Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Gunsmithing Can I solder sights on

I have a Remington 141 that I put a receiver sight on and needed a taller front sight and to put a blank in the dovetail for the rear sight. The dovetails in the barrel and front sight ramp are just a slight bit bigger than 3/8". I would like to position the front sight and blank in and silver solder them in place. Will this hurt the bluing or anything else? I was thinking epoxy, but that would be a pain if I wanted to return the rifle to original.

Silver solder melts at about 1200 degress F. You will have to get the barrel red hot to do what you want to do.

My personal opinion? It could warp and discolor the barrel. Unless you use something to protect the bore, this much heat could also cause scale inside.

Epoxy will turn loose if you heat it to about 300 degrees F. Some less than that. I would go with the epoxy, and if you want to go back to original, that is better than heating it red hot.

How about taking the front sight out, grinding it flat and silver soldering a new front sight on that? No barrel issues and same dovetail. Or, a new front sight could be screwed into the existing front sight after it's milled/ground.

Dan

I learned years ago to take a piece of brass stock, lay it over each edge of the barrel dovetail, and smack it with a hammer. It will tighten up the dovetail and you can't notice it on the barrel. It really does work and will hold sights or slots in place like they should. Thanks...Bill.

Another trick is to add a little "harder" soft solder like Brownell's Hi-Force series to the bottom of the sight to build it up a little. File close, driving the sight in will trim off the little excess that's left.

An old trick, disparaged by some, for a "just a little loose" sight is to center punch inside the dovetail which raises the metal around the divot.

That said I usually go with peening the top of the dovetail like model70man said when practical. Go slow, don't get to strong hammering on it.

Use the correct solder and all is good.Silver solder is for HVAC work not gunsmithing.

.........JIM........

Williams makes a front sight ramp that screws to a dovetail filler that can be munted with locktite if you are worried about returning rifle to original condition.

put a low ramp that is dovetailed for a F sight. there are some that has a filler for a screw it is put in the original davetail and the ramp is set on and a screw goes into the filler to hold the ramp on it dosent matter if the original dove tail is loose. I hope I said it right..

I guess I have been doing it wrong all these years?
I have silver soldered a pile of sights onto shotgun barrels that were cut down to 20 inches. You will need to reblue
afterwards if you get sloppy with the flux.
whelennut
PS If you rap the dovetail just lightly with a ball peen hammer you will not need solder.

Silver brazing is better than screws if it's done well. Brazed sights look and work better on a rifle than on anything else...........MO...