Front Sight Recommendation

[OldMaineWoodsman]

I have a Selb built Hawken replica. I have come to the point where I simply cannot see the blade front sight anymore. Not without really looking anyway. It has a fixed Buckhorn type rear sight. Any ideas on a front sight that will be easier to see and not too high for the rear sight? I have these two, but don't really want Fiber Optic unless I have to. Thanks in advance for any ideas.

 

[Thomas.bill92]

First thing I would do is paint it white, fingernail polish will do once you get all the oil off of the surface. If it works, great, don't have to re-zero your rifle!

 

[Old Hawkeye]

Any bead type sight will be easier to see. In the order of which is easiest, it would be fiber optic, white bead, with a brass bead third. You can get any of these in a height to match your existing sight. Williams & Marble both make them. Brownell's has the full compliment of options both in type & height.

 

[OldMaineWoodsman]

Thanks guys, much appreciated.

 

[Rock Home Isle]

First thing I would do is paint it white, fingernail polish will do once you get all the oil off of the surface. If it works, great, don't have to re-zero your rifle!

My eyes have been on a steady decline for awhile now, I’ve done this right here for years.

Another thing I’ve done recently is I picked up a 1/4 oz bottle of Metallic Fluorescent Orange modeling paint off Amazon, and used this to touch up the front sights. The sights are now even visible in low light, where the white nail polish turns to a grey…things are looking much crisper now.

 

[morehops52]

I tried every color of paint incl fluorescent and it didn't work for me.. For my blade, I ordered a smaller-than-average fiber optic and epoxied it to the top of the post. Now I have a much finer sight picture that I can see in low light. It's also not as clunky looking as a FO mount.

 

[Patocazador]

A rear peep sight is what worked for me.

 

[doubleset]

The typical fiber optic sights are pretty clunky and ugly. What I'm using now is a TOW front blade sight (suitably filed down) and with a short (~ 1/2") piece of small diameter fiber optic rod glued to the top. I got a bunch of the fiber optic rod of different diameters and colors from Ebay (several vendors offer different things). I've got orange on it at the moment, but will probably put green on it. I use a bit of GorillaWeld to glue it on, and it even works on the nickel blade (though I do treat it with a bit of soldering acid just before I glue it).

The only real trick if you go in that direction is that putting the fiber optic on top of the blade to make it a visible "bead" of course increases the height. So it takes a bit of painful trial and error to get the blade filed down to the right height so when you add the fiber optic it works out right for you. But, for me at least, it's well worth the effort.

 

[cgoff]

I was having the same issue and went with a thicker steel front sight instead of brass and had a peep put on and that fixed the issue

 

[wattlebuster]

All my front sights are made from old silver coins which is 90% silver IIRC. Im nearly 60 an about half blind and I have no trouble seeing the front sight even in low light such as Dusk or early dawn hunting conditions. Over time the silver will get a tad dull but you can bring it back to a nice shine by simply rubbing it with a paper towel

 

[doubleset]

I did try the nickel sight by itself, and it's better than any other metal material in terms of visibility. But there ain't nothing like a reasonably sized fiber optic sight -- except a scope or maybe a tube sight. In terms of visibility for me, at least, the order from best to worst is: fiber optic, white bead or post, silver/nickel, copper or brass, steel.

I think something like a "three dot" system as used on handguns (two white dots with square rear notch, and front dot) might be super. But I don't think you can find one on the market that you could easily fit to a BP barrel dovetail. You could probably make one with just a drill or drill press and some effort, but it would be a pain.

 

[Rifleman1776]

My personal taste for front sights is a black post. For me it will contrast well even against dark objects well into the late afternoon. When it gets too dark out to see I go home.
I put several sets of Marble white dot sights on rifles for my wife. Two, maybe three, times they got knocked off in the woods while she was hunting. Not the thing you want when trying to making wifey happy.

 

[doubleset]

My personal taste for front sights is a black post. For me it will contrast well even against dark objects well into the late afternoon. When it gets too dark out to see I go home.

I can believe that, though I doubt it would work for me for squirrel-sized game. Since I spend almost all of my time target shooting, it just doesn't work satisfactorily at all. I'm surprised the Marble sights weren't more robust. I looked at them as possible front sights, but it looked pretty complicated to match front to rear for what I wanted, and of course they wouldn't fit my dovetail. So I went a different direction. I imagine you also had to file the bases or modify the dovetails to get them on a BP barrel. I currently have one of their ramp-style full buckhorns on my Lyman GPR.

 

[Rifleman1776]

I imagine you also had to file the bases or modify the dovetails to get them on a BP barrel.

True for the Marbles. Not a big deal, just part of being an ml'er. Do wat ye need to do and do it yerself.

 

[doubleset]

True for the Marbles. Not a big deal, just part of being an ml'er. Do wat ye need to do and do it yerself.

Yeah, I've gotten real good at filing sight bases and touching up dovetails. I had to do that for the Marble rear on the GPR, and several others I experimented with. The front sight that sits on my Crockett rifle has been seriously filed for contour and height, but TOW told me the base would fit -- and it did perfectly. Saved a bunch of time.

 

[morehops52]

The typical fiber optic sights are pretty clunky and ugly. What I'm using now is a TOW front blade sight (suitably filed down) and with a short (~ 1/2") piece of small diameter fiber optic rod glued to the top. I got a bunch of the fiber optic rod of different diameters and colors from Ebay (several vendors offer different things). I've got orange on it at the moment, but will probably put green on it. I use a bit of GorillaWeld to glue it on, and it even works on the nickel blade (though I do treat it with a bit of soldering acid just before I glue it).

The only real trick if you go in that direction is that putting the fiber optic on top of the blade to make it a visible "bead" of course increases the height. So it takes a bit of painful trial and error to get the blade filed down to the right height so when you add the fiber optic it works out right for you. But, for me at least, it's well worth the effort.

Essentially I used the same method. I really like the green sight. I did not file my sight down but I did have to adjust my rear peep as I found that the fiber optic addition made the rifle shoot about 6" low.

 

[doubleset]

Essentially I used the same method. I really like the green sight. I did not file my sight down but I did have to adjust my rear peep as I found that the fiber optic addition made the rifle shoot about 6" low.

If you were shooting in certain kinds of organized competitions, the rear peep would not be an option.

 

[morehops52]

If you were shooting in certain kinds of organized competitions, the rear peep would not be an option.

I only shoot for hunting and pleasure. Never shoot competition ,but appreciate you pointing it out. Q: what about fiber optics in competition? I would think they would be banned.

 

[andy52]

All my front sights are made from old silver coins which is 90% silver IIRC. Im nearly 60 an about half blind and I have no trouble seeing the front sight even in low light such as Dusk or early dawn hunting conditions. Over time the silver will get a tad dull but you can bring it back to a nice shine by simply rubbing it with a paper towel

Mine are all the same also, I keep heavily worn silver coins around just for that purpose. When I'm hunting I carry a small piece of soft leather to keep the sight polished.

 

[doubleset]

The NMLRA rules have no specific prohibition of fiber optic sights, and none of the rules appear to have any implications concerning them. It would be hard to exclude them on any coherent grounds which would also allow the painting of sights in different colors, including reflective colors, using different colors of plastic beads (which are not prohibited), etc. And, perhaps unlike some other organizations, the NMLRA has no overt concern with "historical accuracy" -- but only with defining classes of rifles and pistols for competition purposes.