.45 GAP through a 1911? O.o

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shootergirl88

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While I worked at the range today, a kid came out and, seeing me hand another customer a box of .45 ACP target rounds, said that he needed another box of them as well. However, when I went to add the ammo to his tab, I noticed that the last box of .45 he'd bought was GAP. I asked if he wasn't sure he needed the same ammo he'd gotten before, and he said that .45 ACP was fine; he didn't care either way. I assumed he was one of the many who simply don't know the difference between the two, and started to explain it to him until he said that yes, he was aware that they are two very different rounds. Then, in an attempt to simplify things, I asked what kind of gun he was shooting, and he said it was a Springfield 1911. Apparently he shoots it with both ACP and GAP indiscriminately.

Considering that his 1911 is designed to shoot ACP, shouldn't it be harmful to the gun (and potentially himself) to put GAP through it as well?
 
It might work, but...

I'm not going to run outside and try it anytime soon.

Autoloading pistol cartridges head space off of the case mouth. Case lengths are different, therefore the GAP round isn't properly headspacing. I can't see how this is a good thing at all.
 
It'll probably work ok, but, as 1911 guy implied, he is toying around with a possible head separation if his pistol doesn't hold the cartridges close to the breech face. With the relatively long "gap" between the mouth of the .45 GAP and the throat of a standard .45 ACP barrel, the case has to be slopping around in there.

Besides aren't .45 GAP rounds more expensive than .45 ACP at your shop?
 
If everything works right, the shorter GAP will feed up under the extractor, headspace against it, and feed, fire, and function. I know a guy who demonstrated extractor headspace control with much trimmed .45 ACP before the GAP ever came out. I had some Boxer primed 9mm Makarov slip through the sorting and get loaded along with 9mm P. I pulled down the first ones I found, then thought about it and shot a couple. They worked.

On the other hand, if the Gap should get ahead of the extractor and push into the chamber ahead of it, the unrestricted firing pin protrusion of the 1911 would still fire it. That would lead to fireworks. G.C. Nonte did it with the "any 9mm" Astra 400 once years ago; shooting 9mm P in a Largo chamber. A blown primer pocket in a pistol is an ugly mess that can be hazardous to your health.
 
Good Way To Break an Extractor

Do a search on shooting .380 in 9mm and you will find plenty of reasons why this is a bad idea. The main reason is it places the full force of the firing pin blow on the extractor claw, and to hear a lot of 1911 enthusiasts talk, this is a breakage prone part.
 
I’ll bet it will work for a while, but it just does not seem like a good idea to me. If it works for your customer, good for him.

Just because you can does not mean you should.
 
Max SAAMI pressure for 45ACP is 22,000 psi, 45GAP max is 23,000. Suppose that might cause a problem in some guns?

Let me correct myself: 22,000 psi is standard pressure for 45ACP. +P pressure runs much higher than that so my point is probably moot.
 
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Jim Watson is right on the money with his answer. If you look at the specs for chamber length and then look at industry standards +/- for case length, you will conclude that the extractor often contols the headspace in autoloaders due to an accumulation of tolerances. STILL, is is foolish and irresponsible to use anything other than the ammunition the gun is chambered for. If the customer doesn''t care if he uses GAP or ACP, then why not use the correct ammo? I would not want to provide a customer with ammo that I know is incorrect for his gun. In todays society, sounds like a lawsuit waiting to happen.
str1
 
this sounds like a bad idea. just because a round WILL chamber, does not mean that it SHOULD be chambered. .45 acp is way cheaper anyhow (at least around here), so it seems kind of silly to me even to try it. i would be kind of interested in one of these new mini 1911's if i ever found one chambered for GAP tho, just becuase it would be different.
 
Yes, .45 GAP is a few dollars more expensive than ACP. According to my coworker who sold him the box of GAP in the first place, though, the customer actually asked for it. *shrug*

And he can't sue us if he's signed a waiver saying he won't. I hope.
 
