Rear sight problem

[Harold1950]

The dovetail on my GPR barrel is cut more up and down rather than at an angle, when I put the sight in that I got from TOTW, it moves ever so slightly. my question is how hard is it to silver solder or can I use regular solder (less heat involved). I am worried about over heating the barrel. I know I have to get the gun to shoot on target prior to soldering. Looking for help and wisdom.........thanks in advance.......Harold

 

[Allan Gray]

Normal solder would work fine.

"Brazing" might get the barrel too hot. TOTW has a low heat solder, (the name escapes me but someone might chime in)...would also work.

 

[robertdale]

use a small punch to peen the edges with the sight in place this will lock it in and allow some adjustment. the punch should have a smooth face

 

[Birddog6]

My guess is the sight you bought is not the right size for the dovetail. Everything on the GPR is metric & the USA parts (sights) are not cut to a metric measurement. Thus when you buy a sight for it (unless it is made for the GPR) you buy one with a larger dovetail & file the sight to fit or file the dovetail larger to fit the sight.

Any heat to the barrel is gonna mess up the bluing if it is blued.

My suggestion is that if it is just slightly loose, take the sight out & with a very light hammer with a VERY smooth face, lightly tap across the top of both sides of the dovetail in the barrel & peen the edges down just a tad, nice & evenly across. Then tap your sight back into the dovetail & see how it works. If it's not tight enough, then remove & tap it some more. On most of my rifles I build I fit the sight & then put 4 stake marks on it, this way if the sight does come loose later from the customer adjusting them alot, there is a place to punch that is already there & not have a bunch of punch marks all over the barrel.

 

[tg]

I would go along with the punching to tighten up the sight,that way you don't have a permanent sight and a blemished barrel, Birddogs method will work well.

 

[William Joy]

Depending if historical correctness is important or not - I agree peening will work, or drill and tap the sight, put a small set screw in. Then at the range put some red locktite in the dovetail, install sight and screw, testfire, adjust ( you have approx 10 min) and then let harden..... I guess it is called a slip fit dovetail for sights....

 

[BrownBear]

I was leery to start peening on my barrel, so I peened the base of the sight to flatten and spread it a little. Took about ten seconds and then I had a tight fit without dinging the barrel dovetail, just in case I wanted to switch sights down the road a piece.

 

[mazo kid]

use a small punch to peen the edges with the sight in place this will lock it in and allow some adjustment. the punch should have a smooth face

All good suggestions; I will add one more: stipple the BOTTOM of the rear sight in several places with a small center punch to tighten the sight in the dovetail.