-up (panel and kneeboard) and the center and top all one piece for distance. They are great! I've been using Walmart's vision center for years; their full price (no insurance) is cheaper than using my insurance discount at the well-known vision store chains.
For sunglasses I bought clip-on shades at an airshow. I remember also seeing websites for clip-ons.
 
I don't know where the cutover is, but bifocals and trifocals are better than progressives if you have a large correction. I needed bifocals and trifocals for 400, 500, and 600 corrections. With progressives, the visibility band was simply too narrow. If you don't normally have a large correction, the progressives are probably best since you don't need to get used to the line every time you change glasses. BTW, having the line in the right place is an art. Your local mall probably won't get it right and won't care very much. In addition, for flying, the line needs to be just a little lower than normal (you are looking down at distance) and you need to work with your optician about that.
 
I had Serengetti's for sunglasses. They were glass lenses with color throughout. One problem there is that the color is denser and darker where the lens is thicker. Don't know if glass lenses are still available, but if you have a large correction, you may want to think of that, too.
 
Ha ha!....board-certified optometrist......

I'm an optometrist. We're all "certified" by a "board."

Ron Levy said:
Cheap reading sunglasses with near-vision insets are just fine for us older presbyopics who are contact lens wearers or have good distant visual acuity. Look for ones which are NOT polarized (unless you don't have any glass panels at all in your cockpit, as they're polarized, too) and have UV-A/UV-B protection. Talked this over with my board-certified optometrist, and she says it's fine -- in fact, she sells them in her very high-end vision operation.
Click to expand...
 
Ron Levy said:
Cheap reading sunglasses with near-vision insets are just fine for us older presbyopics who are contact lens wearers or have good distant visual acuity. Look for ones which are NOT polarized (unless you don't have any glass panels at all in your cockpit, as they're polarized, too) and have UV-A/UV-B protection. Talked this over with my board-certified optometrist, and she says it's fine -- in fact, she sells them in her very high-end vision operation.
Click to expand...

My Maui Jim's are polarized with no interference with my panel. There is issue with old equipment and cheap glasses, but for the last decade or so there has been a standard of alignment.
 
I decided I needed bifocals when I couldn't see to tune the radio frequencies on the 430. I am near sighted in my right eye and so I cheated on chart reading (peeking under my glasses). When I asked my eye doctor about it he said that he doesn't recommend progressive lenses for pilots (the peripheral vision thing mentioned elsewhere in this thread).

I got a clear pair and a pair of sunglasses in bifocal. They worked just fine until the finish on the sunglasses began to bubble and flake off around the edges. (They came from who ever makes the prescription lenses for Sam's Club.)

I replaced them with a pair of clip on sunglasses over my regular bifocals and am happy with it. I particularly like how easy it is to change from sunglasses on to off.

John
 
I got a pair of progressive sunglasses from 39dollarglasses.com for under $100.
 
That's the bifocal sunglasses I use...

http://www.av-sun.com/

Good quality, comfortable to wear...do not interfere with headsets...

Around $ 100.00....

I highly recommend the larger size lenses...
 
Got 2 pairs $20 from Costco. Work well and come in sport sunglass style.
Gotta love Costco :D
 
I normally carry three pairs.

One set of 'work' glasses, focused so I can see the 5 computer screens I sit in front of

Night time driving glasses (clear lenses) & day time driving glasses. Same Rx as daytime, but sunglasses.

Those are long distance on the top and arm's length on the bottom. Makes it really nice to be able to see traffic up ahead and the panel/dash/etc is also nice and blur free.
 
Armageddon Aviator said:
That's the bifocal sunglasses I use...

http://www.av-sun.com/

Good quality, comfortable to wear...do not interfere with headsets...

Around $ 100.00....

I highly recommend the larger size lenses...
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I will second these glasses. A bit pricey for plastic lenses but the glasses work great. The bifocals are clear and just the right size for panel viewing. I still would like to find a clear lense with a bifocal. Just don't like those Columbo half height ones.
 
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