2nd 1911 built from SCRATCH
- Thread starter theQman23
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Qman, your work is inspiring. I remember seeing a beat up old gun in a pawn shop for dirt cheap, makes me consider when I find another deal like that I can turn it into a project like yours. Do you care to share how you learned some of these skills, especially the specialty ones like fitting the slide and hand checkering?
I don't mind sharing at all. My parents were humble people, Dad was a boiler operator at a soap plant and Mom was a dry cleaning clerk. When I hit my teen years and wanted to go motorcycle racing, we just did not have the money.
My father being an EXCELLENT mechanic and engineer type with hand tools, was only limited by his lack of welding and machining experience. In every other aspect of working with metal, including how different metals expanded, re-surfaced, heated and cooled, etc, he was brilliant.
Over about six thousand chess games and a few blown dirt bike engines my father taught me to work on metal with my hands. When I started winning novice races in my early 20's (working part time as a mechanic in various places) I knew I needed to learn from other men the skills of milling, lathe work, and welding.
The average motorcycle racer spends about $15,000 a year at the club level, and maybe wins one or two regional class titles over an average career of eight years. Thanks to the men who helped me learn not only to ride well, but to care for and build my own bikes, (and especially my father,) I was able to run a 20 year long career, and win 17 class championships, and have spent less than $60,000 of my own money, all the rest was sponsor kick ins and contingency and purse winnings.
Fitting a slide tightly to a frame is NO DIFFERENT than doing a bore and hone job on a set of cylinders. Hand checkering is absolutely identical to tire cutting, you just use a different tool.
Now that I'm too old to race professionally, and have discovered the many enumerable benefits to firearm ownership, working on my guns has become a hobby just like working on bikes was.
The best place to start when working on things like this is in your own heart. Start there, and decide in your heart to do a good job that shows pride in your work. Then follow these rules:
Learn all you can before you start.
Don't let ANYONE tell you that you can't do it. Because you can.
Learn all you can while you're in the middle of it.
Don't ever give up on the project until it's done. You MUST FINISH it.
Learn all you can while you're finishing it up.
Make sure that it shows the pride you put into it. If not, repeat last line.
Remember others will criticize when you're done, but the critic is always the same p*ss^ who tried to tell you that you couldn't do it. Well, now that you're done, even if it isn't perfect, you proved him wrong didn't you?
Continue to learn, continue to love the work, and continue to motivate, and continue, continue, continue.
My father being an EXCELLENT mechanic and engineer type with hand tools, was only limited by his lack of welding and machining experience. In every other aspect of working with metal, including how different metals expanded, re-surfaced, heated and cooled, etc, he was brilliant.
Over about six thousand chess games and a few blown dirt bike engines my father taught me to work on metal with my hands. When I started winning novice races in my early 20's (working part time as a mechanic in various places) I knew I needed to learn from other men the skills of milling, lathe work, and welding.
The average motorcycle racer spends about $15,000 a year at the club level, and maybe wins one or two regional class titles over an average career of eight years. Thanks to the men who helped me learn not only to ride well, but to care for and build my own bikes, (and especially my father,) I was able to run a 20 year long career, and win 17 class championships, and have spent less than $60,000 of my own money, all the rest was sponsor kick ins and contingency and purse winnings.
Fitting a slide tightly to a frame is NO DIFFERENT than doing a bore and hone job on a set of cylinders. Hand checkering is absolutely identical to tire cutting, you just use a different tool.
Now that I'm too old to race professionally, and have discovered the many enumerable benefits to firearm ownership, working on my guns has become a hobby just like working on bikes was.
The best place to start when working on things like this is in your own heart. Start there, and decide in your heart to do a good job that shows pride in your work. Then follow these rules:
Learn all you can before you start.
Don't let ANYONE tell you that you can't do it. Because you can.
Learn all you can while you're in the middle of it.
Don't ever give up on the project until it's done. You MUST FINISH it.
Learn all you can while you're finishing it up.
Make sure that it shows the pride you put into it. If not, repeat last line.
Remember others will criticize when you're done, but the critic is always the same p*ss^ who tried to tell you that you couldn't do it. Well, now that you're done, even if it isn't perfect, you proved him wrong didn't you?
