Seemingly poor accuracy test shipped with pistol.

[1911Tuner]

I think a buyer expects a high level of reliability and accuracy when spending $2500 on a gun. Not just combat accuracy.

Precisely my point. So much has been made of small groups on paper when under no time constraints and zero stress that it's come to be expected,
but that sort of thing has almost no bearing in a gunfight. As someone observed...the gun has fixed sights. It wasn't built for target shooting.
As for the price, it sells for what people are willing to pay..whether it meets any preconcieved notions of accuracy or not. Personally, I think the gun is very accurate given what I see here. Moreso than many thousands of guns that have been used successfully in real fights.

1.... Match-grade accuracy and life saving reliability are hard to get in the same autoloading weapon. Accuracy requires tight clearances. With tight, you get a failure to feed or return to battery on occasion...maybe not often, but often enough. One misfeed in a hundred isn't what I would be willing to stake my life on. One misfeed in a thousand under real conditions is getting there. None in 2500 rounds is about right.

2...2.5 inches at 25 yards from a 1911 pistol that is intended to be a serious tool is not sloppy accuracy. It's accurate enough to be a real threat in an IDPA match, and it's more than accurate enough to keep you alive, assuming that you can keep your wits about you and shoot close to its potential. If you can't shoot, a one-inch gun won't be of much help.

3...The gun may well be wicked accurate with the right ammo...and fall flat on the next lot of the same ammo. A different shooter may prove the gun more accurate than the test target shows. Give it a chance. Things vary.

4...If determining the gun's intrinsic accuracy is the object of the exercise, try several different lots of ammo from the bags. Toss out the first shot and shoot the groups. Take an average of several groups. That's more conclusive than one test target fired by one shooter with one unknown lot of ammo in a new gun. Many guns don't settle in and start shining until they've thrown a few hundred rounds downrange. Locking lugs that aren't dead square to each other need time to seat and equalize. The rifling needs to burnish. The lower lug has to have time to wear in to the slidestop pin and sit squarely on it. Then, after you've found what the gun's true potential is, work to shoot up TO its potential...not once...not occasionally...but on demand. When you can do that, then come back and complain about 2.5 inches at 25 yards.

Make sense?

 

[MCgunner]

Precisely my point. So much has been made of small groups on paper when under no time constraints and zero stress that it's come to be expected,
but that sort of thing has almost no bearing in a gunfight. As someone observed...the gun has fixed sights. It wasn't built for target shooting.
As for the price, it sells for what people are willing to pay..whether it meets any preconcieved notions of accuracy or not. Personally, I think the gun is very accurate given what I see here. Moreso than many thousands of guns that have been used successfully in real fights.

That's pretty much the standard response when one is defending an inaccurate gun. The more intrinsic accuracy the gun has, the better it'll shoot no matter in combat or from a ransom rest. If the gun has no error, then the only error is shooter error.

1.... Match-grade accuracy and life saving reliability are hard to get in the same autoloading weapon. Accuracy requires tight clearances. With tight, you get a failure to feed or return to battery on occasion...maybe not often, but often enough.

Perhaps from a 1911, not necessarily so for modern guns with modern designs. My P90 and Glock are the only ones I have direct experience with, excellent accuracy with NO failures. I don't ever remember my P90 failing and lord only knows how many rounds it's fed. The targets I post are typical from this firearm and that's hand held off sand bags, not from a ransom rest.

...2.5 inches at 25 yards from a 1911 pistol that is intended to be a serious tool is not sloppy accuracy. It's accurate enough to be a real threat in an IDPA match,

A 1911 should be able to do this kind of accuracy without failure IMHO if it's put together right.

Many guns don't settle in and start shining until they've thrown a few hundred rounds downrange. Locking lugs that aren't dead square to each other need time to seat and equalize. The rifling needs to burnish. The lower lug has to have time to wear in to the slidestop pin and sit squarely on it.

Quite true. An auto has to break in just like a new car to run properly.

 

[1911Tuner]

Inaccurate

Quote:

>That's pretty much the standard response when one is defending an inaccurate gun.<
****************

Nope...it's not, Gunner. Just pointing out the fact that unless the shooter can shoot to the gun's potential, then he won't be able to tell much difference between that one and one that'll cut one hole at the same distance...and there's no such gun that'll produce zero error.

