Ross Front Sight Hood Orientation

[NORTHOF60]

Question: Should the front sight hood on a Ross rifle slope towards the muzzle, or towards the butt? I've seen them installed both ways. Diagrams in the 1907 Ross Handbook show that the hood should slope towards the butt. The written instructions in the same Handbook say the hood should slope towards the muzzle. I've seen diagrams for the Mk III with the hood installed in both directions.

Help me ... I'm going COVID crazy.

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[Bluenoser]

I believe the majority would say it should slope toward the muzzle. I am in the minority, and suspect a change to forward slope may have occurred due to differences in light gathering ability.

[NORTHOF60]

I agree that it was probably an operational expedient. It could also be the snag factor. That is why I reversed all of the sight hoods on my Parker-Hale sporters. Frustrating - even examples shown in photographs from the Canadian Museum show the hood mounted both ways.

[smle addict]

Here is a muzzle pic of my 1905. Sight hood was installed with slope towards muzzle. The screws are untouched, so I suspect it was assembled like this when it left the factory, and would have been correct for that time period.

[NORTHOF60]

I wish it were that easy. A perfect example is the 1907 Ross Handbook. The written instructions state that the hood should be installed slanting towards the muzzle. Yet the illustrations in Plates I and II clearly show the hood sloping towards the butt. This isn't a simple case of a negative being reversed.

In most pictures I have seen, the majority of the rifles had the hood sloped towards the muzzle.

In "The Ross Rifle Story", I've only noticed the rear sloped hood on a trials rifle, Plate 122A p.175. Pages of pictures and text are devoted to rear sights. Only Plate 446A p.398 specifically deals with the front sight. It slopes to the muzzle.

I wasn't even aware of this issue until I was putting a pair of Ross's into gun socks. (They looked so forlorn and cold in the gun cabinet.) I wish I had a dime for every time someone said "the rear sight protector of your No. 1 Mk. III is installed backwards". "The screws are installed from the left on the swivel band."

I personally think that the hood should slope to the muzzle.

[smle addict]

Hmmm....