Combat Sights Questions

I would just send the slide to Glock and have all steel tritium sights installed.
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I agree. I have three Glocks, as well as most of my other pistols, and all have either factory NS's or Meprolights. I actually prefer the Mepro's, and will replace the others with them as they go.

Al lot will depend on what your used to too. I've been shooting three dots since before they were lit, and I actually see the dots before I see a standard sight picture. The three dot night sights just give me a 24/7 sighting system I'm used to.

I agree with azredhawk in his assessment of using the sights at night with a light, and it works exactly as he describes. Night sights work in all levels of light and work where you have light but cant always see your sights or make out a sight picture, like when you have a dark target with a bright or lighter background. The finding your gun in the dark thing is pretty handy too. :)


I would let the peep sights go until you have a chance to actually shoot a gun with them installed for awhile. They dont work like the rifle versions do, where the rear sight is close to the eye and you pay it no heed and focus on the front sight. With the pistol equipped peeps, as well as the forward mounted rifle type peeps, you still have to mentally and physically align the front and rear sights, and if anything, it actually takes longer and more thought than the standard sights your accustomed to. I installed a set when they first showed up and tried to make them work, but I found them to be more trouble than they are worth. The only advantage I can see with the "hex" version is, the breaks in the circle give you a mid point reference you can roughly align your front sight to to know you have some sort of alignment, something blatantly lacking in the "round" versions.
 
Micah, upon finding a link for you I realized they don't make a tritium version for Glocks. They do have the standard ghost sight available, but in my opinion tritium is a must for a defensive pistol.
http://novaksights.com/genuine%20novak%20sights/glock.htm

Here's what I was talking about:
http://secure.netsolhost.com/484978.494604/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=SFNT&Store_Code=ricekintama

I know what a G17 is, but whats RTF?

Good luck with your purchase.




My thoughts on target identification in the dark. I feel that identifying the target isn't always necessary. You know when someone isn't supposed to be there and it should be in your best interest to announce to this possible threat that you are armed and they need to leave NOW! If they are of right mind they will/should announce who they are and why they are in your house. If not, they have a serious problem on their hands. With that being said, night sights are great for this task and if you ever have to investigate a possible threat you will be glad you had them. A laser is even better. Reason being is that with the gun at eye level you don't really have a good view of anything below the gun and a laser eliminates the need to bring the gun to eye level and also gives a fast pinpoint location of exactly where the bullet will go. Plus, that little red dot is probably a good convincer that it's time to leave.




Japle, do you have a picture of those sights in the dark. Doesn't Truglo make a fiber optic/tritium version too? That would be the best of both worlds!
 
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My apologies. I didn't even know what the RTF was when I saw it. I like it though. It's Glock's newest design. The guy at the store called it the "4th gen". But, the sign calls it the Rough-Textured Frame.

Here's a pic...

http://www.impactguns.com/store/764503002014.html

That's the largest, most detailed one I could find, but I'm sure someone can do better. The G17 version just came out recently. The one I got is the G17 RTF2, although I honestly can't tell you if there is any difference in the RTF and RTF2. I just need to know that it throws metal where I point it. :D Let good marksmanship and training do the rest.

I like the looks of those Novak ghosts. I think I'm gonna put them on the RTF and try those Suresights on the good ole G22 to see how they do. The XS 24/7 looks great, but it strikes me as an oversized Heine-style sight, and I have shot a good bit with Heine sights. They're good, but I'm looking to just try something new and maybe even a little out there.
 
Trijicon 3-dot night sights if you want to hunt people. XS Tritium dot front sight if you want to draw and hit your target fast for self defense.
 
azredhawk, you live in Arizona!

Go to Sedona, meet the guy, try the Hex-sights, then report back. Now you have a mission for TFL :D

Bart Noir
Who thinks the marketing could be interesting. "These sights will put a hex on the badguys!"
 
Problem with XS 24/7

I've wanted to try them for some time and recently did so. But there was a problem since we were at a nice outdoor target range in bright sunlight.

The targets were bright and the firing line was shaded. My eeyes were adjusted to the bright targets. So I saw only the outline of the front and rear sights, no white dot (front) or vertical white bar (rear).

That made it hard to line up the sights. OK, maybe given more shooting I would learn how to hold the big bulge of the front sight into that shallow V of the rear, but it wasn't working for me that day. In that light I would have been more accurate with normal sights.

But that wasn't speed shooting of course.

Bart Noir
 
I've got a set of the XS big dots tritiums on my cz pcr.

I've gotten used to them now and really like them for fast shooting. Very quick to get lined up on target.

For slow fire I am more accurate with my cz75b with the 3 dot sights, that's not what the big dots were designed for.

I want to get a set of with the standard dot to see what they are like, I think they might allow for more accurate slow aimed fire and still offer the speed for defensive shooting.

I like mine, but they took several trips to the range and lots of dry practice to get used to them.
 
I used to believe in night sights. I now think they get in the way of your view, same as shining a flashlight in your eyes blocks your view of what's behind it. The effect isn't extreme but it's there.

The Hexsite works on the principle of always being the blackest thing out there. If there's enough light to ID the target, ON the target (not necessarily on your gun), the contrast between the dead-black Hexsite and the target will allow you to fire. You actually have to try it in nighttime conditions before you'll believe it's possible.

OK. I'm going to tell you something else about the Hexsite that you're going to find really, really weird. I know I did.

It doesn't feel like you're running the sights consciously. It feels like your subconscious is somehow running the sights and gun alignment while your conscious mind runs targets, threat ID and trigger control. And it does those very well in large part because you're target-focused.

