I have a choice of installing a Marble's windage and elevation adjustable tang sight or an MVA (Montana Vintage Arms) Model #134 vernier tang sight, also W&E adjustable.

Which is more durable in terms of resistance to being knocked around? I do not refer to just shooting at a gun range. Nor am I considering drilling and tapping the receiver to install a micrometer sight. Only one of the two tang sights.

So which of the two will better resist getting knocked around when hunting?

Neither, really. Tang ("flagpole")sights, by nature, are rather fragile compared to other systems. I'd go with the MVA, never really impressed with Marbles.

Marbles are far more durable than the tall ones; they were made in the 1800s, to now, as a hunting sight, whereas the vernier ones were, and are, mostly target sights. I have both types on various single shots.
Nothing wrong with Marble tang sight, I have found. Maybe others had different experience. They are short and not overly fragile; of course if you plan to drop your rifle in the rocks, then no sight will take that.

If you are talking about a newly manufactured Marbles sight versus a new MVA reproduction of the Marbles, the latter wins every single time. Not even close.

I prefer MVA vernier sights for hunting - usually. But the Lollipop style has one or two advantages over the standard vernier staff tang sight - and one or two disadvantages.

Not sure why I would ever want a vernier sight for hunting; the peep is not moved around in the field. So the use of the Vernier adjustment is just more things to go/get, wrong. Of course they will work as you said, but just have to baby them in the field. For the OP to consider.
I have hunted a lot with a Sharps 45-70 with an original Lyman peep, just like the Marble. Killed a caribou with it at 108 yards. Black powder, of course. No windage; you sight them in by filing the base to lean it for windage.

quote:

Originally posted by dpcd:
Not sure why I would ever want a vernier sight for hunting; the peep is not moved around in the field. So the use of the Vernier adjustment is just more things to go/get, wrong. Of course they will work as you said, but just have to baby them in the field. For the OP to consider.
I have hunted a lot with a Sharps 45-70 with an original Lyman peep, just like the Marble. Killed a caribou with it at 108 yards. Black powder, of course. No windage; you sight them in by filing the base to lean it for windage.

if that's what you think then the Marbles is the way to go for you. I just happen to disagree strongly for many kinds of hunting that I do. So, more often than not, I have vernier on board, and yes, it is moved around in the field.

I drift my front sight for left-right zeros. Filing the base removed the staff from vertical meaning that windage issues arise again when you change elevations for whatever reason.

I personally HATE tang sights and have split the web of my hand between my thumb and forefinger a couple of times on the base and the post on different rifles when I threw them up quick and forgot to lay my thumb on the right hand side of the grip. I am however a huge fan of receiver sights and use the Williams almost exclusively. It probably sounds silly that a gunplumber and an old guy to-boot would prefer the aluminum sight over the steel Lyman, but I just like them better and they have never let me down. I sight them in, lock the gibb and adjustment screws and forget them until I sell the gun.

I once had a Fish & Chips officer walk up to me on a trout stream in northern Alberta and I reached into my shirt pocket and pulled out my fishing license and firearms license and handed them to him. Even though we had never met, I knew from the look on his face that he knew exactly who the hell I was the instant he read my name. There just aren't that many old gunplumbers in Alberta and I held 2, full time magazine columns for a number of years. But, he still asked me if the gun was loaded and why I was carrying it while there was no open hunting season. I looked down and stared at the Tupperware on his hip for a couple exaggerated seconds and said: "There are 6 in the tube, nothing in the chamber and a 40 Smith & Wesson pistol is far to diminutive and inaccurate to carry around on trout streams in berry season."

I guess he liked my answer.


This is my fishing gun. 30-30s like this hold enough ammo to load all morning and shoot all afternoon. They are also one of the lightest carrying packages ever made and it's a proven fact that 180 grain .308 caliber bullets are hell on bears up to 250 yards. They are also good for gophers out to 150 yards. Receiver sights make them lightning fast to use. Especially if you screw out the aperture.

94 Winchester by Rod Henrickson, on Flickr

A Marble's W&E tang sight would be of current manufacture.