Two quotes:

>2.5 inches at 25 yards from a 1911 pistol that is intended to be a serious tool is not sloppy accuracy. It's accurate enough to be a real threat in an IDPA match.<

>>A 1911 should be able to do this kind of accuracy without failure IMHO if it's put together right.<<
********************

No argument there. The pistol in this thread is not inaccurate. It's just that so much has been made of one-hole groups, that it's expected. No! Demanded.

Again...Shoot the gun enough to let things settle down and do a more comprehensive test with different ammo lots from a rest to determine what
its true potential is. It may surprise you.

 

[MCgunner]

The pistol in this thread is not inaccurate. It's just that so much has been made of one-hole groups, that it's expected. No! Demanded.

Well, yeah, one hole groups are a bit optimistic. I figure if it shoots under 2" from bags and doen't jam or fail in any way, it's a keeper. Some say 4" is plenty for a combat gun, just that I have a little higher expectation. Now, 2.5" is being a little nit picky in a combat gun on my part. My 9mm P85 shoots about that and I've done well with it in IDPA stuff. I'm not really into bullseye shooting. That's the one hole group guys. Got a friend that does that stuff, has a S&W M52? Think that's the gun, the auto that shoots .38 special wad cutters. That's a sweet gun! Ain't no combat weapon. Bullseye is too much a specialist game for me to enjoy it except informally with our local club and my cheap guns.

 

[1911Tuner]

re:

Well, yeah, one hole groups are a bit optimistic. I figure if it shoots under 2" from bags and doen't jam or fail in any way, it's a keeper. Some say 4" is plenty for a combat gun, just that I have a little higher expectation. Now, 2.5" is being a little nit picky in a combat gun on my part. My 9mm P85 shoots about that and I've done well with it in IDPA stuff. I'm not really into bullseye shooting. That's the one hole group guys. Got a friend that does that stuff, has a S&W M52? Think that's the gun, the auto that shoots .38 special wad cutters. That's a sweet gun! Ain't no combat weapon. Bullseye is too much a specialist game for me to enjoy it except informally with our local club and my cheap guns.

Exactly. If you toss out the flyer from that one group...which may have been the "First-Round Syndrome" that most autopistols suffer from...it put the others into a pretty tight cluster. I'd judge this one as a keeper if it'll run.

 

[f4t9r]

I think i understand what you are saying. One would think it would be in the target part of the paper.

 

[Gordy Wesen]

If thats the best an EB gun does I'll find another. I shot 25 yard sub half inch groups with my sig 220 and handloads. much too much toodoo about a custom 1911 at that price.

 

[JohnBT]

I'm just amazed. All this bashing based on ONE test target. It's an overraction folks, pure and simple.


"If the gun has no error..."

I've been shooting for 50 years and I've never seen a gun with no error. Even hand-built benchrest rifles shooting handloads off a $1000+ rest have an error as you put it. It's a very small error to be sure, but they still shoot groups bigger than 0.00". To my knowledge a 0.00" has never been shot in a match.

John

 

[1911Tuner]

re:

If thats the best an EB gun does I'll find another. I shot 25 yard sub half inch groups with my sig 220 and handloads. much too much toodoo about a custom 1911 at that price.

Makin' that call based on one test group fired with one lot of unknown lot of ammo under unknown conditions...from a new gun...

Methinks that you may have unrealistic expectations, m'fren.

Disclaimer. I am neither an fan, nor an owner, nor an apologist for Ed Brown's pistols. Have actually seen very few.

 

[xring44]

I'm just amazed. All this bashing based on ONE test target. It's an overraction folks, pure and simple.


"If the gun has no error..."

I've been shooting for 50 years and I've never seen a gun with no error. Even hand-built benchrest rifles shooting handloads off a $1000+ rest have an error as you put it. It's a very small error to be sure, but they still shoot groups bigger than 0.00". To my knowledge a 0.00" has never been shot in a match.

John

I have to agree with this post, a Bench rest rifle is built to standards you can't even imagine, with custom actions, hand lapped barrels, hand layered kevlar stocks, jewel triggers, optics that are amazing, yet a 5 shot 100 yard group of less than one hundred thousands of an inch is considered a screamer, so much so that a patch is awarded for achieving this. IMO a zero error firearm does not exist, but the bench rest boys are getting close! I have shot one .085 group with a sako varmit rifle,,,one!

 

[MCgunner]

I have to agree with this post, a Bench rest rifle is built to standards you can't even imagine, with custom actions, hand lapped barrels, hand layered kevlar stocks, jewel triggers, optics that are amazing, yet a 5 shot 100 yard group of less than one hundred thousands of an inch is considered a screamer, so much so that a patch is awarded for achieving this. IMO a zero error firearm does not exist, but the bench rest boys are getting close! I have shot one .085 group with a sako varmit rifle,,,one!

