What have y'all found is the cause of most problems in the 1911?

Most of the problems I have found with 1911s that make them not run are with the:

  • Extractor

    Votes: 51 32.1%
  • Ejector

    Votes: 10 6.3%
  • Grip safety

    Votes: 4 2.5%
  • Thumb safety

    Votes: 4 2.5%
  • Barrel

    Votes: 2 1.3%
  • Hammer

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Mainspring

    Votes: 5 3.1%
  • Recoil spring

    Votes: 11 6.9%
  • Magazine follower

    Votes: 49 30.8%
  • Magazine spring

    Votes: 54 34.0%
  • Magazine lips

    Votes: 64 40.3%
  • Feed ramp

    Votes: 36 22.6%
  • Slide

    Votes: 3 1.9%
  • Frame

    Votes: 1 0.6%
  • Hammer

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    159
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It is not on the list, but home gunsmithing gets my vote.

Gun owners who would hesitate to change a spring on a Glock or Sig :)neener: snuck that in, Tuner) are happy to embark on wholesale butchery of a 1911.
 
Are the bushings for the grip screws supposed to be welded in place?
1911 grip screw bushings are supposed to be threaded into the frame.
Then, they are supposed to be staked in place from the inside with a staking tool to keep them from coming out.

The problem comes with the plethora of after-market grips of varying & out-of-spec screw hole depth.

When the screw hole counter-sinks in the grips are too deep, the screws tighten down against the bushings instead of the grips.

If over-tightened, they get stuck in place on the metal to metal contact and turn the bushings out with the screws the next time the grips need to come off.

Modern manufacturing methods by some companies have skipped the "staking in place" part and resorted to Lock-Tight, or nothing at all, making the situation even worse.

rcmodel
 
Yep, "loose nuts operating the firearm" are of a major concern~! :uhoh:

You know, that group that wants the extractors tuned just so, as for
all the spent brass too land in a certain area; or the novice home gun
smith try'in to install after market parts with little or NO knowledge, and
not having the proper tools~! :eek: :D
 
I can see bad ammo being an issue, but if the gun is within basic specs and operating properly, unless they are really inept, I really dont understand how the operator would be an issue. A true to spec 1911 is pretty straight forward to work and easy to shoot well with.

The real problem here is, the originals were not broke, and didnt start having troubles until people started trying to "fix" them, or worse, re engineer them. Its been all pretty much been downhill ever since.
 
Besides the obvious.....bad reloads....

Bad magazines are without a doubt the biggest offenders....followed by bad or improperly fit extractors. But one not mentioned here that I have had quite a bit of trouble with myself, especially with 1911's in chamberings other than .45 acp, has been non fitted or out of spec slidestops.

Long live .45 acp Colt or Checkmate Hybrid lip, dimpled follower, 7 round magazines:) As someone on the mentioned, they are like Viagra for your 1911;)
 
No selection for 'ammo'.

The 1911 has it foibles, many of which have to do with design. It's a 100 year old gun, and materials, engineering and manufacturing technologies have made an advance or two. The fact that the 1911 still makes the short list of serious combat pistols says a lot, and the designs that dominate today all own a debt of gratitude to the old slab side. The best designs correct some of the 1911's peccadilloes.

My take is that if you build a milspec gun and feed it ball, it has very little in the way of problems. It was designed to be reliable with ball ammo as it's basic criteria. Now we try to make it shoot cloverleafs and feed wadcutters. That's probably asking a lot, and no one should be surprised if it needs some tweaking. Most modern autos were designed to function with HP ammo.

The weaknesses I see in the 1991 are the feed ramp - which require perfect geometry and a good finish if you want reliable feeding with ammo that's not GI spec ball. The Extractor, which must be properly tensions since it is both extractor and extractor spring all in one, and the barrel lockup system which is overly complex and difficult fit for both accuracy and reliability. The bushing system works fine, but is a bit of an annoyance.

Modern makers (some, anyway) have done a great job in maintaining the original design while getting it to work with ammo it was never designed for, and give levels of accuracy never specified in the original requirements.
 
