Replacing sights on a pistol

[R1_Demon]

Hey all,

 

This doesn't have to do with competition, per se, but I was wondering something.  For my home defense firearms, I usually end up purchasing firearms that already end up having night sights on them for the purpose of use at night, in case an intruder enters.  (duh!  LOL)

 

Anyway, I have a couple of firearms (a PK380 and a XD9 Mod .2) that I ended up really liking, but neither of these have night sights on them.  I'm wondering how difficult is it to swap out the sights yourself and how do you ensure that the sights are realigned so that the pistol is sighted in correctly like it was with the factory sights?  Is it difficult enough that I should just take it to a local gunsmith and have him/her do it?  Or is it fairly straight forward that I would be able to do it?  Is it something as easy as measuring where the old sights are now and replacing the new sights in the same position?  I wouldn't think so only because the new sights may be made differently or have different widths or whatever, so thus the they would be in different positions or have different measurements when installed.

 

I've actually never had to mess with any sights on any of my firearms (except for in the military forever ago) that I have purchased.  I've been lucky enough that they have been right on (as far as I know or at least I have adapted very quickly and didn't notice), so I really don't want to screw that up.  But then again, I like doing things myself and I'm pretty mechanically inclined, as long as I know the proper way to do something.  I don't like to half-arse do things.  Do I need to buy some sort of rest to do this?

 

Thanks in advance everyone!

Mat

[Sarge]

3 minutes ago, R1_Demon said:

Hey all,

 

This doesn't have to do with competition, per se, but I was wondering something.  For my home defense firearms, I usually end up purchasing firearms that already end up having night sights on them for the purpose of use at night, in case an intruder enters.  (duh!  LOL)

 

Anyway, I have a couple of firearms (a PK380 and a XD9 Mod .2) that I ended up really liking, but neither of these have night sights on them.  I'm wondering how difficult is it to swap out the sights yourself and how do you ensure that the sights are realigned so that the pistol is sighted in correctly like it was with the factory sights?  Is it difficult enough that I should just take it to a local gunsmith and have him/her do it?  Or is it fairly straight forward that I would be able to do it?  Is it something as easy as measuring where the old sights are now and replacing the new sights in the same position?  I wouldn't think so only because the new sights may be made differently or have different widths or whatever, so thus the they would be in different positions or have different measurements when installed.

 

I've actually never had to mess with any sights on any of my firearms (except for in the military forever ago) that I have purchased.  I've been lucky enough that they have been right on (as far as I know or at least I have adapted very quickly and didn't notice), so I really don't want to screw that up.  But then again, I like doing things myself and I'm pretty mechanically inclined, as long as I know the proper way to do something.  I don't like to half-arse do things.  Do I need to buy some sort of rest to do this?

 

Thanks in advance everyone!

Mat

Based on your questions, take it to a smith.

[Beef15]

XDs are notorious for difficult to remove sights. As in have ruined sight tools. Might be best to take to someone.

 

I personally drift out dovetailed sights and drift new ones in with a bronze punch. You do have to be careful where you hit, vials break, thin blades bend.

 

To center typically you can lay the slide on a flat surface and measure, flip, and measure other side, drift as required until equal. If they are already drifted to one side or another witness marks at center of sight will do, cause math is dumb.

 

Sent from my SM-G360V using Tapatalk

 

 

 

 

[Tampa-XD45]

A friend of mine finally had to take a hack saw to his XDM rear sight to get it removed.  Here's a great video from Dave Dawson to learn proper sight replacement technique:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4maCQhEIjoA

[R1_Demon]

Thanks for the info all. If XD's are that hard I probably will just take it to some one experienced. But good video though. ??