This past weekend I took a little vacation to visit my son in Grand Rapids, Michigan for some golf, movies, and of course a little gun range time.  We visited the Silver Bullet Firearms Indoor Range & Training Center, and had an excellent time at their range facilities.  They also have an excellent selection to choose from in their retail firearm and accessory retail operation.

I’ve been wanting to get night sights put on my Springfield Armory XD(m) 9mm, and had a set of Trijicon SP01 night sights back ordered for over a month.  As luck would have it, Silver Bullet had some in stock, as well as an on-site armorer who installed them in about 15 minutes for a very reasonable charge.  Once they were installed, I was able to take my XD(m) on their range and try them out.

One of the reasons why I selected the Trijicon SP01 night sights is that they very much look like stock sights.  I considered getting Truglo night sights, and while they’re likely a bit brighter than the Trijicon sights I purchased, the glow tubes on the Truglo sites really detract from the “stock” look of the gun, and I’ve read failure reports from the optic tubes.  With the Trijicon sites, the casual observer wouldn’t even notice you’ve made any modifications to your firearm.

In terms of “glow power” the Trijicon SP01 certainly provide ample visibility when the lights go out:

In terms of my sight picture during “normal” lighting conditions, I don’t see much of a difference at all in my accuracy or speed using the Trijicon sights.   If the sights were larger, they’d be easier to see, but then it would be more difficult to fit the gun in a holster.

The Trijicon SP01 night sights are exactly what I was looking for and I can’t wait to use them at my local range during a low-light shooting exercise!