Weirder yet, it works in some ways better with "flash sight pictures": bring the gun to target and fire at the same instant everything aligns.

Why would that be?

Well a neurologist name of V.S. Ramachandran may have figured out the answer.

He's managed to prove that we have two visual processing centers in our mind. The one we use all the time, the one you're reading this with, is the "mammalian" version: it can focus on particular still images like this text, or somebody's face, or any level of detail.

The other one though is a leftover from our past - a "reptilian" visual processor that's actually older than that. A lizard can't see "you" as a person. It can see rough shapes, especially when in motion. It's VERY good at spotting an incoming threat, like a bird stooping in. In order to see something still, it'll often use the trick of putting it's own eyes into motion, which is why a cobra keeps it's head in motion before striking. It can only SEE motion. It's also limited to black and white, not color.

We still use this primitive visual processor to do things like catch a ball, dodge a threat barely seen ouf of the corner of our eye, etc. We wouldn't be safe behind the wheel without it. Because this "reptilian visual processor" is limited in scope, it's FAST, which is the whole point of still having it around.

See also the PBS Nova episode "Secrets Of The Mind" from 2001. He figured this stuff out by finding somebody whose mammalian visual processor was damaged, leaving them "blind", but they could still dodge incoming baseballs, step around major objects in their path, etc. The reptilian wiring was still present and working, as was their actual eyeballs - they were victims of a specific type of brain damage. Studying people with funky brain damage is what this dude does - unfortunately this talk available online doesn't cover "blind sight":

http://www.ted.com/talks/vilayanur_ramachandran_on_your_mind.html

I can show you a still image from "Secrets of the mind" showing the wiring between the eyeball and both visual processors:

3642486751_1dd347f63c.jpg


Yellow is mammalian, blue is reptilian.

The Hexsite is more compatible with this "lizard brain" than any other sight you can run. It allows you to throw both visual processing centers of your brain at the same time on the problem of shooting.

The red dot glass sights come the closest, but the red dot itself gets in the way and breaks down the beneficial effects (plus adds bulk, failure modes, etc.).

Try it. Swear to God, there's nothing else like it.
 
Most of my guns have Trijcon night sights. But I've recently fitted out a couple of my guns with Heirloom Precision (similar to the Hilton Yam rear sight) rear sights in plain black with a wide notch together with a gold dot front sight. I'm finding that a great set up, even in fairly poor light.
 
Posted by KCabbage
Japle, do you have a picture of those sights in the dark. Doesn't Truglo make a fiber optic/tritium version too? That would be the best of both worlds!
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Nope, I don't have a pic. I'll have to see about taking one.

The pic I posted is the tritium/fiberoptic (TFO) sight.

Every now and then I hear the old "bump in the night" and have to go look. When I get my G19, the TFO sights light up the inside of the drawer. But from the front of the gun, there's no visible glow.

Here's the green\yellow combo on my XD45:
XD45.jpg
 
XS Tritium Big Dots

Have had these on my Glock 21SF for about 10 months. They are very fast sights. You are on target NOW! Follow up shots are just as quick. That said my groups at 65 feet aren't as tight as with stock sights. But these are SD sights not target sights so I can accept the trade-off. The 21SF is my home defense pistol and I feel the XS Big Dots were the right choice.
 
I did up a picture showing roughly what my variant of the Hexsite actually looks like in shooting it. Being left-eye dominant, the right hex image is the one I'm using, the more "ghostly" one off to the left I ignore. Because I'm target-focused, I'm also able to use the right eye to look "around" the Hexsite and get a clearer view of the target. The Hexsite is out-of-focus yet completely usable.

3880663192_eb0f1a734c.jpg


Concerning "reprapping" these:

First, you have a patent problem. Tim has given me permission to pursue my funky knockoff to validate the Hexsite concept on a one-off basis but anybody (like me) would have to ask and get written permission for an experimental setup. Good science can be replicated, which is now the point of my critter running around loose.

Second, repraps right now work in very soft plastic that wouldn't hold up to recoil even in a .22. They might work for a while on an airsoft gun just to get a feel for what's going on. You wouldn't have the inner metal core necessary to keep even good high-end plastic together, never mind reprap-grade. But there's also a lot of R&D in there now on exact dimensions front and rear to get the "visual effect" right...you won't have access to that knowledge base. My "mark 1" wasn't bad but nowhere near where it could have been and nowhere near my "mark 2" after visiting Tim's shop.

For anyone not in the know, the "reprap" is a personal rapid prototype system that takes 3D designs and re-creates them in plastic by a "printing" process, building up layers to make something real-world physical. One day it's going to take the world by storm, when it can eat and excrete scrap metal into usable objects. Right now, it's barely in the state automobiles were circa roughly 1880 or so: hobbyist/experimental, not real useful. (But for God's sake, you guys ought to keep working on it, it's gonna kick the world's butt in 20 to 30 or so years...)

As to the XS Big Dot: it looks like a good idea, but do yourself a favor, esp. if you have a Glock: take all the sights off, run a bare slide. See which is faster and/or more accurate, that or a Big Dot. A plain Glock "slick" slide is actually a pretty good gross index with geometric proportions, better than most anything else lacking sights.

Big plain black geometric shapes work quite well as sights - and by far the best of these is the Hexsite.

On colored sights:

When you put colors or "graphics" on a sight, you're still doing front-sight focus. Upshot is that instead of jumping to combat sights, you've found a way to slightly tweak and improve target sights. It works great on fixed targets on the range so you think you're doing great, but you still haven't made the full jump to combat sights and get to "force on force" training or trying to stop something hairy and mean and it's a whole 'nuther thing.
 
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