Competition sights

[Clay1]

I have done many searches and read many threads on this board about sights. They all have some good information in them but I am still not getting the answers that I need.

I've looked at most of the sights made for the Glock: Dawson, Heinie, Bo-mar, Ameriglow, Mepro, Trijicon etc. I read that many IPSC race run shooters are running these Brazos micro-dots for a front sight too.

I'm looking for two things out of my sights. Yes, I want to compete in IDPA, SSP class; but I also want to be able to use the gun for home selfdefense. I'm shooting a G34. I see where the Brazos are .90 and the Dawsons run .10, .105, .110 etc. The Brazos front, the lightening bolt dot is very round since you are looking through a drilled hole instead of the melted piece of plastic. Do they even make Brazos for Glocks first off?

Secondly what should I be shooting for rears? Heinie race cuts, Bomars or Dawsons with or without the fiber optics. Thanks for the push in the right direction. Also can a relatively handy guy put these in themselves or do I have to have a gunsmith install them. Thanks in advance for an answer to well worn question. Clay

[SRT Driver]

Clay,

The short answer is:

Shoot what you like best and which works for you best. What Matt Kartozian or anyone likes may not work for you.

Bob should be able to answer abt the Brazos FO front..he lurks here.

As far as rear, I've used Heinies, MMC, and Dawson. Right now the Dawsons look best. You can always change around.

Check out other Glockers setups and see what you like.

Is that vague enough? There really is not a magic setup.

[Clay1]

SRT, I don't know what I really expected as an answer. If someone came on and said that I have to shoot this, this and this and there is no other; I would know that person is full of it.

I just want something that is correct for competition, but not so delicate as to break when it is used for a real defensive situation. The Heinie slant pro straight 8s seem to be very nice for both applications. The Bo-mars are very nice, but seem to be shaped as a target sight even if the corners are cut at 45 degrees. Novaks seem great, but I want an adjustable sight.

Like you said, most people change sites anyhow from time to time. I just know that I have to get something on the gun besides the std adjustable that came with the G34. I went out yesterday with another competitor and his Dawsons were far and away superior to my stock sights. If for no other reason than having more available light on each side of the front sight. Thanks for your comments - I guess that I will just jump with two feet and see where I land. Clay

[EricW]

Slap on some Heinies or Trijicons and be done with it. Contrary to modern Tactibilly doctrine, tritium still has its uses.

[diehli]

Slap on some Heinies or Trijicons and be done with it. Contrary to modern Tactibilly doctrine, tritium still has its uses.

What he said.

Heinie Slant Pro Straight Eights and shoot the damn thing.

[glockster96]

I run a Heinie slant pro rear and a dawson fiber front. It works well.

As mentioned above, find out what YOU like and shoot the heck out of them.

[chp5]

Slap on some Heinies or Trijicons and be done with it.  Contrary to modern Tactibilly doctrine, tritium still has its uses.

I agree. I paint my front Trijicon sight orange round the tritium for high visibility. It's a good set up for my defense guns.

[Clay1]

Newbie goofy question. Are the slant pro's adjustable or fixed? And yes, I do want to just put on the sights and pull the trigger. Just picked up tonight 50 IDPA targets, will make stands tomorrow. Off to the farm for a few days of shooting. I just picked up another 1000 rounds today and the mail man delivered Matt Burkett's Winning IDPA volume #5, Brian Enos's book and 3 more Glock 17 round mags. I'm still waiting for the timer to arrive and a Wilderness instructors belt. The sights and some trigger work are it. First tourney is Jan 8th and have been really looking forward to it. Thanks guys for the tips. You can talk this game all you want but those that do better are those that actually shoot once in a while

Clay

[SRT Driver]

Clay,

As far as adjustables go, the Dawson's are the way to go, IMHO. Bomars are nice but...I'm too cheap.

FWIW, the sights never move once they are zeroed for the load. Hence the popularity of Heinies..plus the cost. But to zero you have to be handy with a file on the front.

But I'm lazier than I'm cheap so ... Dawson it is.

Also, you may want to break the edge on the corner of the Dawson rear. It's a little sharp.

[Clay1]

So the Slant Pros are NOT adjustable. OK then, we are down to the Meprolights adjustables, the Dawson adj or the Bo-mars. Another simple questions for the gamers among us. Can I shoot the Bo-mars in IDPA SSP?

I see where Custom Glock Racing has the Bo-mars for $95 which have a wider cut rear and then you can buy a Dawson .105 front that is suppose to be cut for the bo-mar rears for $38 or something close. That's not much more expensive then the Dawson adjustables at $130. I can buy the std Bo-mar rear for $68 through Brownells. I do kind of like the concept of the longer sight radius - yes, call me gamer. I also like that there are no other dots of marks on the rear sightf so all of the focus is on the front sight.