Don't know why I didn't think of this before:
I inherited a Llama 1911 clone in 9mm from my Dad. It was a jam-o-matic all its life but I held on to it for sentimental reasons. I played around with it some, cleaning, tweaking and polishing to see if I could make it more reliable but nothing worked. Sometimes it would fire several rounds in succession but mostly it would leave an empty in the chamber.
Finally stumbled on to the problem, it was chambered for 9mm Largo instead of 9x19! Largo max case length is .910 while 9x19 is .754
Shoots OK (for an old Llama) with the right ammo.
 
Just for grins you folks that own .45 1911 platform pistols with a conventional Browning extractor try a little experiment...

Remove the slide and barrel. The slip a cartridge under the extractor. With the cartridge in place use your thumb an forefinger to pull it forward as far as it will go. Notice that there is a noticable space between the breechface and cartridge head. You can actually pull the cartridge backward and foreward.

Now remove the cartridge and take a small punch and push on the back of the firing pin. Notice how far the pin can stick out of the front of the breechface.

The extractor does not headspace the cartridge, although it may hold it againist the breechface depending on how much the extractor is pushing against the side of the rim. Headspace is the distance from the front of the chamber to the breechface when the pistol is locked into battery. Because of the wider-then-the-rim distance between the extractor hook and breechface, combined with the way the firing pin can reach out and touch... the 1911 design can accomodate cartridges that have a small difference in case length, but not the kind of difference between a .45ACP and .45 GAP cartridge. If extractor tension is on the light side the Glock cartridge can drop way too far down into the .45 ACP chamber, and the firing pin will hit it anyway. At this point it will slam back against the breechface.

Never, ever... EVER use a cartridge in any firearm except that which it is chambered to use.

Oh, and in most states a disclaimer signed by a customer will not prevent a person from sueing for injury if it can be proven that the range operator intentionally sold that person the wrong ammunition when they knew, or should have known, that that ammunition was the wrong size for the gun being used. Better check with a lawyer in your area.
 
I once accidentally bought 2 boxes of GAP and I couldn't return them(Cabelas ammo policy) so I ran them through my Kimber without any problems.
 
Walkalong, your comment reminds me of my middle school technology class. I decided to, instead of following directions, experiment with my rocket's design. While the teacher launched everyone else's, he told me that I was launching mine and he was gonna stay way back.
 
You can shoot 40 S&W in a 10mm too because the case will often be held in the chamber by the extractor. It's not a good idea, things can, and do, rupture and it's likely the same type risky thinking works with a 45 GAP in a 45 ACP.

I just checked my Glock38 and there's no way a 45 ACP will chamber in it even given it's "generous" chamber dimensions.
 
While not adviseable, lots of guys have been shooting 40's through their 10mm's for quite some time. I might try it if all I had was a 10mm pistol and a handful or 40 ammo, but only in an extreme emergency. Same with 45 ACP and 45 GAP.
 
Never, ever... EVER use a cartridge in any firearm except that which it is chambered to use.
Click to expand...
Using multiple different calibers in revolvers is common and safe. .38 in .357, .40 in 10mm, .45 colt in .454 casull, etc. And look at the Medusa model 47. :)


Regarding autoloaders, IIRC Para Ordnance produced a 1911 designed to chamber and fire both .40S&W and 10mm Auto, by using a special extractor that was designed to hold the cartridge in place.
 
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And buddy and I were target shooting. He had his 380 LCP and his HiPower (9mm).

He was accidentially loading 380s into the 9mm magazine. He could get the first one to fire but the 2nd round would not fire. I inspected the non-firng round and there was NO firing pin dent. The cartridge was sliding too far forward and thus not getting hit by the firing pin. He did this a couple of times before we picked up on what was going on. No damage done that we could tell, but it really got our attention. Need to pay attention when loading from multiple boxes of ammo on the bench.
 
If it works it would be a great long range cartridge in a five inch 1911 as the resident Glock expert once told me the GAP has zero drop out to 380 yards.
 
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