Japle

Since I couldn’t find a suitable front sight, I bought a sheet of 1/8” florescent orange acrylic and made my own. I have similar sights on three of my other Smiths and love them, but those sights aren’t high enough. I took the gun to the range yesterday and it’s just the right height - 0.4”. With the rear sight cranked up just 3 clicks it’s dead on at 50 feet. The .45 Colt is at the bottom of this pic.

I bought a set of LPA adjustable FO sights for a S&W 625-6 in .45 Colt. The LPA rear is about 0.15” higher than the factory sight and the front is 0.06 lower, so the gun shoots 8” high at 25 feet. With the factory front, it still shoots 5” high. Factory front - 0.34", LPA front = 0.28" Looks like I need a front sight (preferably FO) that’s 0.4” tall and I can’t find one. Any ideas? Oh, and it's a pinned front sight.

After some research and an email to BUL, I learned that small-frame Witness 16 round mags will work. I ordered two from Midway and they fit. I ran a bunch of 9mm dummies through the gun and got perfect functioning. I'll get to the range soon to be sure, but unless I get back on here to say otherwise, 16 round Witness mags are the way to go. NOTE: 17 round Witness 9mm mags are also available. Don't buy them. They're for the large frame gun and not for the BUL Storm.

I bought a BUL Storm 9mm from AIM the other day. The gun seems almost identical to a small frame Witness 9mm I used to own. It came with one 16 (almost 17) round magazine. A mag that fits the CZ75 B SA fits, but the mag catch slot is too low to engage. I can't find a listing for a magazine that's specifically for this pistol. Does anyone know what mags fit and who has them for sale? Thanks.

My SteelMaster was driving me nuts. One match it would be okay and the next it would jam like mad. The original mount for the C-More sat right on top of the ejection port and often bounced empty cases back into the gun, jamming things up. I was told, “tune the ejector” or “change the recoil spring” or “install an AFTEC extractor ($75)” or “dance around the gun shaking Sioux ceremonial rattles”. I sorta thought a $2800 gun from Dawson Precision ought to work pretty well without the customer doing a bunch of complex or expensive mods. I was naïve. After removing the mount, I loaded three 20 rounds mags with a mix of three different 9mm loads using mixed brass and different bullet weights and ran them through the gun as fast as I could yank the trigger. Perfect functioning. Not a bobble. I ordered a Quinn III mount and went to the range to sight in. The gun now works 100%. As a bonus, the scope sits lower on the slide and doesn't pick up nearly as much junk coming out of the comp. The lens stays clean much longer than it used to. I'm not happy that I had to spend even more money to get the gun working. STI/Dawson shouldn't be sending out guns that cause this much trouble for their customers.

I used one on my 22/45 for a few years and liked it, but then I bought a TacSol lightweight top end for the gun. It's significantly faster. The light weight makes getting on target and doing transitions faster. Recoil isn't a factor. By the time you've moved to the next target, the effects of recoil won't matter. YMMV

That gun looks pretty rough, but at least it's not dangerous like my 686SSR: S&W has had this gun since 6 January. I haven't heard a thing from them. Considering that this "six-chambers-with-seven-flutes" revolver is the subject of threads on at least 14 shooting forums, I thought I'd get a little quicker response.

I'm running Berry's 125 HP over 4.0 gr of TG for 885 fps in my S&W 327PC. It's a very clean load, pretty mild. A little hotter than I really need for Steel Challenge, but I don't shoot any faster with a lighter load and this one just feels right. It bounces back on target better than other loads I've tried.

I shot the S&W Steel Challenge Nationals in Titusville, FL last year. It was my 1st try at the sport. I came in 106th overall, but was 1st in IDPA ESP Senior and Military clases and 1st in Rimfire Iron sight Senior. The prize table was so big that I won $300+ in prizes and also won a S&W Performance Center 327 revolver in a drawing. That ain't bad. This year I'll be shooting my tricked-out CZ75 SA with a dot sight, the S&W 327 8-shooter and my custom Ruger 22/45. I expect to have a great time, win more in prizes than I paid in entry fees and not be concerned that I get my butt kicked by the shooters from the AMU and Team S&W.

In my .38 Super FS Witness, I use a .357 dia. 125 gr plated flat point bullet over 8.6 gr of Blue Dot. Velocity is 1180 fps and accuracy is excellent. Funny thing, 9mm bullets give me crappy accuracy.

