How to paint sight with tritium insert?

[fatdog]

waited for the paint to dry a bit, took a toothpick and was able to easily rub the paint off of the areas that had been covered over the tritium tube. .

Same here except I use a straight pin and trace the circle around the part covering the vial and its liner until the center just lifts out and flakes off....I gave up on the intracacies of trying to "paint around" when I realized it was this easy to just remove the piece from the face of the vial.

[vcdgrips]

Initially, I would have said to use some very Orange finger nail polish from wal mart/CVS etc and apply carefully with the very edge of the included brush.

However I think saw this above

"Same here except I use a straight pin and trace the circle around the part covering the vial and its liner until the center just lifts out and flakes off....I gave up on the intricacies of trying to "paint around" when I realized it was this easy to just remove the piece from the face of the vial."

So I know think that ----you could paint the whole thing, top to bottom, left to right and let it start to dry for a few minutes and then carefully "dig" it out of the vial area with a toothpick, pin, tack, micro screwdriver etc. and be just fine. You might get bonus points for a quick degrease of the front sight with a mild solvent i.e. a dab of hand sanitizer or even a Zeiss (R) disposable optical cleaning towelette before "painting" with the polish.

[TCB]

Birchwood-Casey hi-Vis paint pen and a toothpick...no prep work and very little skill. 😂

[shootist26]

I bought some Dawson Precision Tritium night sights for my CZ P-01, and I'm not too excited about them. The front has a thin white ring that is OK but really doesn't stand out unless the lighting is perfect. I've got some testors neon paint, but I can't figure out how to do so without covering the tritium.

Option 1: try to cover the tritium with a tiny, perfectly round piece of tape. I'm not sure how well this will work because it's really tiny. And will it just peel off the surrounding paint when I try to remove it?

Option 2: paint over the tritium, then try to scratch the paint off later just where the tritium is. Will that work, or will I damage the tritium before I get all the paint off?

Option 3: ?????


Attachment 68594

Do you have a hobby store near you? One that specializes in plastic scale models and such?

There is this thing called liquid mask that modelers use to mask off parts for painting when tape won't work. You brush it on to the area you want to mask, let it dry, and them paint around the masked area. The liquid mask will try into a latex like layer and you can peel it right off with some tweezers.

Something like humbrol maskol:
https://youtu.be/tqRwTz52DAE

Also, get some superfine brushes for painting on amazon. Trying to paint with a toothpick sucks. These brushes have an even finer point.

[BrazeauRacing]

This is what I've been doing to all the tritium front sights of my guns (with or without RDS):
https://chuckbrazeau.blogspot.com/20...ont-sight.html

It's very easy to apply (takes me about 5 minutes), it's cheap, and I don't have to replace them very often at all. Your mileage may vary...

[matto]

This is what I've been doing to all the tritium front sights of my guns (with or without RDS):
https://chuckbrazeau.blogspot.com/20...ont-sight.html

Yes! Thanks for this post. After doing some tests on other surfaces with paint I decided that a stick-on is probably the way to go.

The only dilemma is which tape to use. What green tape is that in your pic? That looks really nice!

[BrazeauRacing]

Yes! Thanks for this post. After doing some tests on other surfaces with paint I decided that a stick-on is probably the way to go.

The only dilemma is which tape to use. What green tape is that in your pic? That looks really nice!

I just picked up some 1/4" pin stripe tape off eBay. The adhesive properties of the tape isn't that great, but once it's covered with the clear fingernail polish, it doesn't move. I've only had to replace the tape once on two different guns, but it's very easy to re-apply it.

By the way... if the face of front sight is serrated, just dab a little clear fingernail polish on the front sight and let it dry to fill the serrations before applying the pinstripe tape ring.

[Suvorov]

MicroMask

http://www.microscale.com/Merchant2/...y_Code=FINPROD

Can be purchased off of Bezos’s Capitalistic Communistic Shopping Commune (AKA Amazon).

Cover the dot with the mask (a toothpick will put a round drop that should cover the tritium insert), trim with a hobby knife, then paint the front sight. After the paint is mostly dry, use the hobby knife to remove the micro mask.

[matto]

MicroMask

http://www.microscale.com/Merchant2/...y_Code=FINPROD

Can be purchased off of Bezos’s Capitalistic Communistic Shopping Commune (AKA Amazon).

Cover the dot with the mask (a toothpick will put a round drop that should cover the tritium insert), trim with a hobby knife, then paint the front sight. After the paint is mostly dry, use the hobby knife to remove the micro mask.

Thanks!

Have you tried it? I'd be a little worried about it chipping up all the paint touching it?

[Suvorov]

Thanks!

Have you tried it? I'd be a little worried about it chipping up all the paint touching it?

Actually in the process of doing it but have used this technique on similar applications many times. If you can wait a week I will post the results.