Okay, let me spell out my thoughts for the guys that can't understand symbolism. If a gun shoots into 1" at 25 yards, another gun shoots 6" groups at 25 yards, adding shooter error to gun precision, which one do you think will shoot better off hand????????????

I KNOW nothing mechanical is perfect. However, in an ideal word (note, I know we don't live in an ideal world because I still have to work for a living and Boxer and Feinstein and Schumer are still senators!) a gun with no error would mean all error was shooter error. Gun error just adds to the shooter error in off hand shooting, sorta my point.

 

[Walt Sherrill]

Originally Posted by Gordy Wesen
If thats the best an EB gun does I'll find another. I shot 25 yard sub half inch groups with my sig 220 and handloads. much too much toodoo about a custom 1911 at that price.

You know, that's the best accuracy I've ever heard claimed for a SIG 220 -- and I've heard some pretty extravagent claims on forums like this.

I've had several 220s and I thought they were pretty good, but not sub-1/2" good at 25 yards. (That's one hole accuracy.)

You have a truly unique gun and an obviously wonderful handload recipe. (My SIG P-210-6 wouldn't shoot that well, and I considered it the "gold standard" of production gun accuracy.)

 

[huntershooter]

I agree with McGunner. As far as tighter equaling more frequent stoppages/failures-bullcrap. That seems to be a pretty frequent cop out used by "'smith's" that can't set up a gun properly. I have several 1911's that will shoot 1-1.5" @ 25 yds. that NEVER choke. The point being: THAT would be MY expectation of a 2500.00 pistol.

 

[1911Tuner]

Accurate

Walt said:

>I've had several 220s and I thought they were pretty good, but not sub-1/2" good at 25 yards.<
**********************

Not to mention that...theoretically at least...it equates to under two minutes of angle. Hell, Walt...I've got scoped, bolt-action rifles that won't do a whole lot better than that!

McGunner...I understand perfectly gun vs shooter error and how it equates to real-world conditions. Don't advertise it much,but I'm also a long-time and avid tweaker of long-range bolt-rifles, and I've got an accuracy test that's a bit involved, but will provide a much better take on practical accuracy than
firing one group.

Fire five 7-shot groups. Allow the barrel to cool between groups. Determine the geographic center of the group, and measure the distance from that center to the outer edge of each hole. Subtract one-half the bullet diameter. Add all the measurements from all groups together, ignoring the individual group mean radius. Just lump'em all together. Take an average.

Thoroughly clean the barrel, and shoot the groups again. This time, don't let the barrel cool...either between shots, or between groups. Take an average.
Add the two averages together and average those figures.

That will give you a pretty accurate determination of the error from point of aim that the gun will shoot on a given day. Simply firing a group and measuring the widest distance between only gives the gun credit for the
WORST two shots...and ignores the three or five that were closer to the POA.

Taking the average mean radius gives us a much better idea of what we can expect on any given shot on any given day under any given circumstances.
With most guns, you'll generally find that they're more accurate than one group indicates...under realistic conditions. As for 25-yard, half-inch accuracy...that's a quarter-inch radius. I can't SEE a quarter-inch at 25 yards...much less hold to it.
*****************

Huntershooter...Setting up a 1911 that'll shoot into 1.5 inches at 25 and never choke isn't all that tough. When ya get into an inch at 50 yards, it gets to be a bit more problematical. Wanna ask me how I know?

Just curious...How many rounds without choking do you consider acceptably reliable? 100 between cleanings? 200?

 

[huntershooter]

Tuner:

I won't carry a pistol for SD that hasn't consistently shot 400-500 rds. without puking.

 

[MCgunner]

Taking the average mean radius gives us a much better idea of what we can expect on any given shot on any given day under any given circumstances.
With most guns, you'll generally find that they're more accurate than one group indicates...under realistic conditions. As for 25-yard, half-inch accuracy...that's a quarter-inch radius. I can't SEE a quarter-inch at 25 yards...much less hold to it

Heck, Tuner, with iron sights off sand bags I can't shoot good enough to get a half inch group at 25 yards even if the gun will do it! ROFL! I'd have to scope it or use a Ransom rest.

