What can I say. You've helped 50 people and I've only seen my own.
Miraculously I have never shot factory sights the way you have described, and also never shot low.
Keep on keepin on!
Just for everyone wondering how to aim a pistol, what ghostie has done is helped people with a flinch to aim high and flinch down to their target.
If you need some help to learn how to shoot your GLOCK, how the plastic sights work etc., I'm certainly willing to invite you to my home range any time you are in the Vancouver area. We can certainly work on your flinch too, if that is part of what is messing you up on your sight picture vs. point of impact. Forget my experience, one of the ROs there has gone through with with literally hundreds of noob GLOCK 17 shooters, week after week for years! And guess what he tells people? The front dot sits in the white U-notch, just above it. You do not level the tops of the sights. Bingo! immediately people start shooting better.
The bottom line is: the stock plastic GLOCk sights are not designed for the top of the front sight to be level with the top of the rear sight. If you hold the gun like that, you will shoot low. It has absolutely nothing to do with flinching. It is how the sights are designed. The dot "sits" in the notch, without the tops of the sights being level.
Left to right: Aftermarket sights (which level off, the way most people want their sight picture); GLOCK adjustable sights; GLOCK plastic fixed sights:
Looks a hell of a lot like the illustations I was using in my previous post, doesn't it? The idea that you can level the sights off, as shown in figure 3, and that the dot will sit in the notch with the tops of the sights level, is just in somebody's tactical imagination. I personally think that is how the sights
should be, but in actuality they are not.
I personally use the sight picture in figure 4, because I use Trijicon night sights on all my GLOCKs and have done so for many, many years. BTW, if anybody in the Vancouver area needs help getting rid of your plastic GLOCK sights, PM me as I have the GLOCK sight pusher, the driver for the front sight, blue loctite - and I have done alot of them over the years.
Sorry, I believe ghostie to be on the mark. My G17 Gen 4 has a sight picture of #3 with the sights level, and for obvious reasons, shoots low with this sight picture.
That's because you are one of the very few open-minded people on here that is willing to see things for what they are, instead of immediately jumping to a "tactical pissing contest" because you think you are a tactical guru and everyone else knows nothing.
Funny how when you talk to people that work for Glock and are Glock sponsored shooters how they'll tell you 3 and 4 are the correct sight pictures, although 3 isn't drawn correctly really, as the circle is fully visible with the top of the sights level.
Well, the pictures I've just posted flatly refute that, so I'm not sure where that leaves your arguement.
#3 is exactly the sight picture I get if I level the sights (same as the OP). I cannot get a full dot with sights level. Are my sights out of spec?
No, that is how they are designed. The ones that come stock on the pistols when you buy them are all the same.
Second, the irony of your last statement is amazing. Telling Slavex he has no idea what he is talking about is very amusing for anybody who has a clue of his background and experience.
Lots of people have various shooting credentials, which they are rightly proud of, and that's great. But what I am saying, I can actually
prove with the actual pistols in question. I can prove it in person to anyone that needs proof, and I am proving it here with pictures. Notice that I am the only one here who is doing that? Funny, isn't it.
To the original poster... the best course of action by far is to get some decent sights for your pistol. It will immediately help your shooting, and the way your pistol works will now jive with what your brain is expecting. The other thing is, it will help you transition your shooting skills to other pistols faster, as virtually everything else on the market is always - the front and rear sights are level (SIGs, Berettas, HKs, 1911s all come immediately to mind). The plastic GLOCK sights are a bit of a weird abberation, something like the XS Big Dot. The Big Dots are preferrable to the stock plastic sights though, because it is obvious how those are supposed to line up and what the purpose of them is (rapid sight acquisition). The plastic stock sights fool almost everyone, at first, into thinking it is the normal "level" sight picture, but it isn't. That is primarily why I think they are a bad idea.
For myself, I am primarily an HK shooter for pistols. The pistol I use the most is the P7M13. I have three of them, along with two M8's and and two PSPs. Those are definitely "level front and back" pistols (they are also a bit different in that point of impact is "under" the front dot, rather than a 6 o'clock hold like almost eerything else on the market, but HK has always marched to their own drummer). I also shoot GLOCK 19 and 23 alot, and some SIG 228,229,239, so there is no way I could go back and forth between vastly different different pictures - so for my GLOCKs I use the 9mm/.40 Trijicon night sights, which are relatively similar to the stock sights on an HK or a SIG (SIGlite/Meprolight night sights).