BTW, what do you consider the 'best' 1911 manufactured today? After owning Kimbers, Springfields, a Les Bauer, several hand built customs, many Colts and a GI Remington Rand I just picked up a SiG GSR. Haven't shot it yet, but it looks good.
 
Yea, verily. Sad that so many of the younger 1911 fans have never had a chance to handle a real one.

I recently got to!!! It was real nice, another member of my shooting range (He's probably in his mid-50's+-) inherited a pre-wwII 1911 from his father in law, and while he was putting some rounds downrange in a H&K USP he let me fire off a few rounds, it was real nice, I'd need to get used to those sights, but it was nice. Did not catch details, I was so excited to shoot it I wasn't looking for stampings.

Only bad part of the story is a week later I tried out the ranges Springfield "Mil-Spec" thinking they'd be similar...if theres a way that two 1911s that are supposed to be similar could be more far apart I think I found it. That Springfield was not nice, not nice at all. Felt real slim and "bony" in my hand. Nothing against Springfield's in general, the Trophy Match I shot was nice;)

RFB
 
Extractors break. Thats just a fact of life. I don't know how more or less true this is for 1911's than any other gun, but it is just something that happens. They are cheap and easy to replace.

I maintain that magazines are the single biggest contributor to problems in autos there is. I guess I have never really sat and figured which part of the magazine and have instead just considered it as a whole, but in the end, the magazine is the first thing I check. More often than not, thats all the problem is.
 
teh Intrawebz .

I mean the 1911 was rocking and rolling along pretty good until teh Intrawebz come to be.

Even the special Bulls-Eye guns and those altered from Combat Weapons shooting gun games were doing fine.

Then, along come teh Intrawebz. and another great equipment race was born.

0's and 1's got mixed up and Clones come to be. Everybody had to have a clone...
Line extension hit, and everyone wanted a piece of the pie...and come up with pcs of pie to have a pc of.
So the original combat weapon was fine, it worked, it was proven, and still proves...
Clones do not always work, and cutting corners on mfg end, specs, metallurgy and ...

teh Intrawebz. causes most problems...*yep*
 
I voted slide because the biggest problem I see is companies are trying to put a slide that's too short for reliability on the 1911. :scrutiny:
 
I voted slide because the biggest problem I see is companies are trying to put a slide that's too short for reliability on the 1911.

Huh? Let's see, I've got thousands upon thousands of rounds through my Colt Officer's ACP. Only a 3 1/2" barrel. Slide is pretty short 'by your remark'. I've never had an issue.

Ammunition is the biggest problem in my book. The 1911 was designed to feed 230gn ball ammo. It does quite well. People loading bullets intended for the .45LC or SWC's that are too light/short are what I see as the big issue. Still, most can be adjusted in the loading process so they feed reliably.

There's too much talk about magazine tuning. I have four different brands of magazines. They all work great in my 1911's. Kimber to Colt!\

-Steve
 
JackOfAllTradesMasterAtNone, no need to take offense. Just because your Colt Officers Model is an exception doesn't mean that the problem is nonexistent.
 
JackOfAllTradesMasterAtNone, no need to take offense. Just because your Colt Officers Model is an exception doesn't mean that the problem is nonexistent.

I'll second that. I have an early 1991A1 Compact/OM that has been 100% from Jump Street...,at least so far. I also understand that I'm lucky. Of all the functional issues that I see and correct with the 1911 platform, the sub Commander-length pistols account for the majority, and when they do have problems...are usually a lot more persnickety to tweak than with their larger cousins. The main cause seems to be lack of slide mass, and the necessary overspringing of same...with the resultant increased slide speeds.

Extractors break. Thats just a fact of life.

It doesn't have to be that way, though. I replaced two OEM Colt extractors on my beaters during a rebuild that had over 75,000 rounds apiece through'em...and not because the extractors had failed. They went into my range box as emergency spares, and one has since been installed in another guy's pistol after his failed to hold tension at a match. As far as I know...it's still shuckin'em out. If it wasn't, I'd have heard from him by now.
 
Magazine feed lips, feed ramp, followed by my personal favorite, the ejector. Still can't get my Mark IV to consistently keep the empties off my head, even with a Wilson extended.
 
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