Posted: 4/29/2011 8:37:15 AM EDT
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Is it something I can do myself? The gun in question is a RIA. Under the slide it appears to be welded/tacked in place.
Any suggestions? Thanks. |
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It's not easy. Once you get the old front sight out you need to install the new one with a staking tool. Brownells sells the tool.
Then you need a new front sight with the right size "tennon". (the little bit that sticks down that does into the hole) I do not know what size is used on the RIA. These days very few gunsmiths want to mess with it, when I wanted to change out the sights on my 1991 Colt every single smith I talked to wanted to just mill a dovetail. |
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It's the staked in front sight and they are a PITA .... I just replaced one ... easy to get out but not so easy to align correctly and re-stake it.
Like NVGdude said after you get the sight out you need to figure out whether you have the "wide" or "narrow" tenon then you need this.... http://www.brownells.com/1/1/1393-1911-auto-front-sight-staker-brownells-front-sight-staker-brownells.html and I would suggest this also ... it will hold the slide and sight aligned while you stake it. http://www.brownells.com/1/1/12234-1911-auto-night-sight-mounting-fixture-night-sight-mounting-fixture-brownells.html I actually made both tools ... I modified a AR castle nut wrench for the staking tool and used 2 pieces of hard oak one small strip to sit on the flats of the slides bottom and one large square piece with a notch cut for the sight to rest in and then clamped the whole assembly to my bench with large C-clamps ... then your able to get that really SOLID hit that's required to stake the sight ... otherwise the slide will do nothing but bounce around and not stake properly. Hope that helps. 
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