i chose not to do that for backup reasons, and the face is fine, its not a project and i have thousands of rounds through it after the machining, i also hate the way a red dot looks at the very back, and its not cheap anymoreJust a suggestion , if you ever do it again cut back the rear irons and make the red dot cut back further. I would be interested to see how the breechface integrity is. Assuming this is just a "project" gun and thus the cheap S&W.