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Handgun Shooters, Do You -

4K views 37 replies 28 participants last post by  soonerfan66 
#1 ·
Dot your front sight? I have taken to using a very small container of Testers fluorescent yellow with a toothpick to accentuate the front sight. It helps big time.

If the back two sights are white dots, you can instantly pick out the front sight, that used to be white. If the front sight had nothing, it would disappear when pointed at something dark.

If you've not discovered/used this tip, give it a try. It makes a HUGE difference.

My entire life/Military Service, when using a Handgun - it is always Frontsight, Frontsight, Frontsight. This little tip makes frontsight aquisition really quick.
 
#4 ·
I've never painted my front sights. Just a FWIW, my eldest brother carried a snub nose .38 Colt while he was a Detective. He relayed a story to me that I thing might be worth sharing:

The Officers on his Department were required to qualify with their carry weapons annually. At the time, his Department required that everyone carry .38 S&W Special caliber weapons loaded with factory 158 grain lead round nose ammunition. Part of the qualification was done in darkened shooting on the range. My brother said he used to score in the highest ranks - even though the other Officers used their Colt Troopers, S&W Model K-15s and Colt Police Positive revolvers with 4" barrels and he shot his 2" barrel snubbie.

How? He painted the front sight blade with white-out and was able to use his front sight while the others couldn't see theirs. Took them a while to catch on how he managed to score so high....
 
#8 · (Edited)
Just like a lot of things, the best answer usually is “it depends...”😎

I’ve tried them all over the years, from red and orange nail Polish, white, and the ever popular “sight black.”

It all depends on your target and available light. For example white would suck on a snowy day😉 But the example above of the cop on the known range with known lighting and targets, it was just the ticket. “One size NEVER ‘fits all’.”😉

Now a small dot or insert that still allows the dark outline of the front post works well, but it takes experimentation to get the right size...too small you won’t see, too large you might as well paint the whole thing.

From my IPSC days, the best was always a flat, (undercut worked best, but might snag on the draw) wide front sight that we “smoked” as black as we could get it before each stage. Easiest to pick up on various targets.

Funny thing about ramped sights, no matter what color you paint them, in many light conditions all you are going to see is a shade of black anyway😉

But funny thing, on a lot of the guns I’ve hunted with with iron sights, especially my flintlock with the light colored front blade...I’m always asking my wife for her brightest red nail polish before I go out...mainly because that is what her grandfather always did😉
 
#9 ·
I agree with Polish. For me it depends on the target(s). However, nearly all my revolvers with Patridge sights have the front sights whited with white out.
 
#11 · (Edited)
Just did my CZ27 that I got out yesterday, for the 1st time in a long while. Just finished dotting it. Tried to post a before/after post, but my Internet "Service" is waning like usual about this time everyday, so no go. Will try and post them tomorrow AM.

I live in the Boonies. Mtns all around. Use a Verizon 4G dedicated tablet internet to get access to the Internet. Nothing much better around here. My "Service" disappears everyday around 9-11AM. Gone till 7pm'ish. "Terrain related." Yeah Okay. Right. You must think I'm Stupid or something. Grrrrr...................

This Luminescent Yellow, is bordering on Green. It is exremely "Visible."
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Sorry, not the best before and after. The before photo was taken to show the partially hidden hammer that you can still easily thumb cock for SA trigger. You can see the green tint to the fluorescent Yellow.
 
#12 ·
I have never painted sights. Some of my handguns have night sights. One has a Holosun green dot sight. Most just have whatever sight that came on the gun.
 
#16 ·
I have never painted a front sight, that I can remember. Most of the revolvers that I have already have some sort of colored insert in the front sight. The Sig Sauer pistols all have night sights on them. I recently put very small red-dots on a couple of my pistols (Ruger57 and PMR-30). Just about all of my rifles have a scope or red-dot sight of some sort on them. I guess I may have to try a dot of white or green paint on the other handguns that I have.
 
#17 ·
Dot your front sight? I have taken to using a very small container of Testers fluorescent yellow with a toothpick to accentuate the front sight. It helps big time.

If the back two sights are white dots, you can instantly pick out the front sight, that used to be white. If the front sight had nothing, it would disappear when pointed at something dark.

If you've not discovered/used this tip, give it a try. It makes a HUGE difference.

My entire life/Military Service, when using a Handgun - it is always Frontsight, Frontsight, Frontsight. This little tip makes frontsight aquisition really quick.
I now have a rds so they are black serated suppressor heights. I have used and looked though ones with true or fiber optic and prefer all black combo with the red dot
 
#24 ·
While I appreciate your initiative, I doubt that is very bright. (As in Day Glo Bright.)

Just Saying.
 
#26 ·
There is this option for those that change colors according to use....

 
#30 ·
Even though I've never painted a front sight green, I would like to have a green fiber optic front sight. Having used them on some hunting bows, I've never seen one fade out under any conditions other than when it got so dark you could hardly make out the target anyway. That flo green has got to be the best all around choice.

I believe tests have shown that those red plastic inserts that were so popular years ago fade out with fading light. I never did like the white outline/red inserts anyway. I did see a flo green insert years ago and did like it. Oh how I hated to pass that model 15 on. I bought it from another enthusiast and it was the smoothest K frame I'd ever handled but I was buying it for a friend who wanted it for training as he was going into law enforcement back in the '80s.

I just go to the hobby store and buy the brightest flo orange I can find. If I have the time and ambition, I also will first lay a coat of white down first. I just noticed today that the LCP Custom needs to be refinished. It's been many years since I ran around with a can of that black spray for a front sight.
 
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