Installing sight

[Don]

I have a CVA plains pistol I put together from a kit a few years ago and I want to install a rear sight. My question is if I file a dove tail into the barrel for a rear sight will I be weakening the barrel and make the gun dangerous? I usually shoot 30 to 40 grains of pyrodex RS through it.

Don

 

[Zonie]

You probably would not weaken it enough to make it dangerous but, what is the caliber and what is the distance across the flats?
Knowing the wall thickness is important to knowing how strong the barrel will be after dovetailing the sight notch.

 

[Don]

Zonie,

Cal. is .50 barrel thickness near as I can tell groove to outside flat is 3/16 of an inch and my dovetail is 1/16 of an inch deep. About 3/8ths across the flats.

Don

 

[Terry Zboril]

Don,
The dovetail sight groove shouldn't be more than .050 or less deep, and shouldnt hurt in the least. :results:

Regards,
Terry

 

[Don]

Terry,

I'm not up on my metric convertions so is 1/16th too much or is it OK?

Thanks for the reply,

Don

 

[Zonie]

Don: 1/16 inch is .062.
Although this is .012 (about 4 sheets of paper)deeper than the other post suggested, I wouldn't worry about it.
Based on your comment about the wall being 3/16 inch (.188), your dovetail will still leave 1/8 inch of solid metal.

I guess I was not specific enough with my question about the measurement "across the flats".
I don't blame you for misunderstanding me, but when most folks talk about the "distance across the flats" on a octagon barrel, they mean measuring from the flat on one side of the barrel to the flat on the other side of the barrel. They aren't asking for the width of the flats.

Using your 3/16 wall thickness and the .50 caliber, the "distance across the flats" for your barrel would be .188+ .188+ .500 inch or .876 or 7/8ths of an inch.

So, is a 1/16 dovetail in a 7/8 octagon barrel OK? Yup. There are a whole lot of rifles shooting over 80 grains of powder with that same condition ::

 

[Don]

Thanks a bunch Zonie.

Don