I've found that cupping my hand over the sights and peeking into a "viewing window" I've made with my thumb and index finger will allow me to reliably visualize the glow from a tritium-lamp night-sight.
Give the clerk or your seller a heads-up that's what you're going to do, though, as it can look kinda weird.
In the case of the Hellcat, the U notch rear sight does not glow so there is no way to align front and back sight in darkness. It's all in how well you know the feel of the pistol in your hand and if you have a good natural point of aim. I don't think one could even aquire the front sight in darkness with that dim glow. So, I still feel the tritium front sight is not useful. At least for me it isn't. But, I agree, a light is the most useful item. I also like a high decibel home alarm and night vision cameras in the house now that they are $35. Then you can shelter in place, watch them on the camera and get them stuck in tight hallways where they have no cover and a blind turn into what will ultimately become their worst day
In addition to @10mmLife 's scenario (waking at night, in a darkened room), there are others where tritium night-sights can be helpful -
Why Night Sights?
A recent discussion at pistol-forum.com regarding night sights motivated me to take this photo: Pretty straight forward, yes? I shot it with my phone sitting on my couch in the living room. Literal…
pistol-training.com
^ The following article was penned by the late ToddG, and demonstrates a specific scenario where having self-luminous night-sights would be quite advantageous.
But in the end, it's just that: it is but *_a_* tool, and just as there are scenarios which favor its use, there will be those for which it is neutral or even simply not useful at all (and potentially deleterious [while I cannot think of one for tritium night-sights, this can nevertheless be an issue for other tools]).
If you use a white-light, it won't matter, you'll be shooting the silhouette of the sights no matter what the configuration.
The self-luminous Tritium elements do present an advantage in lower-light situations where there is sufficient light for you to positively identify the target but cannot see the sight bodies, however, understand that since you are "shooting the dot(s)," even if those dots align on-target, you still won't have as-precise aiming as you would in more well-lit situations where you can actually see the sight bodies.
Whether any one particular shooter prefers a front-dot-only versus a dot-over-dot (or dash; whatever the rear sight marking is, this is just a straight-line, up/down format) versus a three-dot or dot/outline setup is just that: straight-up personal preference, as there are pro/con arguments for each configuration. There's also ones where the front/rear markers are of different intensities - and ones where they are different colors. The best way to figure this out is to shoot these different configurations for yourself, under varying conditions/scenarios.
There are sights that pair a gas-tube with the fiber optic, as well as others that have a white-light-"recharged" luminescent ring that surrounds/highlights the tritium, to aid in transitional-light visibility (as even the brightest Tritium tube won't be visible until your eyes are at least somewhat adjusted to the darkness).
Once thing that those who desire tritium-lamp night-sights will have to somewhat compromise on, though, is that to house the tritium tube the front sight post will need to be a bit wider. There are a few that are a bit thinner than the rest, but even then, they won't be able to match what you'd otherwise be able to get with the thinnest, non-tritium.
We all "see" somewhat differently than one another, so there's that to play with, in terms of personal-preference as well.
Overall, my personal opinion is that while I don't need it, I'd like to have it, if-possible - but I don't have night-sights on either my primary HD nor EDC handguns, which both carry a WML (and I also EDC a handheld flashlight, and have one staged with my HD kit). As you well noted, @ajz1966 , there's more to the home-defense equation than just the gun or the accessories on the gun: to me, in the HD context, particularly as I also employ those other suggestions you made above, the self-luminous tritium night-sight is not as useful for me, either.
I wrote the following on another Forum, and I think this offers some good perspective here in this thread, too:
.....The truth is that there's a lot of different ways that the low-light equation can be dissected, and each tool -be it photo-luminescent paint, tritium gas tubes, self-powered optical sights, white-light and/or visible laser- has both its pros and cons. It's often a combination of the exact circumstances and personal preference that will drive how the decision is made.
And remember also it's not just about darkness - but also how the varying types of ambient lighting that is often seen in modern society can distort our scotopic vision. It's about understanding what photonics barriers are and how to combat them. It's about remembering that, as this article by Dr. House points out, while the statistics suggest that violent crimes most often occurs during hours of darkness, those same statistics fail to actually examine whether if the engagement truly took place in the dark. In the article, he quotes the legendary Tom Givens as saying that “There have been times where I have seen my sights clearer at 3 AM outside of a well-lit gas station than I have at 3 PM on an overcast day.” - Low light, red sights, and Tom Givens’ Glock 35
This is why it's so important to get out and get low-light training, so that you can start to experiment with the various hardware and techniques.
[ Here, it's worth noting that finding truly well-qualified low-light instruction is still somewhat of a crap-shoot, even today. Despite recent advances, oldthink, dogma, and outright misinformation still persists to a large extent in the community with regard to low-light white-light use. Vet your instructors very, very carefully, where it comes to this sector. If they can't tell the difference between lumens and candela/lux or demonstrate an understanding of photonics barriers, these basic vocabulary words can serve as watersheds for that initial yes/no in your decision tree. ]
