1911 Front Sight Staking Question

[Char-Gar]

When you stake on a 1911 front sight, how do you keep from peening the top of the front sight in the process.

[Mk42gunner]

Do you have any of the Gunsmith's Kinks books by Brownell's? In a couple of them there are descriptions of tools made to hold the sight in position while staking. Basically, you clamp the slide upside down to a heavy piece of steel, thus holding the sight in position while you use whatever design of staking punch you favor to deform the stem. Most of the ones I can think of use a 1/4-20 bolt through the ejection port to provide the clamping force.

I think you could do it by placing the slide and sight in a heavy bench vise, then using a homemade bent punch to clear the bottom of the slide while stirking a straight blow.

It doesn't take a lot of force to peen/ swell/ swage the stem of a 1911 sight. As long as the sight doesn't move, I never had any problems with the top of the sight peening. I have done several before the Navy finally got around to issuing Berettas.

MMC used to make a tool that held the sight tightly to the slide and then used a grooved swage to displace metal from the bottom. We had one at one of the armories I ran, it worked very well. Unfortunately, it cost way more than I could justify for my own occassional use.

Robert

[Char-Gar]

I have staked a few 1911 front sights and am looking for a better way. I do have a good armory type staking tool. I bit the bullet and ordered out a jig from Brownells to hold the slide etc, as you suggested. They don't give them away, but it doesn't break the bank either.

[markinalpine]

I used two woodworker's hardwood double screw clamps, a small one to hold the sight firmly in place, and a largers clamp to hold the slide in the bench block, and to hold the slide/bench block combination to my work bench. Staked it, after I applied a drop of purple loc-tite, using one of Brownells staking tools.
Mark :coffee:

[MtGun44]

I clamp the slide, muzzle up, against hardwood blocks in a vise. One holds the sight down
hard in place and the other locates the slide. Make sure you have the slide countersunk
so there is a place for the shank to swell out and make a rivet head. Add a dab of JB Weld
on the top,filling gaps under the sight and around the shank, then start with a center punch
and spread out the shank with hits in the center, about three locations front to back, then
work it down with a small flat punch with LOTS AND LOTS of tiny taps with a tiny hammer,
do not use big hits. File smooth when the rivet countersink area is filled with steel head.
Clean up any JB Weld on the top with a fine wire brush or hardwood scraper.

Never had one come loose.

Bill

[HeavyMetal]

The original staked front sight on a GI 45 was Ok but as soon as you make the sight big enough to see you have issues with them flying off under recoil!

I shot IPSC in the 70's and 80's and can't count the number of stock front sight that flew off during my time in the league.

Bigger tangs, silver solder were tired. In the end two systems came about that cured the issue Millett's DC front sight and the custom guys who used a dovetail and a pin to hold on the front sight.

These days Millet is gone but from time to time you can find a sight or two on e bay or Craigs list, heck I've bought Millett sights here in swap and sell.

Kind of a pain to put on if you don't have the special Vise Grips ( they are easy enough to make though!) or the carbide counter sink ( I've used a Ball Diamond grinder in my Dremel tool and gotten as good, if not better, results).

I put a set of Millet sights on my 1911 in 1983 and to this day they have never come loose or lost the red paint. Still a good option if you hae the time to wait for a set up to float by.

Dove tail front sights are the real way to go today! Available from Brownell's fitted correctly you will have no issue with the coming off. You don't need special tools either just a couple good files and specific "clean up" file to make sure you have the right angle on the dove tail.

I've done several by hand using a file, but would rather use the mill!

[SharpsShooter]

+1 on dovetailing! I've had my front sight re-staked, tried JB, etc. etc. etc. No good! They just will eventually work loose and get to the point that the stake hole is no longer capable of working with. For the cost of fancy Jigs you can have it done right and nothing short of a train wreck will take it off.

SS

[Char-Gar]

When ever the topic of front sights on a 1911 comes up, folks start to tell tales of staked on sights becoming lose and even coming off.

I am 50 years deep into 1911s with at least 1/4 millions rounds through a dozen of so pistols. All have had staked on front sights and none have become loose or flown off. I have reached the point in life, where my experience controls my opinions.

My opinion is that is a front sight is staked on correctly then it won't come off until it is taken off on purpose. The size of the front sight doesn't seem to matter. I have been using King Hardball sights for years with zero problems.

[starnbar]

I'm with chargar on this one been shooting cast and hardball in my dads issued 45 since 65 and hardball in a series 70 from 72 on nothing coming loose yet and if i had a quarter for every round i've shot i could buy a couple of wilson 45s' completely decked out. I've noticed glocks seem to have that problem though.

[MtGun44]

Chargar is dead right.

Crappy and incompetent staking and crimping jobs will fly off. Many so-called gunsmiths
have no clue how to do this right.

I have some that I did that have over 60K rounds full power 185,000 power factor.

Read my post carefully and follow this and you will NEVER lose a front sight.

Starnbar - A QUARTER! If I had 1 cent for every .45 acp round I have fired in competition, I
could buy 10 of them.

Bill

[starnbar]

MtGun44 I talkin inflation prices my series 70 new in the box with my discount was 225.00 out the door. I shoulda bought a couple of em. I got a few 2 gallon buckets of 45 brass that I keep handy for when my 5 sons and the rest of the family decide to go shooting on the weekend. The one pistol all of em want to shoot the most is my dads gi 45.

[MtGun44]

Don't you wish you could have bought some more of the guns and cars at old prices "back when"?

Of course, I didn't have any money "back then", so it wasn't possible.

I refigured my calcs from above and it is not good to do math in my head when sleepy. About
300,000 rounds at a penny each is $3000 which would buy one of the hotshot Wilson or
Baer custom guns these days.

In any case, if you make a good .020 chamfer, slowly peen the tang with a centerpunch
to spread it wide and then carefully finish with a flat faced punch, with many, many tiny hits,
you will never lose a front sight. No chamfer, one or two hits with a staking tool = guaranteed
failure.

Bill

[andremajic]

First thing to do is use a small carbide ball grinder to enlarge the underside of the hole slightly. (About the size of a match head.) This allows the swaged sight metal a place to displace to.

I've had success with holding the front sight between a smooth sided machinist vise with the slide resting on top of the vise.

Stake it in place and slowly swage the metal outwards. An undersized cylinder wrapped with sandpaper touches up the underside so any swaged metal that might contact the barrel is taken away, but really you won't have any to take off it you swaged it right.

I use the brownells staking tool. Although they say to use some loktite or jbweld I've done it without. Wouldn't hurt to use some though.

Rock solid and has lasted me years of shooting.