RIA 1911 sight

[tatso7]

I got hold of a RIA 1911 A1 FS in a trade. Shoots Ok except with my old and tired eyes , I can barely see the rear and front sights. I have night sight on my other pistols. Are this sights replaceable? What sights do you guys recommend. Thanks.

[SkyHawk]

There are several RIA 1911 with that generic model designation. Some have easily replaceable sights and some not. Post the SKU or a pic

[rodralig]

I got hold of a RIA 1911 A1 FS in a trade. Shoots Ok except with my old and tired eyes , I can barely see the rear and front sights. I have night sight on my other pistols. Are this sights replaceable? What sights do you guys recommend. Thanks.

Same here - aging eyes...

Either you go red dot by having the 1911 milled or use prescription shooting glasses.

While I have/am transitioning most of my pistols to RDS; I have to make do with Rx for those firearms I want to remain with iron sights. That said, I am scheduled to pick up my latest shooting Rx this afternoon (about 2x on the lens on my dominant eye; plano on the other). Yeah, I am far sighted, so it makes it extremely difficult to see the front/rear sights.


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[walmart_ar15]

Standard RIA A1 GI model front sight is staked. Unless you have the tools, it is a 15 min job for the gun smith to replace the front sight with a stake version of the larger dot or nite sight. They sell rear sight that will replace the old GI sight. They tend to sit higher.

BTW, it is generally not cost effective to have the gun smith mill the slide so you can use better sights. RIA sell slides already have the better sights that will drop-in fit and cost less than the labor and parts to have the GI slide modified.

[KrizB]

[Ruber]

I tried a few different options, all worked well, the only real difference is in aesthetics.

Option 1- DIY 3-dot sights from Fusion, about $35:at the time. No modification to the slide so you can always go back to GI configuration.





Option 2- New slide with Novak style sights from Hooper or Advanced tactical, less than $100 at the time. Right now it looks like they run sbout 180.


Option 3- Had Novaks mill a hi power slide for me, about $200:


I've heard folks have had good results sending their slide back to Armscor to get milled and have the Novak style sights installed like #2 above. All said it turned out well and was cheap.

Prices seem to leapfrog and go up and down. When I did the 3-dot install myself, it was very much the cheapest. Now it seems the prices of the sights have gone up more than the labor, so not the bargain it was.

The Novak low mounts on the HP have a white dot front and black rear. Grrat sight picture for old eyes and the work was very nice with a super fast turnaroind (shipped the slide on a Monday and received it back on the following Friday).

All perform equally as well, just depends on how much you want to spend for looks.

[Sailormilan2]

You can get high visability sights in either black on black, or white dot, that go into the existing hole/dove tail of the slide. RIA uses a narrow tenon front sight. The rear sight will probably need some fitting.
Or, simply replace the slide with one that has Novak sight cuts. Transfer all the internals over. Slide will probably have a fixed Novak Black on Black sight. Which can be replaced fairly easily with an adjustable one. I've replaced most of mine with adjustable white dot. Though the front one needs fitting if you go that route.

https://advancedtactical.com/tac-standard-fs-45acp-slide/

[naz]

I like heinie slant pro blacked out rear with fiber optic front for my 1911 but not sure if the cost to put those on ria with staked front sight (and need to mill for the proprietary Heinie dovetail cut) would be worth it

If I were in OP shoes I would mill the slide for a red dot and call it a day

[ShaneB]

I have a GI in 9mm and found a new 9mm slide with the Novak style sights on ebay for about 150 bucks, I then put my GI slide on ebay and got 100 for it. Its shoots great with the Novak style sights.

[k1dude]

IIRC, RIA used to have an unusual cut for the sights and only Fusion had an off-the-shelf solution. Then at some point RIA joined the rest of the world and started providing a Novak cut. So you have to know which cut your gun has. But, I could be wrong about that.

[Sailormilan2]

IIRC, RIA used to have an unusual cut for the sights and only Fusion had an off-the-shelf solution. Then at some point RIA joined the rest of the world and started providing a Novak cut. So you have to know which cut your gun has. But, I could be wrong about that.

RIA changed about 10 years ago.