Colt XSE LW "Ghost" Commander

They are made by Talo right? IMHO they are nothing but dressed up Colts. They are limited edition but really are only limited by the number Talo wants to commission.

They have a fiber front with a Novak rear. IIRC they also have a two tone finish. Stainless on an tan frame.

IIRC they did not do any custom work on the gun as far as its action or or configuration beyond the sights and grip change. It still comes with the duckbill right?

All that said there is nothing wrong with them. If you like the look and it shoots well for your mother she's done good.

Wow!

I thought that style sight was gone for good. I've had one on my Kimber Compact for over ten years. In my opinion, it's the best sight system ever devised.

That Ghost sight looks awfully interesting. Who sells em these days?

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Novak.

It's a bizarre idea. An aperture, or complete ghost ring works because of the weird optical trick that forces your eye to center an object when looking through a circle. You simply put the front sight on the target without referencing the rear sight and pull the trigger. It's much faster than a standard sight.
Novak took it a step further. You only have about 1/3rd of a circle, but somehow your eye completes the circle and centers the front sight.

The problem is that nobody ever tries it. Or, when they do try it, they can't let go of their training and they try to consciously center the front sight. It only works if you ignore the rear sight and just look through it at the front sight. Your eye does the work without bothering your brain for any details. It's lightning fast - just like a holo sight.

This is my piece with the old style Novak Ghost Ring that Kimber used to offer:

It just works even though if you think about it, it's counter to everything you think you know.

Do try again and report your results. Just pretend there's no rear sight and you can't fail. Mine is set up to cover the target for a hit - like a red dot sight. Your Moms may be set up to do the traditional pumpkin-on-a-post. Try it both ways.

When I shoot plates, I concentrate on the front sight and just get the blurr (old eyes) of the rear "centered", so this sight should be right down my alley.

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Try it, and I think you'll be sold. If you get the fire dot front you can swap out different size dots. With the small dots you can be very precise. My piece is strictly for carry so I put the largest size on it, for light-gathering purposes. Even with the large dot I can make a palm sized group at fifteen yards as fast as I can throw the dot on the target.

A quick check of Novaks website shows the ghost ring rear sight with a tritium dot at 6:00. I would hope it could be ordered without the dot.

The photo in post 3 is of a Novak ghost ring without a tritium dot, so it's available.

That looks like the hot set-up. KodiakBeer, is that Kimber compact your favorite carry and would you mind posting a pic of it ? Fire dot front sight ? Is that a fiber optic combined with tritium ?

The Kimber compact is my winter carry gun. It's an early version prior to the Swartz safety, and the ghost ring has been on it almost from the beginning. It's just fiber-optic, no tritium involved.

Very Nice. Thank you very much for sharing. And to the OP, thanks for posting. A very interesting and informative thread. I like this alot, and I am going to look into converting at least one pistol to this set-up.