1911 Firing 7.62 Tokarev?

[grendelbane]

On another board, several posters were discussing their Chinese modified 1911s, that had been converted to 7.62 Tokarev.

Magazines had been elongated for the longer Tok cartridge. The magazine well, likewise, had been lengthened.

I am not pursuing this as a practical matter, but hypothetically speaking, what do you think would be the best way for us western types to accomplish the same thing?

I don't want to try this, as I am sure that several frames, and several magazines were probably destroyed before they got this one to work right. They had a pile of .45s, no pistol ammunition besides the 7.62 Tokarev, and nothing to lose.

How would one go about lengthening the magazine well? There is not much material there to remove, and I don't have a clue as to how one would remove it anyway.

Perhaps there is a market for a slightly longer Gov't frame and slide. It would work well with 7.62 Tokarev and 9mm Largo.

Some thing midway in size between the traditional Gov't model frame, and the Grizzly, is what I am thinking of. If it could keep the outside dimensions of the Gov't model, but accomodate a 7.62 Tok length cartridge, then that would be great!

 

[Car Knocker]

Wouldn't a 10mm frame and magazine length work for the Tok?

 

[BBBBill]

Wouldn't a 10mm frame and magazine length work for the Tok?

Nope! 10MM frame is the same as a 45 in all but the feed ramp. I'm curious as to the board where this was being discussed.

 

[A. Patriot]

I know that I am not answering your question, but for around $100 bucks, you can buy a really neat CZ52 that shoots the 7.62 Tokarev. I have several and they are really fun to shoot.

 

[White Horseradish]

Never heard of the Chinese doing that. Did hear of some guy making one for himself, but he was a machinist and did it because he could. I'm not sure if I can find the particulars now, though...

 

[mrmeval]

Tokarev is almost a 1911 made for that cartridge.
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0BQY/is_9_50/ai_n6125518

 

[Jim K]

A factory would probably use a broach, but the only example I ever saw had been worked on with hand filing. There is (barely) enough room to file out the magazine well, but it was done. The magazine appeared to be made from scratch (bent sheet steel) rather than being a modification of anything else. But it worked.

As a practical matter, the 7.62x25 will not give any better results than the 9mm Parabellum. It is impressive to fire and the light bullet gives a high velocity, but the bottom line is that the cartridge is not anything super. The Chinese and Vietnamese converted the guns for logisitics reasons, not because they considered the .45 inadequate.

Jim

 

[grendelbane]

I was afraid it would require Eastern patience and a lot of filing. I am not actually considering doing this, it was just a mental exercize. I think that good magazines would be the hard part.

Examples of a scratch built, and of a stretched/squeezed .45 magazine were shown. At least one barrel was made from scratch, 2 others were obviously lined.

I have owned both a VZ52 and a Tokarev. While both are great fun, there is nothing that fits my hand quite so well as a true 1911.

Now if I can just figure out how to convert my 1911 to 5.7mm Velo-Dog!

 

[grendelbane]

I checked all of my .38 Super magazines to see how close they would come to accepting 7.62 Tok. With both the Wilson and the Colt it is not close at all.

However, a Mec-Gar mag that I have will accept 7 rounds before it gets too tight to operate. It would only need to be stretched a little to work, I believe.

Even the rib in the side of the mag seems to be in the right place, right where the shoulder of the Tok would be.

I am sure that only a very small amount of material would have to be removed from the front of the mag well. Only a very slight amount of "squishing" would make this particuliar Mec-Gar mag work.

The good news is that I don't have a barrel, so I will probably just load some nice JHPs in .38 Super cases, and forget about it.

It would be nice to have a Gov't model firing 9 rounds of 7.62 Tokarev, however.

 

[Jim K]

What I hate about the Velo-Dog conversions is trying to get the rounds to feed into the conversion unit barrel.

Jim

 

[Clark]

Someone off the internet just this week came over to my house this week to get a couple of those barrels.
Notice how much dust they gathered at my place.
I got them years ago out of a junk box at a gun show.

 

[grendelbane]

I will have to avoid looking in junk boxes at gun shows.

I am really trying to avoid this project. I really am.

I like the .45 ACP, and I like the .38 Super. I don't need a Gov't model 7.62 Tok!

I will try and concentrate on more sensible projects, like converting that cheap FN pistol to the the more traditional 5.7 mm Velo-Dog cartridge!