kindlyoldcoach

This is what I'd do, as well. That pin is usually staked at the factory, so it won't crawl out and drop your link onto to the floor (or the sand, the grass, the snow) every time you field-strip your pistol. No reason for you not to re-stake it. Just go carefully.

Hmmm. I'll ask its owner when I see him this week- not sure if he has a holster for it. Bullseye shooter. There's gotta be something out there, though, 'cause some IDPA shooters seem to be using this pistol, and they can't all be carrying "Mex". I'd bet that any open-ended Smith Model 39 holster would fit quite correctly, since their frame & slide cross-sections are almost identical.

I handled and shot one a little while ago. Very nice indeed. Seemed pretty accurate. I was off my game that evening but I think it really wanted to group. Here's a thread you may find useful: 952 discussion

I'm a "D" in Standard. Last match I shot, the range officer gave the LAMR command, noticed it was me on the line, clipped his CED 6000 back on his belt and dragged out an old Heuer stopwatch. I think I should be back in "U".

Can you reach the magazine release AT ALL without moving your hand? If you can, I may be stating the obvious, but have you tried a lighter magazine catch spring? Solved my problem for three bucks, and the stock magazine catch is still in place.

Colt used to hog out its Gold Cup slides internally. Two places that I've noticed: 1) They'd remove stock from either side of the firing pin tunnel. Problem: this leaves a VERY thin web on the part of the breechface that passes under the extractor hole. 'Cups have been known to crack there when used extensively with stiff loads. From the photos I've seen of the SVI removable breechface, this may NOT be a good idea for your pistol, either. 2) They'd backbore the upper inside of the slide, between the lug recesses and the bushing race. (More or less the area that gets cut completely out when a Hybrid barrel is installed, only Colt didn't cut all the way through.) An impressive amount of metal can be removed from there. I've never heard of that lightening cut being a liability. Why do you want your slide lightened?

Two moderately pimped-out Colt single-stacks, in Standard division.

An update: The pistolsmith who fitted the barrel has admitted to having deliberately altered my chamber. He is also sending me another (I hope) virgin Bar-Sto barrel he had on hand as a replacement. Needless to say, I will be having the replacement barrel installed by someone ELSE. Ideally, Paul Barrette. And kudos to Bar-Sto; Irv III's attitude in this matter has been stellar, and I'm certain his e-mail reply (which I forwarded to the 'smith) helped me out in no small way. I won't post the name of the pistolsmith in question on a public forum, but any other Canadian shooter who is contemplating some custom work and wishes to know who the, ah, butcher is should feel free to PM me.

Standard Division pistols: Single-stack 5" Colts, either an NM .45 or a Series 70 1911A1 in 9mm Luger. Skateboard tape on the frontstraps, short 52mm triggers, S&A flatback funnels, Bar-Sto barrels; various "high-performance aftermarket" everything else. Rig: Bianchi Chapman Hi-Ride holster and Ernie Hill Leatham/Enos mag pouches, on an old Bianchi leather belt. Presciption eyeglasses. Good plugs & good muffs. Baseball hat, jeans, T-shirt, thick woolly socks, hiking sneakers. Functioning wristwatch. All the kit in the world is useless if I show up late & miss my slot. Underwater Kinetics lockable hard case for the pistols, mags, and rig. Big cardboard box for my munitions, brass, water bottle, dried sausage, canned asswipes, rulebook, and autographed, plasticized copies of "The Complete IPSC Re-Enactor" and "How To Be A Luddite". And I'm having a blast. An absolute blast.

I've thought of that, believe me, but because I'm in Canada, it would be easier and cheaper to send them my liver.

You ain't kidding. I'm severely distressed at the thought of sending it back to him for warranty work. Apart from the fact that he's at the opposite end of the continent (and my country's legal options for pistol shipments just plain SUCK), well, it took him 15 months to rebarrel it the first time. And when I finally got it back, there were some things that I had to correct. There are, unfortunately, very few pistolsmiths making a trade of working on 1911s here in Canada.

Reply from Bar-Sto: "I have seen something close to this but it was after someone reamed the chamber with a dull reamer and it picked up. It may have gone out like that but I have never sent anything out like that but it I guess could happen . I would like to see it. If it is our reamer spec then we would replace it with out a doubt. If you can get it to us I will get it handled ASAP. " Now I just gotta see if the pistolsmith will fess up to having reamed the chamber at all.

Ya think? I've fired off an e-mail and pictures to Bar-Sto. I'll see what they say.

I shoot Standard, with a moderately tarted-up single-stack .45. Why? Because I like having another excuse to shoot accurized 1911s. I shoot that style and frame size of pistol better than any other centerfire auto I've ever owned or borrowed. I have an excellent .357 revolver that I adore, and if its crane were modern and swung out enough to accomodate speedloaders, I might be shooting Revolver class. But it's from the age of dump pouches, older than I am. If IPSC was still one big divisionless division, with an optics-&-comps equipment race going on, I'd still be shooting informal outlaw stuff with one or two others at my club. I have no interest in compensators and optical sights on my pistols, and, outside of military service pistol matches, box-stock double-stacks leave me cold. (The shooters who do choose these, however, can eat at my table any day. Strictly a blondes vs brunettes issue.)