[Chuck Anderson]

Any particular reason you are limiting yourself to adjustables? I have never had a pair of Heine sights that I couldn't get to shoot to point of aim easily. The Heine's will be substantially cheaper than adjustables and they are more sturdy. I shoot my Heine's with 9mm from 115 to 147 gr with no change in point of aim.

[Duane Thomas]

Another vote for the Heinie Slant Pros. They're on the G34 I use for USPSA/IPSC, IDPA and daily carry. Dave Sevigny was nice enough to install these sights on my gun and set them up the way he has them on his own G34s, with a .110" front blade, and, though Dave said he runs a .150" rear notch on his own sights, my dial caliper measures the redone notch on my own rear sight at .144". It's an amazing visible sight picture.

I'm not the world's greatest fan of night sight inserts. And that's a change after years of viewing them a a non-negotiable necessity on a carry/defense gun. These days I'd rather have plain black sights and trust my index in low light.

[kevin c]

MMC's are an option my smith recommended for my 23, which I told him I wanted to do double duty as a house gun and for Production Class/IDPA. I got contrasting tritium inserts. The rear sight has wings to protect the blade, and is click adjustable for elevation. There are two set screws that can be loosened to drift the sight in the rear dovetail, and then locked down, w/ or w/o loctite. Quality is good, and they're cheaper than Trijicons. Just don't overdo it on the set screws - they can be stripped out with too much torque.

Brownell's carries them.

[Clay1]

Bluntly I don't have enough experience with this type of shooting to say what I want and that is why I am asking the more experienced on this site for some guidance. Being the novice speed shooter, but not a novice shooter I have history to deal with. Non-adjustables in my very limited experience would not give you the ability to do just that - adjust the sites for different ammo and different loads.

You guys with the fixed sites what do you do when you change from shooting 115 fmj Blazer practice rounds to something like a 147? The point of impact must be different. Might oneday shoot some very light 60/90 grain super high velocity, again point of impact must be different. At "in side of the house ranges" and front site acquisition or just point shooting I'm sure that is not a concern but at 40 yard shots you have to be off target. Lawman at what range is there no change in impact? I'm just playing devils advocate here because I don't have the answer.

I see that the Heinies are very popular and wouldn't mind shooting them. One thing that you keep bring up is the price difference. Where I have been looking on the web, CGR, the price is within $5. If you buy stock Heinie's and have them cut you are still going to be in the $130 + category after a nice front sight like a Dawson or Brazos. If there is somewhere else to buy them at a much reduced price don't hold out on me brother!

Guys I'm just try to work this out so that I feel comfortable with my decision. One of the things that I have learned about myself over time is that if I skimp and don't buy what I deam to be the right product to begin with, I will probably by the cheaper one and within a couple of months buy the more expensive one. That is no way to save money for me. Do it right, do it the first time and then forget about the sights and shoot.

Sincerely thanks for all of the great input. Clay

[Nik Habicht]

Clay,

I think you just need to order some sights and see if they'll work for you. I went through that a couple of years ago --- started with a set of Bo-Mars for a Glock 34 to replace the Meprolight night sights that were on all my Glocks at the time. I liked the Bo-Mars enough --- but decided to have the top half of the front blade trimmed down to .090. Liked that better.

Got Bo-Mars for a couple of more guns, then ordered A Dawson fiber optic front. Liked that as well, but still prefer the plain black skinny front sight. My IDPA Glock wears Heinie Straight Eight night sights --- it was the closest I could come in night sights to the preferred Bo-Mar sight picture. I'm jonesing to try a set of Dawson's new adjustables.....

It's really an individual decision --- and it requires testing. Unless you really go nuts, testing every site made, I don't think it's time or money wasted....

[scooterj]

The slant pro rear and Dawson fiber(height is for Heinie slant pro) has my shots hitting point of aim with no filing or any other elevation adjustments.

[Chuck Anderson]

I shoot my Glock 17 all the way out to about 55 yds and don't have any problem getting hits on a 5"x8" piece of steel about the size of the A zone. This is with whatever I stuff in the gun. I never tried it with the 60-90 gr bullets, and never would. If you buy a set of plain old Heine's from Brownell's it's $52.00. If you really feel later that you need the awesome speed advantage that comes from a fiber optic front sight you can buy the Dawson sight that fits the rear. If you don't think that the sight lets in enough light, take it to you smith and have him open up the notch a bit. But Heine's make a great base to start with. I just left mine alone and they seem to work just fine.