Continue to learn, continue to love the work, and continue to motivate, and continue, continue, continue.
Rail Driver
Member
BEAUTIFUL pistol. You've given me a wealth of ideas for my RIA.
I hope you don't mind, but I'm stealing those rules to print out and put over my workbench.
Your rules are similar to what my dad tried to teach me when I was young. I wish I'd had the sense to learn them back then instead of wasting the first half of my life.
hey thanks Rail. You can steal my rules and print them if you like, one ONE CONDITION.
You take pics of that RIA while your working on it and post them here to motivate OTHERS who are hesitant to touch their guns.
If you can't jump into a project on your gun and USE those rules, then you can't have them. Because then you're just like the guy in the last line. The critic. Don't you be the guy who tells you, that you can't do it. Let some other jerk do that, it'll give you someone to show off to when you HAVE DONE IT.......
You take pics of that RIA while your working on it and post them here to motivate OTHERS who are hesitant to touch their guns.
If you can't jump into a project on your gun and USE those rules, then you can't have them. Because then you're just like the guy in the last line. The critic. Don't you be the guy who tells you, that you can't do it. Let some other jerk do that, it'll give you someone to show off to when you HAVE DONE IT.......
Rail Driver
Member
More than happy to. It doesn't look anywhere near as good as yours, but here are in progress photos of the RIA compact I finished awhile back - I haven't started on my full size yet, but I am going to do something a little more extreme with it - I'm going to try my hand at doing a bob-tail.
This is how it looked when I got it. I HATE those grips, and can't stand the baby-poop green duracoated slide.
Here it is after some love with my diamond files. I still hate those grips, but I got rid of that nasty paint:
And here it is after the slide stop, grip safety, thumb safety and mainspring housing had a serious run in with my dremel, and then the whole gun got an acid bath (FINALLY, some NICE grips!)
I sincerely regret selling this gun, especially after I found out that the post office caused quite a bit of damage to it in transit (shipped via FFL). Even though it wasn't my fault, nor am I liable, I still feel bad about it considering the hours I put into it. It felt wonderful in my hand, and shot beautifully. I didn't do any work on the internals aside from buffing out a few tool marks here and there (nowhere dangerous). This is one Rock that turned into a gem.
This is how it looked when I got it. I HATE those grips, and can't stand the baby-poop green duracoated slide.
Here it is after some love with my diamond files. I still hate those grips, but I got rid of that nasty paint:
And here it is after the slide stop, grip safety, thumb safety and mainspring housing had a serious run in with my dremel, and then the whole gun got an acid bath (FINALLY, some NICE grips!)
I sincerely regret selling this gun, especially after I found out that the post office caused quite a bit of damage to it in transit (shipped via FFL). Even though it wasn't my fault, nor am I liable, I still feel bad about it considering the hours I put into it. It felt wonderful in my hand, and shot beautifully. I didn't do any work on the internals aside from buffing out a few tool marks here and there (nowhere dangerous). This is one Rock that turned into a gem.
AWESOME, that's cool that you re-did the slide finish. So you sold this gun then is that it? What's next, and be sure to put photos of it up when you get working on it!!!!
I like the Glockish slide stop, designed to work as a slide stop and not a slide release eh? Very cool and stout looking.
I also like that solid long trigger.
I like the Glockish slide stop, designed to work as a slide stop and not a slide release eh? Very cool and stout looking.
I also like that solid long trigger.
bluethunder1962
Member
I never thought of doing something like this. I love old cars and it is a lot more rewarding driving something that you brought back from the grave. There are prob thousands of guns out there right now that somebody with your talent cou make new again.
how about you bluethunder? What work have you done on guns, and/or would like to learn? Do you have a project you'd like to have done but need tools, or do you have something you want to do as soon as you have time..... what's your next project?
Very cool, nice work! I just got into 1911's bought my first one this week and I'm hooked. Its a kimber crimson carry that ill probably leave alone but my uncle had a llama 1911 that I can get real cheap off him so i may do that and use that pistol to tinker with. I plan on learning the 1911 platform inside and out.
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