Posted on 12/23/2010 5:29:16 AM PST by marktwain
I have said it before and I will end up saying it again: the 1911 an old design that is more trouble than it is worth. I don’t say it to be confrontational, or to draw attention to myself. I say it because I see my fellow shooters mindlessly parroting the gun equivalent of Chuck Norris Facts whenever the 1911 comes up in conversation, and I just don’t get it.
I am not surprised that the 1911 is out of place in today’s world, and you shouldn’t be surprised either. What other 100-year old design is still in daily use?
In the comment section of another blog, I summarized my skepticism of the 1911′s attributes thusly:
It’s a 100-year old design. It needs tools to disassemble. It has unreliable magazines. It is finicky about ammo. And, as a single-action pistol, it is unsafe for 95% of its users to carry.
In my original complaint, I forgot to mention the issue with slide-stop failures, and the whole internal extractor/external extractor situation. Either of which would be serious enough to kill any other design’s reputation in the shooting world.
In response to some knee-jerk defenses of the 1911 from fanboys who drank too much John M. Browning Kool-Aid, who told me how all that I needed to do was buy a bunch of aftermarket parts and send the gun to a gunsmith, I added:
Why does a reliable 1911 cost so much, and need so much gunsmithing?
To be fair, I have some of the same complaints with the Walther PPK. Which is also a very old design, one which has been eclipsed by more modern designs which can do everything it does better.
I mean, is it unreasonable to expect an affordably-priced pistol for defense to reliably feed hollowpoints out of the box? What Smith&Wesson pistol of recent manufacture won’t feed hollowpoints? What about Glock? SiG? Beretta? (I know Kahrs need to have some rounds through them before they are reliable, but it says that right in the owners manual). The shooting public would not accept an unreliable gun of a more modern design. But for some reason, the 1911 gets a pass for all of its flaws. “Just use hardball” is not a valid defense of the 1911 design, nor is it a valid strategy for selecting ammunition to defend yourself.
And God help anyone who buys a used 1911. Everyone and their brother seems to think they are qualified to take a Dremel to their 1911. Guys who can’t change their own flat tire somehow have no reservations about playing doctor on their 1911. Who knows what wacky “custom” parts have been put into the gun because someone read about it on the interweb tubes?
It was the best military sidearm of its day, and for a long time afterward. I do not dispute that. But its time has long passed. And a military sidearm is not the same thing as a handgun for personal defense.
Leave aside the lack of reliability with hollowpoints, and the other problems. The 1911 is too big to conceal. And the smaller versions are less reliable due to the shorter slide-travel and a tendency to limp-wrist the gun.
Some people protest by saying that the 1911 is the best gun for defense, because the most “realistic” shooting sports are heavily populated with 1911 users. And everyone knows that you should train like you fight, so that you will fight like you train, right? Well, that would be a more convincing argument if those “realistic” shooting sports didn’t have intricate rules that somehow disqualify most non-1911 designs. Purely by coincidence, right? Sure, they come up with semi-plausible rationales for some of those rules, but there is no way to disguise the overall bias towards the 1911.
I don’t hate 1911 fans. I merely pity them, because they are victims of marketing hype and groupthink, the lemmings of the gun world. And if someone sinks thousands of dollars into a 1911 (and isn’t using it to compete for money), well they are just gullible. Like the kind of people who pay money for tapwater in a bottle.
So what if Jeff Cooper liked the only handgun in use when he was in the military? It’s not like he had a choice of other handguns to use. And, on a related note, Jeff Cooper has a reputation that exceeds his accomplishments. The best information that I can find shows that he spent the battle of Guadalcanal as the training officer on Gen. Vandegrift’s staff. Not leading a platoon. Not on the line, pulling a trigger. And his coy evasions when asked about his real-world experience with gunfighting are revealing, if one cares to view them objectively. (If you have documentation about Cooper’s real-world experience, please drop me a line. I am happy to revise my opinion.) I have no doubt that he was qualified to teach people how to shoot on a range. Beyond that, a grain of salt is required. I prefer to get my advice on defense & gunfighting from men who have actually been there & done that; Massad Ayoob, Jim Cirillo, etc. Am I a qualifications snob? No, I am an results snob.
Ok, got it out of my system.
