It is easy to get caught up in the mystique and history of the 1911, but the design is over 100 years old, and we have learned a few things about designing and manufacturing since then. If you enjoy the craftsmanship of a finely built 1911 or you enjoy tinkering on your own, by all means continue to enjoy them. However, if training, shooting, and performance is your primary goal and you lack the resources, time, patience, or knowledge to keep after a 1911, then be realistic and choose something more modern.
via My Personal Path Away From The 1911 | Modern Service Weapons.
The Cult of the 1911 is a funny one. The acolytes scream a top of their lungs that the venerable gun is the best semi auto ever designed and that J.M Browning was a genius, but the next thing they do is screw around with the gun to make it “better.”
And the darn thing is a good gun or used to be. Stories of 1911s found in attic stashed away since WWII shooting without a hiccup without even the benefit of a dose of lubrication are not unheard of. But if you have spent any time at a range, specially at a competition, you cannot see but seeing a 1911 throwing a tantrum and acting like a congressman. But both guns are not the same: one was made for warfare and to survive its dirty and challenging environment with loose tolerances and the other is a distant cousin tuned for the mythical high performance and tolerances so tight, air molecules have trouble existing inside.
A true-to-Browning 1911 is more $400 AK-47 than $3,000 M-4. But 1911 owners for generations now have treated and built it more like a finely tuned Ferrari than the do-all tractor in the farm. And the sad part is that I don’t think there is one single manufacturer that builds the 1911 to the original specs (Cylinder & Slide built a special batch of 100 following the original blueprints) so we are stuck with a bunch of possible maniac girlfriends that can go south on us at any second.
JMB would go Mormon on us.
“but the next thing they do is screw around with the gun to make it “better.”
I think that’s the problem. You only hear about the ones who tune tune tune. Then there are us who have no need to tune, because its our carry pistol, and we don’t want to mess with it. But we don’t talk about it.
Every time this debate comes up, it always involves some variation about how 1911’s need tinkering. But that’s the small minority. For the rest, the 1911 works great.
For those who “training, shooting, and performance is your primary goal” the 1911 is perfect (among many pistols). You don’t need extra ” resources, time, patience, or knowledge to keep after a 1911″ because they damn things don’t need that, unless you like to tinker.
coffee has been spit. keyboards have been sacrificed. well done my good sir.
Guess I’m glad my 1911 is a military-issue one, then.
You know… like he says, we have learned a few things about manufacturing and design in the past hundred years. I would kind of really like to see what could be done to make an heir to the 1911.
Kind of like I’d really like to see what could be done to make an heir to the SR-71. But that’s so expensive it will likely never happen.
The only “tinkering” I have done to either of my 1911 is polishing the feed ramps. On my current carry gun, I put a fiber optic front sight on it (when it belonged to a customer) a extended safety and slid release and a set of Houge grips. One is a Llama X1A, (laugh you naysayers, those Spaniards built a good pistol) and my current one is a High Standard Executive.
Both of them go bang every time and the only issues have been ammo related. I have thought of going to either a 40 or maybe even a 9. mostly for the extra capacity. I keep thinking Beretta 92 OR 96. i’ll probably give the Rugers a good look too. I’ve always had a soft spot for them after my 1st Security Six.
Yep, hardly a sacred cow for me. I learned to shoot on a 1911, and always wanted to shoot a 1911 before I had guns of my own. Naturally my first gun was a 1911…and I got a little sacred cowwy about that.
Still it only made sense my primary carry gun should be a 1911.
I do get preachy when I realized a slimmer gun concealed and carried better than a thicker one, and there are few guns in a major caliber that can be as thin as a 1911 with slim grips on it.
Still I can’t be too faithful to the Church of JM Browning, as I don’t much care for the M1911 and M1911A1. I like big sights, light triggers, high-rise beavertails, and non-standard metals (my night-stand gun is stainless, my carry gun scandium….want one is Damascus).
Glock or M&P are just as good, if not better, but I haven’t spent the time with those guns as I have with this one.
Certainly when a new shooter asks me for gun recommendations I do not recommend the 1911, because people who should own 1911s know who they are.
TInkering with the 1911 like that goes against scripture:
http://www.frfrogspad.com/jmb.htm
1 In the beginning was the 1911, and the 1911 was THE pistol, and it was good. And behold the Lord said, “Thou shalt not muck with my disciple John’s design for it is good and it workith. For John made the 1911, and lo all of his weapons, from the designs which I, the Lord, gave him upon the mountain.”
2 “And shouldst thou muck with it, and hang all manner of foul implements upon it, and profane its internal parts, thou shalt surely have malfunctions, and in the midst of battle thou shalt surely come to harm.”
Yup — tinker at the expense of reliability. Oh, sure, I’ve changed a few things on my 1911s.
The RIA I got for use as a reenactor had the smooth grips replaced with double diamond wood grips, a lanyard ring mainspring housing installed, and the factory mags with big plastic floorplates swapped for USGI mags, so it is GI in configuration. NONE of that adversely affects reliability a whit.
The Colt Commander I’ve been carrying for twenty years has had the diamonds on the upper left grip blunted to avoid grating my thumb, the Series 80 crap removed and replaced with spacers to restore the trigger pull, and the plastic mainspring housing replaced with a solid S&A flared magwell for faster reloads. (Since I use Pachmeyer slam pads, the gun isn’t any harder to conceal with the flared well.)
The only functionality issues I’ve noticed are that the Colt has issues reliably igniting Tula .45 ammo (about 1 in 10 misfires), so I’m considering swapping all the springs (which is definately not “excessive” PCMS after twenty years of use). But, I was planning on swapping all the springs anyway.
O course, I don’t have an overly-tight Kimber, either, nor will I – nor any other super-tightly “handfit” 1911. I’ve hated the Kimbers since I first handled one over twenty years ago, because they were too tight THEN.