MVA's #134 (13x series) does not have a long stem when compared with MVA's and similar sights intended for use in 1000-yard matches by single shot black powder cartridge rifles. And yes, I know of which I speak. Frenchtown, Montana, has such a rifle range. I believe that last time I shot there - not on a competition day - matches occurred one Sunday per month (one weekend per month??) during which no other shooting was permitted. Matches did not occur during winter.

MVA also makes this #13x series mid-range series with elevation assembly along the stem upside down for greater protection from the kind of getting knocked around when hunting.
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The "Ooo, neat!" effect is greater with MVA. But "Strong like bull!" is more attractive in this instance.
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Using a tang sight is as much of an acquired taste as appreciating Irish whiskey. For me, the additional 3-4 inches of sight radius, plus a heavy duty globe [front] sight assembly with "post" insert mounted upside down metamorphoses a 130-yard rifle - hold-over blots out the animal beyond this range with conventionally mounted front sights - into a 200-yard rifle. This hunting sight combination is capable of still longer effective range, on a rifle capable of accuracy. My effective range kind've tops out between 175 and 200 yards on clear, sunny days. . . which brings me back to my original post.

Actually, the 130 series of sights are Schuetzen, short range sights, which, depending on the amount of drop in the rifle's wrist, may or may not reach even to 200 yds, or may go quite a bit further. There is a mid series and a long range series and then some other special sights that they make as well. they come with elevator screws, upside down elevator screws, and NO elevator screws, among other things. I am one of those people who does shoot to 1000 yds with them in competitions, and I have used them from Namibia to New Mexico and many points in between. I have more MVA tang sights than I can even count and keep track of, so, I can say without equivocation, that the "fragility" of tang sights is so far overblown on the internet as to be incalculable. It is just plain ridiculous to say they are fragile.


The use of tang sights for hunting is pretty straight forward but also not well represented on internet hunting forums such as this, but it is safe to say, they can be used for game as far out as you care to go.

As for the Modern Marbles - don't. Find a vintage one or buy the MVA reproduction. I would avoid Lymans in general. Modern made Lymans most of all.

Brent: In my "stuff" box I have at least one of each of the sights about which we've been chatting. Does MVA's #134 (upside down elevation adjust assembly) protect the assembly more effectively than the #130's conventional assembly?

Oh yeah. By the way, you have convinced me to go with an MVA #13x series.

quote:

Originally posted by Naphtali:
Brent: In my "stuff" box I have at least one of each of the sights about which we've been chatting. Does MVA's #134 (upside down elevation adjust assembly) protect the assembly more effectively than the #130's conventional assembly?

Oh yeah. By the way, you have convinced me to go with an MVA #13x series.

Whether it is better protected might depend on what you are protecting from, and that may depend on the rifle. For instance on a lever gun, the downward knob may be battered about by the levergun's bolt as it is cycled. But it won't catch on all the lianas and so forth at are always attempting to wrest your gun from your hands

To be honest, I think the reverse elevation screw is simply done to protect the shooter's eye if he or she attempts to shoot the barrel sights with the staff folded back. For this reason, I prefer a sight without the elevator screw sometimes. Just depends on the type of hunting I'm doing and the rifle I'm using.

Front sights matter too, in that they affect how much elevation you might need. The shorter staffs may not reach to the distances you want to go for a given rifle and front sight combination.

For moose in the Yukon Pennisula, I used a fairly short-staff, original Ballard sight without an elevator screw on a Ballard Pacific in combination with the original barrel and front sight. I then had my rifle equipped with two zeros at all times - one for 100 yds with the barrel sights and one for 200 yds with the tang sight. In the end, the moose was at 80 yds. Everything worked perfectly as I shot the barrel sights over the tang sight that was folded back along the comb of the stock.

That situation did not work in Africa using a Sharps with an MVA midrange vernier since the elevator screw was too great a risk to my eye and face to shoot under pressure when it folded back. So, there I dialed elevation as needed, or I held over or under as the case may be - shot an eland holding on air below his chest). Anyway, there are lots of ways to go with a tang sight and they are very effective when used correctly.

This fall, it will be elk in Wyoming and deciding on what sights I want to use will be more important than what rifle I choose.