1911’s in general, 9mm versions specifically

[Dobermann]

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Midway USA backorder finally arrived. When I backordered them they were only $17 but looks like the price jumped back up to $21.
Probably going to be wishing I ordered a dozen @$17 if they run as good as everyone says.

Will be interested to hear if all of yours take 10 rounds easily ... some of mine only seem to want to take 9 - and some seem to have a hard time keeping them in line with the follower, with the rounds poking up and against the feed lips. Could be something I'm doing wrong, but it doesn't happen with some other mags ...

 

[sbaker0029]

Will be interested to hear if all of yours take 10 rounds easily ... some of mine only seem to want to take 9 - and some seem to have a hard time keeping them in line with the follower, with the rounds poking up and against the feed lips. Could be something I'm doing wrong, but it doesn't happen with some other mags ...

I'll load them up this evening and report back.

 

[RockAndSage]

So I’ve seen in a number of places (including this thread I think) that commander length 9mm’s are potentially more reliable (or maybe just easier to make reliable) than full length ones. Do you guys think this is the case? If so, is it a significant difference?

I'm not sure I'd agree with this on the whole...there's more going on than just form factor.

At one level, a shorter slide means less weight that needs to be cycled, in reliably ejecting a casing and forcefully stripping a loaded round off a mag and firmly chambering it. That's sometimes why commander-length guns can be a bit snappier - the slide's going faster with there being less weight to move. And to some degree that might make some companies' builds "more reliable", as they're just keeping slide velocity up.

But the flip side of this is simply spring power - if a full-length government slide is going too slow, a slightly lighter recoil spring reduces that resistance, and increases slide velocity enough to eject and chamber reliably. Similar tuning can be done with the hammer spring - hammer leverage and their friction on the cocking-radius at the bottom of the firing pin stop are just about the least commonly appreciated sources of cycling resistance in the 1911 space. But a small change in hammer-spring weight can yield big differences in resistance and cycling reliability.

Separate from all of this, is, IIRC, there were some teething problems early on with 9mm 1911s, but the commanders seemed to have fewer problems than gov't length guns. This is a really faint memory, so I could be off on this, but don't underestimate the power and durability of fudd-lore hanging around. In general, I'm not aware of any differences in reliability between commander and full-size 9mms, on the whole.

 

[sbaker0029]

Will be interested to hear if all of yours take 10 rounds easily ... some of mine only seem to want to take 9 - and some seem to have a hard time keeping them in line with the follower, with the rounds poking up and against the feed lips. Could be something I'm doing wrong, but it doesn't happen with some other mags ...

All six loaded 10 rounds without fuss. Even with them being brand new the were just about as easy to load as my Sig factory mags that have had several hundred rounds through each of them.
One thing I did notice was that a bit of a push on the 10th round would get it to nose dive a bit in the feed lips. Not sure if it will cause feeding issues, have to wait until next weekend at the range to unload all of them.

 

[Dobermann]

All six loaded 10 rounds without fuss. Even with them being brand new the were just about as easy to load as my Sig factory mags that have had several hundred rounds through each of them.
One thing I did notice was that a bit of a push on the 10th round would get it to nose dive a bit in the feed lips. Not sure if it will cause feeding issues, have to wait until next weekend at the range to unload all of them.

Thanks. That's some of the funkiness I've seen too - last round noses down or up and has me concerned about the feed lips. Was wondering if it was just me! But would still love to know if there's some kind of technique solution for this.

 

[Sponge]

Was wondering if it was just me! But would still love to know if there's some kind of technique solution for this.

For the mecgar 10 round 9mm mags, make sure the top round is pushed all the way to the back of the magazine. Really a good idea to be in the habit of doing this for every round loaded.
From @sbaker0029 photo above, there is a little flare at the back of the feed lips that the case rim seats/snaps into. If the top round is not seated all the way back you can get some wonky presentations.

 

[RockAndSage]

PSA on springs...

I have somewhere between 15,000 and 18,000 rounds on a Dan Wesson DWX Compact, and recently tore it down for a deep cleaning and maintenance. I wanted to see how far it would go just in proofing the mechanical design, and decided somewhere around 15k-ish rounds was good enough. Part of all this is checking springs, and if the interval has been long enough, swapping springs out as preventative maintenance. I don't know if there's a maintenance schedule for this gun that's been published yet, but gun springs in general are just best considered consumable items.

This is the recoil spring - you can see how much shorter the used one is.






With 1911s in .45 ACP, the lifespan of normal piano-wire recoil springs is about 3000 rounds. I don't know what that is in 9mm variants - if anyone does, please share. The flat-wire ones like this though, are known to go in excess of 20,000 rounds, sometimes far more, depending on the company/gun, etc. But even at 18K on the high side here, you can see how much it has shortened, which decreases its strength. That translates to increased slide velocity backward, and less power going forward. When you start getting increasing numbers of failures to go into battery on an otherwise reliable and maintained gun, especially if it's high round-count, that's often the culprit.


