I’ve also shot my red dots without batteries, using the optic housing, as a big ghost-ring sight, which is still surprisingly accurate at defensive distances.
Wow, thank you for posting that -- I would never have thought of it, but it makes sense, as long as what you want to hit is inside the ring you would probably be fine.
Meanwhile I started working with my new AR. So much time had elapsed since my original lesson and one range visit (largely due to the arrival of coronavirus in the US, but with all the discombobulation I didn't even buy the gun until recently) that my body didn't remember the right stance. I've been practicing in my house, first just trying to get on target and then trying to get on target right away when raising the gun, which is now thankfully going fairly well. Next added dry-firing with the dime exercise (put a dime on the flash hider, shoulder the gun, pull the trigger, goal is for the dime not to fall off), happily no problems with that. With advice from a knowledgeable friend I decided it's better to first cement the muscle memory shouldering it on the right, before trying to learn how to do it on the left.
The very good news on the vision issue is that after concentrating on looking at the target instead of the sight, I can now see the red dot with both eyes open, when I had tried it at my lesson I was seeing two red dots and ended up using the red dot sight like a regular sight, i.e. with just my right eye open.
Now I need to get to the range to try actually shooting but being in the highest COVID risk group I'm not going to my normal indoor range, and temperatures here are currently running 110-117, so the trick will be to get to the outdoor range very early in the morning when it's only 90-something.
However,
the red dot sight I bought (Holosun HS403c) seems only to work in bright light. Supposedly it runs on "solar" (ambient light) and automatically switches to battery if ambient light is insufficient, or you can force it to use the battery by holding the plus button down for 3 seconds, but for me it does not work unless in fairly bright light. I bought the AR for home defense -- my house is sufficiently hardened that I will have time to get into position to be ready to fire if wannabe breakers-in start succeeding, so my plan was to direct light to where they would be coming in while myself remaining behind cover in semi-darkness, but so far I cannot get this sight to do that. I even tested by standing right next to the relevant light switch, aiming with the light on, see the red light, turn off the light switch without moving the gun, red dot disappears. IF ANYONE HERE HAS EXPERIENCE WITH THIS SIGHT OR OTHERWISE KNOWS HOW TO FIX THIS PROBLEM I WOULD VERY MUCH APPRECIATE ADVICE. Otherwise I guess for my intended purpose I wasted my money on this sight and have to get something different. I am not willing to make myself easier for BGs to see.
Separately, when I get up to learning to shoot off the left shoulder I will report back as to how that goes WRT the vision issue -- my central vision is worse in the left eye than the right one, so even though I will have both eyes open the left one will be the one looking through the sight, so I'm a little apprehensive about that aspect of it. (When I shoot my revolvers left-handed I use my right eye.)
edited to correct three minutes to three seconds, sorry!