I installed a tang rear sight and love it.  Problem is, the factory leaf rear sight is in the way (technically, it co-witnessess, kinda).  The leaf is rivited on.  If I want to take it off without messing up the rifle, what should I do?

Well, if you don't want to destroy the original rear sight, maybe install a taller front sight to get up over the other.  Aren't they just drifted in? How much adjustment is there in the tang sight?

H78,

The rear leaf should just be dovetailed in and you should be able to tap it out with a hammer and brass punch.  Although I haven't installed it yet, I got the scope adapter which replaces the rear leaf and the instructions which came with the adapter said to do just that and replace it with the weaver rail and set screw.  

I would go out and do it now to test it, but my M72 is sitting in my cabin in Virginia 600 miles awayhammer
Cheers  

Edited to add - I just went to the Taurus web sight and they have an exploded drawing of the M62/72 (pg 24) in their online rifle manual (http://www.taurususa.com/pdf/rifle_manual.pdf)which shows the leaf sight and the dovetail fitting.

I'll see if I can make it happen, thanks for the advice!!!

H78

I just read your post on the other thread and realized that you wanted to remove just the "leaf" and NOT the entire rear sight assembly.  

I think that would probably be tough to do without damaging the entire sight assembly, but I can see the cosmetic downside of having a big ugly empty dovetail slot cut in your barrel if  you do remove the entire sight assembly.  

An option might be to do the full remove and then cover the empty dovetail slot with the weaver scope mount base (http://www.taurususa.com/products/carrifsmb.cfm).  This would cover the dovetail slot, give you an unimpeded view of the iron sights and offer the option of later adding a scope if you wished.

Cheers,

PS - apologize for the "cut and paste" links, but not sure how to do a hot link to a message.

Mostly I just don't want to destroy the finish or gouge the metal (I have a stainless 10/22 that I

ruined the surface of the front sight assembly on by being impaitent and using the wrong tools.  

I guess I really just want it out of the way so I have an unobstructed view of the front sight post.