[SRT Driver]

Clay,

There are two kinds of Bomars. One fits the factory dovetail and ovehangs the back of the slide about 1/4 in. The other is a Bomar, like on a 1911, where the slide is milled like a 1911.

The plug and play version is about $85.

The mill and go version is about $250.

Tried the "plug and play" version and didn't like them. Overhangs too much.

I like adjustables more then Heinies, which are great sights, but loads do vary a bit. Different front heights are available but I want the bullet to impact right were it is aimed. I guess that is from NRA AP, PPC, and Bullseye.

And I like to be able to hit upper A/B shots by using the top of the post then the fiber optic front is good for everything else. I do not like the fiber optic rear.

Also, I start each practice session with a group in the upper A/B. Just seems a little easier with the adjustables.

FYI, a friend of mine just made Master in L10 using a G35 and a Fobus holster. He has been shooting about a year.

[twix]

Your vision is going to be different than mine, so YMMV.

It sounds like you might like the Dawson FO front with plain black adjustable rear.

I have shot this setup on a friends G35. It is nice but if it were mine I would widen and deepen the rear notch.

If you start this way your only a Heinie rear sight away from a change. Or start with the Heinie's and you can switch to a FO front later.

I have the Dawson FO front, .100 I think with a black Heinie slant pro rear. The FO front helps me pick the up the front sight quicker, and the black square outline around the FO rod gives a nice sight picture for longer and more precise shots.

Thread drift: So, Duane and Erik, I've been out of the tactibilly loop, what's the latest on tritium vs. non-tritium?

TomB

[Les Snyder]

Clay... I'm an old fart, but have been shooting practicle shooting competition since 83.... before that a couple of years of IHMSA Silhouette, and have used nothing but flat black front sights... typically with a BoMar sight picture.... .220 tall and around .090 to .100 wide matched to a nice amount of light with the rear....If you shoot a variety of ranges and in all lighting conditions, you will still be able to hold elevation for long range plates, something I notice that a lot of young shooters have trouble with if they have a fiber optic dot.... I would concur with the Heinie Slant Pro...simple and rugged... I have them on the G35 and on the G22 before that... I have Trijicons on the G23 carry pistol.... had some Novacks on the G19 but like the sight picture of the Heinies much better....Hell I even have my last set of Swensights on my Para I use for 3gun (If anybody has an extra set laying around I would sure like them).... I've seen a lot of fiber optics laying on the ground... regards

[Clay1]

Thanks for all of your comments and help for the new guy on the block. It came right down to Bo-mar's or Dawson's. I called Custom Glock Racing a couple of times and didn't recieve an answer - only over a two hour period or so so this is not a cut on him, but rather a comment on my impatients once I made a decision to buy. If he would have answered the phone the Bo-mar rear with the Dawson front would have been ordered.

I ended up calling Dawson direct and bought their adjustables. They had them on a small sale right now that paid for shipping. $119 instead of $129. My Wilderness belt just arrived and I have 400 rounds in the shooting bag and am heading to the range.

I get to pick up the Pack Mk IV timer tomorrow morning at UPS between 8:30 and 10:00. I couldn't even wait for them to deliver it, I said that I would come and pick it up.

[the duck of death]

Here's what I did for sights on my G23:

Put on a plain black MMC rear made for the Glock and a Dawson Precision Fiber Optical front made for the Novak rear. The front sight is .160 high. I opened up the MMC rear a little with a file and Dremel.

Looks like a small combat rear sight and it's adjustable. The front sight is very low.

[Harmon]

dawson sights are probably too tall for carry, they snag on lots of stuff(front sight, W/matching rear)

they give good sight picture though

im probably gonna try the heine slant pro rear with dawson front on my limited gun

[Duane Thomas]

Like I said, I'm a major fan of the Heinie Slant Pros. If one absolutely must have adjustables, I'd go for the MMCs. As Grand Master Bruce Gray put it to me, explaining why he has MMCs on his match SIG, "There are adjustable sights out there that are bigger and clunkier and weirder, but nothing that really works any better."

[Clay1]

I'm sure that you are right Duane you have alot more experience than I do. So if anyone else is reading this thread don't buy what I did.

I'll start with these and struggle along. But from this point forward I won't be worrying about sights - that's behind me now, the decision on the equipment has been made. Now it is more range time and training on the proper techniques. 6ix days with the gun, 500 rounds fired in 3 range sessions. I might never shoot like many of you but I will do my best with what I have to try and get better than I am today. Clay