SIGHT PUSHER DAMAGE & XD MOD.2 RESTORATION
A Sad Looking Mod.2
By James Nicholas
We had a customer send us an email asking for some help. He used a sight pusher to remove the factory sight and everything was going great, that was until he backed off the pusher. The front sight was removed, but the pusher had gouged into the band new XD Mod.2 and actually raised up the edges of the dovetail thoroughly messing up the slide.
The customer basically thought all was lost and he would have to live with the damage. I told the customer that I would realistically be able to fix about 80% of the damage, but there was a chance that I could not fix the deep gouging.
So here is the same slide after I worked some of my magic. The XD Mod.2 slide was originally a stainless steel version, but the customer chose to get it refinished after the restoration in KG Gunkote Grey and top it off with a set of Trijicon night sights. Overall the restoration was a complete success and at least 98% of the damage was fixed. If you did not know the slide was ever damaged you would not be able to tell by looking at it now.
Step one was to clean up the deformed metal with a metal working hammer. Afterwards I dressed up the dovetail working though progressively finer files. I then blasted the slide with aluminum oxide and refinished the slide in a Matte Grey KG Gunkote. The customer let us know that after getting the restored slide back that they could not be happier. The work exceeded his expectations and thats what I like to hear.