I shot in the Nationals at Titusville, FL this past weekend. This was my first try at the SC game. Shooting 3 entries was expensive, but worth every cent. The prize table included, IIRC, 24 guns and enough stuff that, even with a 106th place finish, there were plenty of good prizes for me to choose from. I chose a package that consisted of $150 worth of Starline brass, a nice Safariland holster, a set of Hogue “Extreme” 1911 grips, a Warren/Sevigny sight set for Glocks and a Brownells aluminum bushing wrench. Plus, I had one of the winning tickets in the “Junior” raffle and won a S&W PC Jerry Miculek signature 627 revolver! Not a bad haul for a guy who’s best centerfire time was 167.84!! I’ve been in competitive pistol shooting for over 35 years and have to say that this was the best run, smoothest, hassle-free match I’ve ever seen or heard of. Every administrator and RO was extremely friendly and helpful. Not a range Nazi in sight. The weather forecast for Sunday was looking pretty bad, but things went so well they had time to run the awards ceremony and the prize table on Saturday. Great match!!

Max, you just might have something there. It didn't occur to me that the excess pressure from the Sprinco might have damaged the frame. My mom is sleeping in the bedroom with the safe (long night in the ER last night - don't ask) so I'll check in the morning. Thanks.

Thanks, Heckle, but I replaced that spring too. Forgot to mention it. I just pulled the slide and replaced the slide stop. The spring tension on the slide stop measured 9oz with my trigger pull gauge. It's the same on my Super. So it seems the slide stop spring is strong enough. Nothing in or on the magazine is touching the slide stop. I'm as sure as I can be without X-ray vision. I can't make the slide lock back by cycling the gun, no matter how hard I do it. For some reason, it seems like inertia is pushing the slide stop up during recoil. Why this should be happening after the Sprinco experiment, especially after I replaced the slide stop and spring is beyond me. It didn't happen before Sprinco and it's constant now.

Guess I didn’t give you all the info, including my troubleshooting steps. First, this gun functioned perfectly before I installed the Sprinco unit. I used it as a CCW piece and I don’t carry guns that aren’t 100% dependable. I’ve replaced the slide stop with a new one and also with the one from my .38 Super fullsize. I filed the inside bottom of the slide stop to the point where there’s no chance it’s being hit by rounds in the mag. I can’t get the slide to lock back with rounds in the mag unless I’m shooting. All 4 of my .45 mags have the red follower and they all do the same thing. Premature lockback happens most with higher velocity, snappier loads and much less with lower velocity, gentle loads. Holding the slide stop down with my left thumb solves the problem, but then the slide won’t lock back even on an empty mag. I replaced the ported barrel with one from a fullsize Witness. It worked fine until Sprinco came along. The problem happens with either barrel.

+1 on the 124-125s. I got bad accuracy with 9mm 115s. Plated FP 125 .357 bullets shoot great.

My best Super load is the West Coast / Acura 125 gr plated FP .357 bullet and 8.6 gr of Blue Dot, Starline +P brass and CCI 550 primers. The load chronos at 1180 fps and is very accurate in my full-size Witness.

I have a Witness .45 with a problem. It’s a steel “Wonder” finish pistol with a full size frame, compact slide and ported barrel. Limited run made 7-8 years ago for a distributor. History: I wanted to try a Sprinco recoil-reducer. The thing worked OK as long as you didn’t want to be able to lock the slide back by hand or release it with the slide stop. It was way too strong. I sent it back for a full refund. Ever since then, the slide locks back 3-4 times per mag. I’ve tried replacing the slide stop (it got pretty beat up by the Sprinco unit) and the slide stop spring. Loading a 255 gr bullet to low velocity helps, but that’s no fun. I’d send it back to EAA since they’re right up the road, but I’ve had such bad experiences with their “gunsmith” that I hate to do it. Anyone else had a similar problem? Got a solution?

My experience is something like Pat Sweeney's, except my eyes were corrected with surgery, not lenses. I got my eyes done, (astigmatic keratotomy) several years ago. My right eye is the "close" eye and has excellent focus from about 12" out to just past the front sight. My left eye is for distance; it's 20-25, but doesn't focus well under 2 ½ feet. My brain just uses the feed from whichever eye is providing the best focus and tunes out the other one. I believe this is called "mono-vision". It took me a couple of weeks to get used to it, but then it became second nature. I hadn't really thought about it for years until I came across this thread, just before it disappeared. I had noticed that, in IDPA matches, I could see the front sight in sharp focus and also see the bullet holes appearing in the target, even at medium to long range. Being the slow learner that I am, I didn't do anything with this knowledge. Now I'm finding that I can look hard at the precise spot on the target I want to hit and let my reflexes handle the sights. My concentration is on the target, but I still can watch the sights bounce. I'm not sure this is any better or faster than concentrating on the sights and noticing the bullet holes appear. I'm an IDPA Expert shooter, not a Master. More research is needed. John Cape Canaveral

