The NECG front sight hood on my .416 Howell flies off on every third or fourth shot. How do I keep it from happening?

Send it back to NECG and have them replace it with a heavier gauge one. But, do you really need a hood on a DGR?

Newguy,

By mistake, I posted a similar question on the
African Hunting Reports site. Nobody responded. Too OT. I should have posted it here.

I had the same problem on my AHR Safari 550 DGR in .458 Lott. And in the time since I posted my question, my gunsmith has solved the problem.

Did Ed Plummer make your .416? I know he builds a lot of rifles in Howell calibers. After a couple of tries, he finally fixed my "flying front sight hood" problem.

You really don't want a heavier hood. Ed modified the NECG hood in such a way as to lighten it and keep it in place on the Masterpiece base. The hood has big oval cuts on either side to admit light for the fiber optic bead, and Ed futher lightened it by grinding away a portion of the rear of the hood at an angle that slopes up towaard the front from the lower rear of the hood. He ground off a fair amount of metal from the rear/top side.

It still works well for its intended purpose, which is to protect the bead from being damaged by the odd bump or whack, but stays firmly in place shot after shot.

If Ed built your rifle, he should be able to fix the hood the same way.

[ 07-11-2003, 07:25: Message edited by: mrlexma ]

John Ricks built mine from Ken's orginal reamer. I got the front sight hood for protection from the odd bump or so.

Make sure the plunger is engaging the hood slot.
Sometimes the hood needs a little squeeze from a padded pliers.

Thanks John, I will give it a try.