Need Night sight installation near PGH area, any suggestions?

[LittleRedToyota]

if they work like glock sights (post on the front, dovetail on the back), you can do it yourself in about 15 minutes.

[fireblast713]

Originally Posted by LittleRedToyota

if they work like glock sights (post on the front, dovetail on the back), you can do it yourself in about 15 minutes.

Any guide or instructions on what tools someone would need or how to do? Just saying it can be done and doing it are 2 different things hehe. If you know or can post a guide that'd be great

[LittleRedToyota]

this is for a glock...sigs may or may not work the same...i dunno.

1. field strip gun to remove slide and take barrel out of slide

2. using 3/16" (going from memory, but i'm pretty sure that is the right size) socket, remove nut on underside of slide holding front sight in place.

(note: the socket i use had a little bit of a "lip" to make them easier to guide onto nuts--so the actual grabbing part of the socket didn't start until a 1/16" or so into the socket. this "lip" was too deep and prevented the socket from getting a grip on the nut--since it only sticks out a millimeter or so--so i had to file off the "lip" so the socket so the actual grabbing part would sit flush and grab the nut. that took about 30 seconds.)

3. put the slide in a vice (i suggest putting rags between the slide and the jaws of the vice to prevent marring the slide finish). position the slide however you want so long as the rear sight is clear of the vice. use a brass punch and hammer to simply drive the rear sight sideways and out of the dove tail.

(if you happen to have a sight pusher, use that instead of the vice and punch in this and the next step, but i don't have one and don't think it is worth the money to buy one since a vice works just fine for doing a limited number of sight installations.)

4. start the new rear sight into the dovetail with your hand (just push it in as far as you can...won't be far, but will be far enough for it to stay in place).

(you could just pound the new rear sight in with the punch and hammer, but i am always afraid to whack the sight like that for fear of breaking the tritium vials, so i use the vice to push it into place instead.)

open the vice and position the slide so that one of the vice jaws is against the side of the slide and the other is against the sticking out rear sight. hold the slide in place with one hand while slowly closing the vice with the other. this will push the rear sight into the dovetail to the point where it is flush with the side of the slide.

at this point, the rear sight is almost installed, but will still be too far to one side.

now you have to jury rig things a bit--exactly how that will work depends on your vice.

open the vice wider. figure out a way to clamp the slide to one of the vice jaws. with my one vice, i can just put use two woodworking clamp and put one of each one's jaws inside the slide and the other on the outside of the vice and it will hold the slide in place nice and securely. with my other vice, i have to stack some wood under the slide to get it to stay in place. at any rate, figure out a way to securely hold the slide against one of the vice jaws.

how take a punch or flathead screwdriver bit (a brass punch solves the problem of risking marring the finish on the sight) and place one end on the sight and the other against the other jaw of the vice. hold the punch/screwdriver bit in place with one hand and slowly close the vice with the other hand. the vice pushes against the punch which pushes against the sight and forces is the rest of the way into the dove tail. push it until it is centered on the slide.

5. put a little dab of locktite on the new front sight post. put the post through the hold in the slide and screw on the nut on the underside. make sure to keep the front sight lined up parallel to the slide while doing this. the post is oval shaped, so it more or less will keep itself lined up (it isn't a circle so it cannot spin all the way around), but i have had some with a lot of play that i had to pay attention to to keep it straight. (i did this by flipping the slide upside down, closing the vice jaws so that the front sight would fit in between, but the slide itself would not, then gently closed the jaws so they were not really "clamped" on the front sight, but holding it from turning. so the slide is kinda sitting on top of the vice with the sight sandwiched between the jaws.)

using the 3/16" socket, tighten the nut on the sight post sticking through the underside of the slide.

5. if you keep the front sight at least close to straight and get the rear lined up in the middle, the accuracy will probably be fine for IPSC/self-defense shooting. if you want to, though, take the vice and punch to the range and you can use them to push the rear sight back and forth to sight the pistol in.

this sounds a lot more complicated when typed out than it really is. it's actually very simple--just a bit hard to explain in words.


here are some other write ups/videos:

http://www.dt-concepts.com/ca/ns.html

http://membres.lycos.fr/shooter/glock/hg701.html