5.2 gr of WST with a plated RN - West Coast, IIRC. It's a little warmer than nedded for my 1911s, but works in my Witness and I don't want to fool around with 2 .45 loads. John Cape Canaveral

Many years ago when I was in college, I attended a trumpet clinic in Vermillion, SD. The day had been fairly warm for late November and the morning ride from Yankton had been pleasant. By late afternoon, the temps had dropped into the low teens. No problem in a car, but I had my Triumph 650. My windbreaker was a heavy plastic jacket that I’d used for winter surf fishing. That and a pair of ski gloves and ear muffs under my helmet were all I had. By the time I pulled up at my place, I was about frozen stiff. I pushed down the kickstand and when I reached up to grab my helmet the plastic jacket shattered into 127 pieces and fell on the street. The biggest piece was smaller than my hand. I live in Florida now. John Cape Canaveral

I started shooting “combat” matches in the early ‘70s, then got into metallic silhouette for 8 years, then out of active shooting for over 15 years. Now I’m back and IDPA is the game. Besides teaching me a lot that I’d never though of, Brian’s book has reminded me of a lot of things I’d forgotten, the 3rd person-observer phenomenon being one of the coolest. Something else that occurred to me recently was a technique I used very successfully in my draw. As soon as I have both hands on the gun, I’m partly focusing on having the gun pointed at the target. The gun moves straight from just above waist level to the final, extended position, all the time pointed at the target. When the sights come between my right eye and the target, they’re already lined up. They have to be. The gun’s been on target for the last 28” of its movement. Since I’ve pre-loaded the trigger, (especially with a Glock) the shot breaks very quickly. The gun seems to run into position on invisible rails. No doubt, this is at least partly fantasy. I’m not much of a fan of point-shooting except at very close range. It’s a useful image, though. At least for me. John Cape Canaveral

Ross, I bought the frame on my FFL from a Shotgun News ad. It was made by A.R. Sales. They went out of business due to a divorce in 1979. They had a special deal that allowed the buyer to have a custom serial number. I chose my initials and the year. -- JPL 1975 -- I checkered the front strap and the flat mainspring housing and beveled the mag well. A few years ago I added a beavertail grip safety. The frame was black anodized. I didn't like it, so I boiled the anodizing off with a warm Draino solution. After finishing the slide, I had all the steel parts hard chromed. I made a set of grips out of Hawiian Koa. It's a real nice looking gun and is very accurate. In the late '70s I got annoyed with the trend of our local combat shooters going to highly customized guns and expensive leather. For the whole season I shot my fixed-sight LW Commander out of a home-made holster. I won every monthly match and the Regional match. It was fun, but it didn't stop the equipment race.

Thanks for the advice, guys. The crack is on the right sideof the dust cover at the front edge of the rail. It's 0.185" long. Interestingly, the demensions of this frame are exactly the same as my G.I. Colt. The dust cover is normal Gov't Model length. I now recall that I had to cut the recoil spring plug back to a shorter length to get it to work. It's been 30 years and it's worked fine all this time. I've been using a 5" barrel since reading Mas' article on the Combat Commander he liked so much that was set up that way. Anyhow, I'll keep it as-is. No more competition, though. John

Duane, thanks. The crack is in the dust cover right at the front end of the right-hand rail. Last night I swapped the commander slide onto a standard 1911 frame and it seems to fit exactly the same as it did on the LW frame. BTW, the LW frame was made by A.R. Sales, which went out of business in the late '70s. The slide is unmarked, but I seem to remember that it's by Essex. IIRC, the slide was advertised as fitting standard or Commander frames. John

My LW Commander, which I built in 1975 and have fired 8,000-10,000 times, has finally developed a crack in the frame. Guess I'll have to retire the old girl. I'm looking for a new steel frame. Baer and STI look good, but they're lots of $$$. Brownell's and Sarco have Essex frames for good prices. Does anyone have experience with them? The Essex Commander frame is less than $150, which fits my budget. And another question: Is the length of the dust cover the only difference between the Gov't and Commander frames? John Cape Canaveral