How do you determine which night sights to deploy?

[rutilate]

What decision criteria do you use in determining which of the plethora of night sights better serve your needs?

For example, Dawson has varying width blades, recommending wide blades for bulls-eye and narrow for fast target acquisition. Based on this I would choose the middle width as I'm not hard-core into USPSA (yet).

I'm planning on using them on an M&P 9. I'm shooting target for now and have the pistol available for home defense, but am planning on getting into USPSA. I like the highly visible fiber-optics in the daytime, and would love to find something with tritium for nighttime home defense.

I'm cross-eye dominant and am trying to retrain to be right eye dominant and so need something bright enough to pick up easily but not so bright that it obscures the target.

Under what circumstances would a different color front/back be useful?

How do you decide between Trijicon, Ameriglo, Mepro, TruGlo, etc., assuming they all have a fiber+tritium that fits the M&P full-size? I know that Trijicon is the premium brand, but I'm not willing to pay a premium just to brag about how much money I spent. Are there meaningful reviews anywhere? So many gun rags (and especially American Rifleman) don't dare say anything negative against their advertisers so every review is glowing. Pun intended.

Is it possible to just get a front sight and leave the existing rear S&W white night sights?

 

[M60]

Rather than asking for opinions on which sights to buy, I'm asking for decision criteria you would use in determining which of the plethora of options to add to a short list.

For example, Dawson has varying width blades, recommending wide blades for bulls-eye and narrow for fast target acquisition.

I'm planning on using them on an M&P 9. I like the highly visible fiber-optics in the daytime, and would love to find something with tritium for the night vision. I'm shooting target for now, but am planning on getting into USPSA.

Bingo! Rapid acquisition is the priority always. Tritium for night and fiber optic for the day. There is only one company that I know of that provides both options in one set of sights. That company is TRUGLO. They do not make these sights for all handguns. The package that I am looking at says that they make them for Glock, Sig, Kimber, that is 1911, Springfield XD'S and S&W SD.I use these sights because they work.

 

[white feather]

Be careful with different color front sights. I believe that the yellow/orange are only good for half as long as the green.
White Feather

 

[YZhou4]

I'm cross-eye dominant and am trying to retrain to be right eye dominant and so need something bright enough to pick up easily but not so bright that it obscures the target.

I am also cross dominant and it is my understanding that one cannot easily train eye dominance. You can close your left eye, or learn to shoot predominantly with your left hand, but you can't make your brain prefer your right eye when shooting with both eyes open unless you do extensive training with an eye-patch. The amount of difficulty will relate to the degree of dominance. Personally, I just make sure to consistently bring the sight under my left eye before extension. I also tilt the gun slightly to the left when shooting righty. Can I ask why you chose to retrain your eye rather than just train your left hand?

 

[Queen Bee]

Im intrigued why you want to change eyes vs shooting hand...

Im cross dominant as well

I do know its a pain in the ass for rifles though, but thats another story

 

[rutilate]

Im intrigued why you want to change eyes vs shooting hand...

Im cross dominant as well

I do know its a pain in the ass for rifles though, but thats another story

My eye dominance has changed recently. I've been shooting for too many years to make an easy change. And, if I can cause eye dominance to change back then I get the benefit of being able to more easily shoot rifle and shotgun again

 

[johnnymac101]

I decided to go with AmeriGlo not just for price, but for the posititve reviews I read from actual users (not magazines editors worried about AD revenue!)
I have the Pro i-dot set for my Shield. I like the bright orange front sight in daylight and the glowing green sights in darker times.

The 'i dot' sight picture in new to me, but I'm getting my practice in!

 

[TBalls]

I'm a fan of the Trijicon HDs. You get a nice, big orange (or yellow) front, with tritium inserts all around. I especially like that the rear inserts are very unobtrusive during the day.

 

[dcmdon]

I prefer tritium on only the front sight. I find it aids POINTING the gun, which is all I can hope for if I'm using my gun without a flashlight.

If you have a flashlight, you don't need night sights since the spill from the light will light up your sights to a degree that you can't even see the tritium.

Re handedness and eye dominance. I've taught a couple of hundred people to shoot pistols. I've had the best results teaching people to shoot behind whatever is their dominant eye, if they've never shot before.

So if its a truly new shooter who is RH but L eye domanant, they shoot left handed.

Shooting cross eyed won't really hurt you if you are doing something like shooting at distance through a scope.

But it will hurt you in what I call "Instinctive" shooting situations. That would include any use of a shotgun which should be pointed not aimed, practical shooting games (both handgun and rifle), and the real defensive use of a firearm.