Iron sights

[BrentD]

Kotikant

Depends on what you mean by modern, but I'll take that to be bolt rifles. I have owned about 3 centerfire bolt rifles. I have only one now. Perhaps not "modern" by modern definitions. But this one has an aperture rear sight. It does not conform to the 2-zero get up like my rifles above. But this is for a much faster and flatter rifle (by my standards), so that isn't so necessary.

This is an 06 Springfield that I stole off the web. I once had one much like it, but blew it up, sadly. Anyway, between the wars, when scopes were in their infancy, these types of sights were being put on the best custom bolt rifles of the era - which is something of a testament, I suppose, to their utility. Searching out rifles like these is almost as much fun as hunting with them. Which is not to say that you can't do this with a brand new Winchester or whatever, but you typically don't even have a front sight dovetail to start with so why not find a rifle made to work like this. Stock comb height, front sight configuration, etc, are all made to work together and nice examples of these rifles are just not that expensive. Here an early scope was also added as a quick-detach to give the owner multiple options. BTW, these receiver sights really work well with or without the rear barrel sights as you wish.

Here is an example of a very inexpensive 1903.

Rock Island Arsenal Sporterized Low Serial Number Model 1903 `04, Blue 24

LSB#: 190411RL05Make: The action was originally built by Rock Island Arsenal. We do not know who sporterized the rifle. Model: This is a sporterized 1903 rifl

www.gunauction.com

 

[fmnjr]

Kotikant

Depends on what you mean by modern, but I'll take that to be bolt rifles. I have owned about 3 centerfire bolt rifles. I have only one now. Perhaps not "modern" by modern definitions. But this one has an aperture rear sight. It does not conform to the 2-zero get up like my rifles above. But this is for a much faster and flatter rifle (by my standards), so that isn't so necessary.

This is an 06 Springfield that I stole off the web. I once had one much like it, but blew it up, sadly. Anyway, between the wars, when scopes were in their infancy, these types of sights were being put on the best custom bolt rifles of the era - which is something of a testament, I suppose, to their utility. Searching out rifles like these is almost as much fun as hunting with them. Which is not to say that you can't do this with a brand new Winchester or whatever, but you typically don't even have a front sight dovetail to start with so why not find a rifle made to work like this. Stock comb height, front sight configuration, etc, are all made to work together and nice examples of these rifles are just not that expensive. Here an early scope was also added as a quick-detach to give the owner multiple options. BTW, these receiver sights really work well with or without the rear barrel sights as you wish.

Here is an example of a very inexpensive 1903.

Rock Island Arsenal Sporterized Low Serial Number Model 1903 `04, Blue 24

LSB#: 190411RL05Make: The action was originally built by Rock Island Arsenal. We do not know who sporterized the rifle. Model: This is a sporterized 1903 rifl

www.gunauction.com

I never see a gun I don't like, those are beautiful weapons. Thanks for the feedback. For now, there's just not enough time to pursue all the shooting, hunting, new weapons, etc., that I would like to.

 

[BrentD]

I never see a gun I don't like, those are beautiful weapons. Thanks for the feedback. For now, there's just not enough time to pursue all the shooting, hunting, new weapons, etc., that I would like to.

Keep in mind that life is far to short to hunt with an ugly gun and you ain't gettin' any younger

 

[ImBillT]

I’m not nearly an expert with iron sights, but I think most people can shoot a lot better with them than they realize. I often hear older shooters complain that they can’t get the rear sight, front sight, and target all into focus. I’m well under forty and last I checked I read the 20/15 line and thought it wasn’t all that small. I can’t imagine that my vision could have degraded below 20/20 yet. I can’t ever remember having both sights and the target all in focus. It’s not that big of a deal. Just because the sight is blurry doesn’t mean you don’t know where it is. You have to be able to see both sights and the target, but you don’t have to see all three of them clearly at once. Also, you’d be surprised how finely you can discern your aiming point. I don’t do a lot of shooting with iron sights, but I did shoot a lot of HBR at one point. HBR is limited to 6X scopes, and has scoring rings .5MOA apart. Only under the best of lighting conditions could I ever actually see the rings at 6X, however, even without seeing rings, pretty much all the competitors would hold to one side of a ring or the other(1/4 MOA from center) A common argument was whether someone could actually hold “half a bullet hole” or not. I guess the guys that didn’t think they could, assumed that no one else could, and that anyone who said so was just blowing smoke. I figured I held about half a bullet hole one way or another all the time, but I also don’t think it was all that special or unusual. Draw a cross hair on a target even an 1/8 MOA off center, step back 5-10 feet, and you’ll see how ridiculously off-center it looks. Your brain can resolve things quite finely even with normal to fairly poor vision.