How does Bubba install a GI front sight?

[Guamsst]

Found one cone shaped stone bit which worked really well. Stayed up way past my bedtime but I got the sights replaced and coated the dots in Duraglo and flourescent yellow front dot. Can't wait to go to the range and see how much worse I shoot with upgraded sights....LOL

Thanks for the advice and photos. I peened it and then epoxied it too. It might stay in place.

[Guamsst]

Ok, after several trips to the range and hundreds of rounds of ammo the front sight is still tight. Makes me a little concerned about the "Gunsmiths" that replaced them and then they came off.

[Oyaji]

Delete duplicate post

[Oyaji]

Why dick around with it? Any thing worth doing is worth doing right. Send it off to Novak to have the slide milled and new sights installed.

http://novaksights.com/products/sights/index.html

[Dave Waits]

Oyaji, if you're going that route why buy cheap Novaks, put a set of these on.

[Guamsst]

Why dick around with it? Any thing worth doing is worth doing right. Send it off to Novak to have the slide milled and new sights installed.

I invested $25 and some time in mine and had it done in one evening. Care to qoute price and turnaround on having Novak mill and install?

[Col. Colt]

Installed tightly, the tenon sight is superior to the dovetailed front - which can move - and looks better and is cheaper to boot. Dovetailed front sights belong on Kentucky rifles and Brown Bess Muskets - where they originated. Not modern handguns. CC

[Dave Waits]

Colonel, most of the better dovetail front-sights, like the Kensight on my Rock, are pinned once windage is settled. Mine is rock-solid sir.

[Col. Colt]

Pinned does indeed work, if you must have a dovetailed front. I think John Moses Browning made the right choice. He had not heard of the United Autoworkers Union, apparently....

But all the extra work to install a dovetail is totally unnecessary, if the tenon style is done right - which it was on over a million US Military M1911s, and hundreds of thousands of civilian 1911s.

Why cut a larger chunk out of the front of the slide, locate the sight, then drill and pin it? Even if the tenon was not done correctly initially (and if it is a Colt it is under warranty - free fix), it is still easier and cheaper to correctly replace it than to do a bunch of machine work. And the tenon front sight looks like it grew there, and cannot move - no pinning required. More elegant, more "modern". CC

[Guamsst]

Col. I agree. What point is there to a dovetailed front. Unless you plan on replacing the front sight often there is no benefit. You can adjust windage from the rear sight so the front dovetail is unnecessary.