Change rear sight from adjustable to buckhorn
I have a Traditions Hawken and want to swap the adjustable rear sight to a fixed buckhorn sight. Just because I prefer the traditional style. Any suggestions? I can get rear sights from Track of The Wolf, but how do I determine the dovetail size? Also, I suppose I'll have to change the front sight so I can adjust it for elevation. I figure I'll zero at 100 yards. Thoughts? Suggestions?
Tagged for interest, I'm thinking about doing this too.
I went the opposite direction and got a Lyman 57 - I haven't shot it (T/c Hawken) since I got it back from the gunsmith (had to drill and tap tang) but I think I'm going to like it.
Tagged anyway, out of curiousity.
The easy way to measure it would be to knock out your old one, and measure the dovetail on the sight and get the closest one. You will have to clean up the castings, they are not finished. You will need some small files to complete this.
Is your traditions dovetail rear or drilled and tapped? if drilled and tapped, you will have to cut a dovetail for the sight.
For the front, basically do the same, and pick out a sight width you like. Then file down until you get your elevation. You can be fairly close if you measure the tip of the bight blade of the origional before you remove them and keep your height close too it. ( or at lease if your rear blade is .030 higher make your front that much higher.
Next pick out a opening width for your rear sight. allot of people just use a thin hacksaw blade, it will work fine. But you can fine tune this too, if you can cut various size grooves. I have some files cut up by someone with a surface grinder and can cut a groove from .027 too .039 Now I am not sure what your barrel length is, but most of mine are 42to44" and I use a .070" width front sight and a .031 groove on the rear sight (for my offhand guns) .. This also is affected by how far up your sight is from the breech. ( I usually put mine around 8.5" up, some of the older people I shoot with go up to around 12" )
My Traditions Hawken is dovetailed for the front and rear sights. I took them off and measured the bases for both sights. Track of the Wolf has a decent selection of traditional sights in buckhorn and semi buckhorn, also various blade front sights. All of the bases on their sights are too big and I will either have to file them down, or have the dovetails on my barrel cut to fit. I suppose I'll get something close and file it to fit my existing dovetail grooves.
It's a cap lock in .54 with a 1/48 twist. I think I want to zero at 100 yards for my Maxiballs, but I'm thinking of going back to a patched roundball. I'm also thinking I should zero at 75 yards and just compensate for the drop at 100. I've hunted with this rifle for about 18 years. I've taken a lot of deer with it. Never used it to take a shot beyond 100 yards on an animal. Most of them were well within that range. My wife gave it to me as a Christmas gift the year we were married. It has been an excellent rifle. No complaints at all especially considering that it was realtively inexpensive. I think it was $150.00 back then.
I'd just like to give it a more traditional look. I sighted the rifle about 15 years ago when I switched to a maxiball and a good powder load. I haven't touched them since. So, I don't really see a need for adjustable sights on this gun.
