Looking through the offerings at Track of the Wolf, and ran across the Italian made tang sights they are selling.

At right around $50 for a tang sight, just how cheap an' nasty are they? Anyone had hands on a set?

Nasty? Really nasty? Useable?

Looking at building up a BPCR type rifle for fun, on the cheap. Given the amount of effort that would go into building a set of sights, I figure that $50 is cheap, even if they do require some working over to get reasonable use out of, but I figured someone here would have had hands on a set.

Cheers
  Trev

Trev,
the 50 dollar sight is pretty nasty if you want to shoot for score. If you want something to just sit there and look kind of original, go for it. Lee Shaver takes them and makes a soule sight out of 'em for under 200.oo. Buffalo Arms carries a good assortment of them. My Pedersoli came with the sight a step up from the 50 dollar sight. I took it right off when I got the gun. At the time, I could not find a soule I could afford and got one of the Pedersoli sights with a windage screw and a Hadley eye cup. That sight kept decent settings and repeatability, but ran out of windage! It wouldn't go over far enugh on a windy day, and I was shooting 200 NOT 500 meters. 
Then I got a pedersoli soule sight for my Birthday one year, I still wasn't aware that Shaver was offering his updated soules for about the same price. My pedersoli soule works ok, but repeatability is something to be desired on it. It seems something in the drum has a little slop in it.
If I get on and stay on, I am ok. But every match my settings in my notes only get me close, then I need to shoot more sighters than I want to.
I guess what I am saving, is if money is an issue, and it is for most of us, at least look at the Shaver italian sight reworks. They are about half the price of even his complete made units and people seem to like them. SIghts are NOT where you want to skimp if you can help it.
There is a Ukraine made sight out there that a lot of people use and like. It falls somewhere between the Shaver Italian upgrade sights and the MVA sights in price if I remember right, around 300.00.

Merwin

One problem with commenting on your questions is that we can only answer based on our own experience and we really dont know exactly which sight it is that you've got your "sights on".  At any rate, if windage is not an issue, the basic Italian import sight for around $50 will be serviceable, sometimes the marings are a little crude and not evenly spaced but they to work.  I would hightly recommend a Hadley eyecup,which is will give you your best return in terms of equipment improvement for your dollar. Lee Shaver sells them to fit any sight.  Start with the basic sight, buy a Hadley when you can afford it, and if the elevation markings arent good enough you can always upgrade later. Lee Shaver can also re-cut the elevation markings for  a lot less than the cost of a new sight. With the hadley eyecup you will have a very  serviceable sight for about $100. I won a few medals with a $35 Italian tang sight before I upgraded, so I know they can be be serviceable, the reason I upgraded was lack of windage, otherwise I was happy with it. Good Luck! Joe S

You can make a bad sight shoot good. Use a dial caliper to set it recording measurements for distances.

As long as the staff stays straight and nothing slips all you need is the aperture.  The dial caliper takes care of the rest.   

I struggled with a poor tang on a H&R Officers model until someone showed me that trick

Boats

Trev, someone has to be included in the results column "also shooting poorly was..." besides myself!   

David
Montezuma, IA

Thanks for the invites and the encouragement.

Gotta build the rifle before I can bring it anywhere!

Looks like a Rolling Block, as I have two of them now, both of Scandinavian origins.

Gotta turn down the barrel, etc, etc, etc...

Cheers
  Trev