My Contender will do it, but I have a scope mounted on it. That thing, the .30-30 barrel anyway, is a 1.5 MOA gun. An AUTO shooting that good? Well, maybe, but I'm a "show me" kinda guy. Best revolvers I've ever fired, and they tend to be more accurate than a sevice/SD type or out of the box auto, shoot 4 moa. If I get a revolver that accurate, I'm in hog heaven! That's why I'm totally thrilled with my P90s sub 2moa with most ammo. It is consistently that accurate and never bobbles. I mean, you can't ask for much more in an out of the box service auto.

 

[1911Tuner]

500

I won't carry a pistol for SD that hasn't consistently shot 400-500 rds. without puking.

500 is a pretty good yardstick. Mine is 2500...without cleaning or oiling.
'Course, I'm pretty anal over reliability.

 

[BevrFevr]

my money says

That ain't even a factory test target. Does Brown even include factory test targets with thier guns?

I think that sure looks like some off hand shootin to me but what do I know.

 

[1911Tuner]

re:

That ain't even a factory test target. Does Brown even include factory test targets with thier guns?

I think that sure looks like some off hand shootin to me but what do I know.

You may have hit it.

Since the thread has veered a bit...bein' that it was originally about the gun and target shown and not about what is acceptable accuracy to each of us as individuals...lemme try once again to steer it back on course.

The gun in question hasn't been proven as wicked accurate...nor has it been proven as a lump of steel that just goes bang. One group fired from a new gun by one person with one lot of ammo doesn't prove anything. Shoot it!
Shoot it a bunch! Shoot it with different lots and types of ammo! Have fun finding out what it'll do.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled flame war...

Out!

 

[Gordy Wesen]

LOL.
That was my best Sig. I went through about six 220's till I picked that one. (I learned what to look for). My wife was at the range with me and I kept the target for some time. I used Speer 185g match bullets over 4.3 grains of Winchester 452AA and ran 5 or 6 rounds into the target.
Like the EB target I only did it once but was happy knowing I had an accurate gun. The guy who bought it from me raved. That was a nice Sig.

 

[JohnBT]

"Okay, let me spell out my thoughts for the guys that can't understand symbolism."

Symbolism? I thought 'zero error' was English. Now I see that it symbolizes the need for a gun so precise that it will make up for the owner not being a decent shot. Or something like that.

I'd still bet folding money on that one EB gun shooting much better groups than the group on that one test target, even without using handloads.

I've been told there's a reason some manufacturers have stopped shipping test targets and it's not that the guns won't shoot.

John

 

[MCgunner]

LOL.
That was my best Sig. I went through about six 220's till I picked that one. (I learned what to look for). My wife was at the range with me and I kept the target for some time. I used Speer 185g match bullets over 4.3 grains of Winchester 452AA and ran 5 or 6 rounds into the target.
Like the EB target I only did it once but was happy knowing I had an accurate gun. The guy who bought it from me raved. That was a nice Sig.

You SOLD IT????!!!!

 

[MCgunner]

"Okay, let me spell out my thoughts for the guys that can't understand symbolism."

Symbolism? I thought 'zero error' was English. Now I see that it symbolizes the need for a gun so precise that it will make up for the owner not being a decent shot. Or something like that.

Okay, you've convinced me. The intrinsic accuracy of the firearm has nothing to do with off hand accuracy. It's all in the shooter, gun has nothing to do with it. All I need is find a good shooter and give him my Grendel P12 and he can win an Olympic bullseye event. Why in the world do all those Bullseye shooters worry about their handgun's accuracy? They could save a lot of money by just shooting Hi Point .45s!

 

[1911Tuner]

Okay, you've convinced me. The intrinsic accuracy of the firearm has nothing to do with off hand accuracy. It's all in the shooter, gun has nothing to do with it. All I need is find a good shooter and give him my Grendel P12 and he can win an Olympic bullseye event. Why in the world do all those Bullseye shooters worry about their handgun's accuracy? They could save a lot of money by just shooting Hi Point .45s!

That's a bit ridiculous. The Distinguished Experts and Grand masters want all that accuracy because they can shoot up to their gun's potential at a hat-drop. That's not easy to do...not even with a pedestrian 3-inch (25 yard)pistol.

Sandbag the gun. Shoot a few careful groups and take an average. When you can match the average from offhand...on demand...THEN you're at the point of needing a match-grade accuracy job.

 

[Gordy Wesen]

There are patterns, groups, cloverleafs and bugholes. Personally, from a custom smith I want reliability and bugholes. I picked up a Caspian 1911 from Dave Helton and I wasn't disappointed.

http://dvcustom.com/