Gunsmith Grant Cunningham has a post up about pistol sight options for those of us who are optically-challenged. It’s interesting to read that he and his customers have had uniformly bad luck with XS Big Dot sights. I don’t have a firm opinion on them myself; I’ve handled several guns with Big Dots but haven’t actually shot one yet, so I’m withholding judgement.

I do know that pdb raves about them, and my buddy ColtCCO likes them well enough that both of his carry guns are outfitted with Big Dots (and I get the definite impression that ColtCCO doesn’t do anything half-assed when it comes to his personal guns).

On the other hand, Mr. Cunningham and his clients weren’t satisfied, and Ross Seyfried had this to say:

Another kind of sight that has seen some presence lately is the bead-and-V notch as used on express rifles. These are usable with the long sight radius of a rifle but basically a bad idea on a handgun. They are not faster than square ones and are far less precise.

And that, I think, is the heart of the matter. Standard square-post/square notch sights, with their right-angle geometry, make it very easy to control both horizontal and vertical sight alignment. With the Big Dots, it’s quick’n'easy to get a coarse sight picture but holding precise, repeatable alignment is much harder.

Still, I’m willing to give them a try. The Charles Daly Hi-Powers come with XS sights as standard equipment, and who doesn’t need another Hi-Power?

EDIT: The pdb pointed me to this video. Pretty impressive shooting.