Hmmm... Brand new Bar-Sto. About one thousand rounds fired. Haven't checked for the smear position yet, but I will. As for the lack of sealing that's been offered as a theory, I'd considered that. It's just that with similar loads, this pistol's original, sloppy-fitted barrel used to smudge the cases with only the slightest music-hall moustache.

Here's a picture of some cases I shot in my recently rebarrelled .45 National Match. The loads were mousefarts; 4.1 grains of Bullseye, 200gr LSWC. IPSC PF maybe 140- 145. Other particulars: 5" slide & barrel, non-ramped; lightened postwar Colt NM slide, fresh 16lb spring. The pistol is quite accurate and locks up with only the slightest bump at the end. I don't ever recall my cases being this sooted-up when the stock barrel was in it. And other .45 shooters' brass I see on the floor is nowhere near as badly blackened as mine. Is this common? And what does it indicate? Should I worry? Any insights will be appreciated.

Ten years ago, I had a frame, slide, and a handful of parts turned into a very nice custom pistol in less than three weeks by Paul Barrette, a local, full-time 'smith who'd just been named in an American Handgunner IPSC column. He's still building part-time, and I hear his leadtimes for complete pistols run 9 months these days. A couple of local shooters have told me they find this too long by half, and are sending work elsewhere as a result, but he's apparently got enough work that he can pick & choose his commissions. In March or April of 2002, I sent another 1911 pistol away to a different 'smith, for a simple re-barrelling. I finally saw it again in July of 2003. There were, ah, issues with the work done and the parts supplied. And I had been quoted about eight weeks. Would I send another frame & slide to Mr. Barrette? Yes, and I'd gladly wait the year it would take, because the pistols he builds are worth the wait. Would I deal with the other guy again? Not even if he shipped me a pistol in advance.

That's crapulent. And when the new barrel they install fails, what then? I'd tell Baer to ship the pistol straight to Benny Hill.

Mine's a sawn-off brass .30-06 casing. When the teeth get bent or worn, it just needs to have a .45 expander ball run into it. Touch up with a small file, and voila.

Are you using 9mm magazines? Nines will feed from .38 Super mags, but don't expect them to feed well. If the malfs involved the disconnector rail hitting the cartridges in mid-case and feeding them into the hood, try 9mm magazines.

Wolff sells 7- and 8-lb variable rate springs for the Commander. Wolff Springs

Yup. Great combination to learn on. I had this one built as a trainer/loaner about ten years ago. It's in 9mm Luger.

I'd be steamed as well. Apart from being distracting, it can be unsafe. Slightly tangential case in point: Non-standard safety warnings. At a recent match, a highly-strung but otherwise totally switched-on range officer was attempting to tell a shooter that he was perilously close to breaking 180° as he moved from port to port. He shouted, three times at least, "Watch your gun!" The shooter was new to IPSC, I think, and his initial reaction was probably that this loud, enthusiastic fellow was coaching him. He looked at his pistol, looked at the RO with a quizzical expression, and kept shooting. It didn't help AT ALL that we had people with six different mother tongues signed up at that match. Made the need for clarity and consistency all the more apparent. It doesn't seem to be covered in the rulebook, but at my safety course, I was taught to expect a call of "Muzzle!" or "One-eighty!", if the RO was inclined to give warnings at all. If someone yelled "watch your gun" into my ear, I'd immediately wonder if it was on fire or turning into a snake, or something. Meanwhile, I could be putting a slug into Jimmy next to me, DQ-ing us both.

For someone built on a bicycle frame as mademoiselle seems to be, I'd say the old (and unfortunately, rare) skinny-barreled 5-1/2" Smith 41 with home-shaved stocks might be the answer. There's a lot of wood that can come off those stocks. I have seen but not touched a Walther P22. It does look small enough, though. Like, kid-sized.

I have no hands-on experience with the .22/.45. As regards MkIIs, based on my experiences in both service conditions and NRA/ISSF bullseye, I must respectfully disagree. In my mind, the stock Ruger MkII is to .22 what the Glock is to centerfire: NOT what I'd choose to hand to a beginnner, under any circumstances other than outright unavailability of everything else. It is much easier to learn and progress with tools ergonomic and accurate enough to take blaming the tool out of the equation, ESPECIALLY at the rank of virgin. (I am thinking of Pistol Pete's rookie ladyfriend here.) I have yet to handle an out-of-the-box Ruger .22 that inspired such confidence. Their stock triggers, in my experience, SUCK. Like they were dipped in oil and kitty litter before shipping. And their factory sights are straight out of the 30s. I can always tell when someone at the club is selling a MkII; the air is filled with the unmistakable sound of the pistol being taken apart for close inspection. We're on our second conference table. Rather than wake the household up at 2300 after a range session, people simply tend to not clean them. You can spend money on MkIIs to make them shootable; Tom Volquartsen will sell you everything you need. But you very quickly arrive at Smith 41 pricing. Smith 41s, High Standards, and the target iterations of Buckmarks I've handled all have crisp triggers and nice big sight blades, as shipped. An experienced pistol shooter can always make his/her brain deal with "service conditions", but when I have a newbie on the line, I deliberately hand them the most accurate, most ergonomic pistol I have available. And if I had to run out and buy a .22 trainer tomorrow with my money, my last choice of those mentioned would be a Ruger. No rudeness intended. Just my two pence.