This next photo is the firing-pin return spring. Including dry-fires, it easily has in excess of 40,000 cycles on it, and quite possibly as high as 60k. Notice the shard of spring just below the shorter one - that easily could have jammed up the firing pin at some point, and it just fell out when I pulled the firing pin. An old rule-of-thumb with 1911s is to replace the firing-pin return spring every other time you change the recoil spring. Conservatively, with .45s that's every 5k rounds, 10k on the high side. With 9mms there's less power in the hammer springs, and so you might stretch that out a bit if it's not an EDC gun. But every 10k rounds would probably be a good point to swap them out.





The key takeaways here are that springs can shorten up and lose power faster than you realize, unless you have something to check against them - and that guns can keep running "fine" with high mileage springs. And then suddenly they don't. This DWXc was cycling great, but at any time that spring shard could have shut the firing pin down.

The great thing about springs, is they're cheap. I always keep several spares of each on hand. Someone once told me to think about it like getting a fresh set of tires every few oil changes - zero need to wait until they blow out or just fail. Plus, it feels good knowing you're in top maintenance.

 

[fisherman983]

**I effing suck at shooting**
I am not the super duper high level shooter that some are on this thread. I’ll defer to their expertise and preferences. But I’m working on it, and have seen a lot of growth. Some general principles have become very clear:

1. Shooting is shooting. Meaning someone who shoots at a very high level with one platform will also shoot any other platform at an objectively very high level. The gun handling, vision, timing, and control that make a good shooter translates between platforms.
2. This also means that if someone sucks with a striker gun, picking up a different platform won’t make them any better. They simply have not developed the gunhandling, vision, cadence, or control.
3. Are there differences between guns? Yes!! Look at hit factor scores for USPSA classifiers. Certain guns give very well trained shooters a competitive advantage. But the majority of shooters are not good enough with their baseline skills to reap the fullness of that advantage. The differences in gun performance is the last 1% of performance that’s on the table.

Your wrong on #2. I dont shoot my glock 19 or sig 365 axg legion very well but I can shoot dam good comparatively with my staccato xc.
Its far more accurate and easily the most shootable pistol I have ever touched.
And I cant shoot it anywhere near what its capable of

Sent from my SM-S928U using Tapatalk

 

[Walker6]

I don’t frame my statements or responses around what world class can do- I frame it around the audience it is intended for. The audience here is a thread about 1912’s and quite a few people learning to shoot 1911 relatively seriously.




No. You keep saying “tune” a gun. Unless you mean adjust an extractor correctly- which this thread is full of people learning to do easily, no- you do not have to tune anything.

What does “tune” mean to you? It’s not an engine.





What does that even mean? Did you read this thread that you are posting this in? I literally bought the cheapest 1911 made ($399) and had it working correctly in sub 20 minutes with 4 different types of magazines.

What is your personal experience with 1911’s for serious use- say in the last decade? What guns, what mags, what ammo, and what did you do to them?





Reread what I wrote.





And I care why? This thread isn’t about bumbling boobs. It’s a thread about what 1911’s and some best practices.





No- safeties are an enabler. Far more people have ND’s than need to use their pistol martially- and safeties help greatly in not having ND’s. Again- the same bumbling boobs that miss a safety also miss reloads, draws, target transitions, movement, etc. The local soccer moms ability to drive has nothing to do with what vehicles can be driven best. I simply don’t care what bumbling boobs do- it takes a modicum of correct practice to make safety usage a 100% non factor. Literally 100% of the military is back to being issued a pistol with a safety and it is a non issue- and they suck.




You are repeating internet talking points, and apparently match shooting- while ignoring all the glocks that didn’t work at those same matches. Glocks at USPSA matches are no more reliable than 1911’s or 2011’s at matches- they all get stupid stuff done to them, and they all malfunction.

It is quite easy to make a modern 1911 way more reliable than is needed for carry.



Nope. 100% false. Not only false, but those matches you shot for a decade show that- Single Stack has a higher hit factor than Production. By quite a bit historically. Single Stack has a HHF than Carry Optics.





These “costs” simply aren’t there if someone doesn’t want them to be.

This pistol has more than 20,000 rounds with one malfunction with 185gr semi-wadcutters
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This pistol went over 30,000 rounds without a single malfunction before being redone in 9mm (the Glock behind it is at 70,000’ish rounds at that point)
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This pistol is now nearing 12,000 rounds- it has not had a single malfunction:
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These pistols were brand new here-
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This is one of them at just over 40,000 rounds with zero cleaning ever, and zero malfunctions to this point.
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Here it is after being thrown down range in gravel- somewhere around 30,000 rounds on it here-
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Of those four Staccato P’s- three are over 30,000 rounds with zero (0) malfunctions; and one is over 60,000 rounds with 2x malfunctions due to not ever being cleaned and so much carbon built up under the extractor that it couldn’t flex back and grab the case rim (right at 43,000 rounds). Extractor was scraped and hasn’t malfunctioned since.