I have a Kimber with a red lazer built in.
At a reasonable distance I put a hollow point on that dot.
Love my Kimber
I needn't say more.
The M-2 Browning for one.
L
My DA revolver.
Please, a 1911 needs tools to disassemble? Lost me right there. Anyone that one and cannot field strip a 1911 in 20 seconds flat with their bare hands has no business owning one.
Reasoned? Not really.
Mark — thanks for posting the article. No doubt YOU will get flamed instead of the author ;-)
BUT ... Handgun magazine just ran an article (I’ll have to go to the john and find the article in the stack of ‘library’ material) about how timeless the 1911 design is, AND how good it still is in fact.
Is the 1911 optimized? no. Does its design take full advantage of materials available today? no.
But does it take a likkin’ and keep on tickin’? absolutely.
The fact that the 1911 is a mature design does not make it out-dated or anachronistic. Rather it is proven, reliable, and out-of-the-carton a fine weapon. Perhaps not the best match gun, but as a weapon it’s hard to find a design truly better. (especially in .45 ACP IMHO).
Enjoy the flames. Thanks for posting this DRIVEL!!! ;-p
Excellent point:
U.S. M1895 Colt-Browning machine gun
FN Browning M1899/M1900
Colt Model 1900
Colt Model 1902
Colt Model 1903 Pocket Hammer (.38 ACP)
Colt Model 1903 Pocket Hammerless (.32 ACP)
Colt Model 1905
Remington Model 8 (1906), a long recoil semi-automatic rifle
Colt Model 1908 Vest Pocket (.25 ACP)
Colt Model 1908 Pocket Hammerless (.380 ACP)
FN Model 1910
U.S. M1911 pistol (.45 ACP)
Colt Woodsman pistol
Winchester Model 1885 falling-block single shot rifle
Winchester Model 1886 lever-action repeating rifle
Winchester Model 1887 lever-action repeating shotgun
Winchester Model 1890 slide-action repeating rifle (.22)
Winchester Model 1892 lever-action repeating rifle
Winchester Model 1894 lever-action repeating rifle
Winchester Model 1895 lever-action repeating rifle
Winchester Model 1897 pump-action repeating shotgun
Browning Auto-5 long recoil semi-automatic shotgun
U.S. M1917 water-cooled machine gun
U.S. M1919 air-cooled machine gun
U.S. M1918 Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR)
U.S. M2 .50-caliber heavy machine gun of 1921
Remington Model 8 semi-auto rifle
Remington Model 24 semi-auto rifle (.22) Also produced by Browning Firearms (as the SA-22) and several others
Browning Hi-Power (Grand Puissance or GP), the standard sidearm of many military and police forces
The Browning Superposed over/under shotgun was designed by John Browning in 1922 and entered production in 1931
It needs tools to disassemble. Maybe if you consider a paper clip a 'tool'. You can detail strip a 1911 quite handily with nothing but your hands and a paper clip.
It has unreliable magazines. Define 'unreliable'.
It is finicky about ammo. Maybe at one time it was. Mine eats everthing from 230 gr ball to 185 grain hp's without so much as a hiccup.
And, as a single-action pistol, it is unsafe for 95% of its users to carry. Really. Does this author mean that 95% of the people who carried this weapon for almost 6 decades were in mortal peril? If he does, he's a fool.
L
Perhaps the author means getting WAY down into the trigger mechanism; removing the safety, or simiilar. Who knows.
My Sig P220 comes apart readily with no tools, and goes back together with a little more hand effort than disassembly (OK, 30 sec to reassemble).
Maybe the author is an aspiring Kimber or Glock dealer ;-)
For the new “I want it now kids of today” the premise is viable. In the hands of the fully trained a 1911 is dangerous.
The SA gun use I think will go down with us old folks, as well as any notion of freedom.
Possible. Yes many modern semi’s can be stripped easily. However, they all have their own issues.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jl-ZIo-Wztc
That should have been “not fully trained”
Sorry
RE: unreliable magazines.
For my P220, I ONLY use Sig-Sauer factory mags. THEY have no issues.
I quickly determined that the el cheapo mags generated stove pipe jams and or swelled to the point that insertion and removal from the gun became irregular. I literally put them in the trash.
Blame the cheap mag, not the 1911 design.
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