I’ve shot a Glock or two as well.

Iron sighted G17 with over 80,000 rounds on it in this picture, with the dot gun behind it at about 20,000 at this point-

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The dot gun from above. G22 frame and 17 slide-
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Both those Glocks got shot until they had to be retired: one at 86,000 +/- rounds, and one with just over 100,000 rounds. Hit the picture limit, but in that same time span 2x G19’s were shot until they had to be replaced one at 120,000+/- and the other at just over 100,000. A G22 as well- though it doesn’t take much (thankfully) to wear one out. Multiple Berettas and Sig 226/228’s as well. Then of course Sig M18’s and 17’s.

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Somehow I and those I am around continually get all the magical 1911/2011’s that just aren’t fussy.

@Formidilosus or anyone else: Who makes a AIWB Kydex holster that has an integrated kydex claw shaped like this? I have a JM and it is good, but the claw has a block shape that requires an extra finger to get it past the belt/pants on the way in. I gotta think that tapered claw would slide in easier:



Or is that even what I’m looking at in this photo?

 

[Formidilosus]

@Formidilosus or anyone else: Who makes a AIWB Kydex holster that has an integrated kydex claw shaped like this? I have a JM and it is good, but the claw has a block shape that requires an extra finger to get it past the belt/pants on the way in. I gotta think that tapered claw would slide in easier:

View attachment 1084928

Or is that even what I’m looking at in this photo?

It’s not. That’s an OWB holster and that goes inside your pants.
I am unaware of any claw that isn’t a block shape.

 

[Walker6]

Thanks.

Anyone got a lead on the best 5” Turk 9mm 1911 single stack deal currently going? I’m seeing $469ish for the Tisas Duty B9’s. Any other models worth looking at on the cheap end?

 

[Billogna]

I have never bought from this site but price in cart is $439.46 before shipping. This one does NOT have optic cut.

https://friscoguns.com/product/tisa...ide-frame-w-picatinny-rail-black-rubber-grip/

 

[Fever Buck]

Just ordered the Sig P211 Combat GTO. Excited to join the club.

 

[K9kodi]

Did you get the optic option or no?

I went without and mounted the vortex defender xl.

This Sig shoots ridiculously flat and fast.

Forewarning, when you take it apart , down to field strip, remember to install guide rod assembly correctly. I put it in upside down and was lucky enough to unstick my sticky situation.

 

[Joel/AK]

Thanks.

Anyone got a lead on the best 5” Turk 9mm 1911 single stack deal currently going? I’m seeing $469ish for the Tisas Duty B9’s. Any other models worth looking at on the cheap end?

Been resisting the double stack/2011 style for years. Used to carry a colt commander for years and really like gun lay out vs most striker fired but picked up RIA 1911A-2 for $300. Damn thing can run. For a cheap gun im impressed. Hate to see how a high dollar gun can run.
Had to change out the front sight, why put a solid black front sight on a gun? I also wish it was optic ready but I just tell myself, look at the price.
Im think of upgrading to a better double stack but this thing works for what I use it for

 

[JohnJohnson]

Speaking of holsters, Tenicor's blem sale just went live. Saved like $40+ on a Velo5 so I figured I'd let you guys know. They do offer holsters for some Staccato pistols, since this is a 1911/2011 thread.

BLEMICOR

ALL SALES ARE FINAL No Returns | No Exchanges | No Complaining

tenicor.com

 

[Fever Buck]

Did you get the optic option or no?

I went without and mounted the vortex defender xl.

This Sig shoots ridiculously flat and fast.

Forewarning, when you take it apart , down to field strip, remember to install guide rod assembly correctly. I put it in upside down and was lucky enough to unstick my sticky situation.

I did not buy it with the optic. I’m thinking about putting an RMR HD on it.

 

[Howler65]

The GP Forza arrived. Have not fired it yet, but initial impressions are really good. Going back and forth between it and the CS, the grip size and angle on the Forza are noticeably better for me. The Forza is slightly more upright. Trigger feels very similar. I had Gilbert install a short/flat trigger.
While being slightly shorter overall, the steel frame adds some heft to it, coming in 6 oz heavier than the CS, which is what I wanted. I did not get the ported barrel, though the slide is cut for one.
I’ll update after getting some rounds down range.


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Any thoughts on the Forza now? I'm really curious how it shoots compared to CS? Also, how do you feel about what I am assuming to be a thicker grip on the Forza?

 

[WhoGarrDen]

Speaking of holsters, Tenicor's blem sale just went live. Saved like $40+ on a Velo5 so I figured I'd let you guys know. They do offer holsters for some Staccato pistols, since this is a 1911/2011 thread.

BLEMICOR

ALL SALES ARE FINAL No Returns | No Exchanges | No Complaining

tenicor.com

Even when I search the non-sale options (aka full line) and filter by 2011/1911 with no light, the search function returns 0 results. Do they not make one for a basic 1911?