Which Beavertail Grip Safety

[Fo0]

Anyone have compared the Ed Brown Machined Memory Groove VS EGW .245 Radius or the EGW/JEM Grip Safety .250" Radius High Cut?

Thanks

[Beef15]

I have the first two. Shooting I notice little difference. If I sit and hold them and think too much about it I like the EB's feel slightly. Got the EGW for a frame with undersize tangs.

 

I might be able to get some pics up tomorrow.

[robertg5322]

Once they're installed and blended, they can pretty much be fit to your preference. The question is which one will be easier (fit closest to the lines of your gun).

 

I've done them on Kimber, Colt and Springfield Mil-Spec frames. I've yet to find a BTGS that works well enough to use on a Springfield frame with a factory Springfield BTGS. And as much as factory Springfield BTGSs rattle, it'd be nice to find one that could make the gun complete without having to weld. 

 

The Ed Brown has the highest cut out of the box, though I made the others as high with judicious use of a dremel and sanding wheel. 

 

Springfield has their funky radius, the EGW and Smith & Alexander are about the only ones I've seen that work without having to weld up the tangs. The EGW is more expensive, so the S&A gets the nod (for me on this unstressed part, I see no benefit of a machined tool steel part over the cast S&A unit).

[zzt]

Of the three mentioned, the Ed Brown is the last one I would pick.  In fact, I would only use it if it were the only one available.  Been there, done that. 

 

The EGW .245" has a lot of extra meat on it.  You basically lap the fit by putting 600 grit on the tangs and rotating the GS on them.  You do end up with a perfect fit.  Blending is a bear if you are putting it on an STI , JEM or similar frame.  You definitely will need a Dremel or a vertical belt sander.  The arm is massive.  You have to remove a lot of material (typical for EGW) but it will NEVER break.

 

The JEM GS fits a JEM or STI fame so well you can do the blending with a strip of emery cloth.   It is STI style so it has the small arm, but it is cut from billet or bar stock, so it is much stronger than the STI POS.

 

Tool steel or cast:  wait until you have the arm of a cast GS break off and you will be converted.  That happened to me with an STI GS.

Edited February 19, 2019 by zzt

[Fo0]

6 hours ago, zzt said:

Of the three mentioned, the Ed Brown is the last one I would pick.  In fact, I would only use it if it were the only one available.  Been there, done that. 

 

The EGW .245" has a lot of extra meat on it.  You basically lap the fit by putting 600 grit on the tangs and rotating the GS on them.  You do end up with a perfect fit.  Blending is a bear if you are putting it on an STI , JEM or similar frame.  You definitely will need a Dremel or a vertical belt sander.  The arm is massive.  You have to remove a lot of material (typical for EGW) but it will NEVER break.

 

The JEM GS fits a JEM or STI fame so well you can do the blending with a strip of emery cloth.   It is STI style so it has the small arm, but it is cut from billet or bar stock, so it is much stronger than the STI POS.

 

Tool steel or cast:  wait until you have the arm of a cast GS break off and you will be converted.  That happened to me with an STI GS.

 

I changed my options and now I am leaning towards the Cheely pinned beaver tail with no arm

[Aiden]

I have uhhh 3 of the Cheely pinned beavertail GS. It works out really well on my CK frame, but it still has a slight gap in the rear. It also wiggles slightly with my Dawson MSH so I ended up pinning it anyway.

 

 

 

 

The EGW grip safety was fantastic because it had so much you could remove and fit, but I didn't want to fit it to a finished frame so I went with something closer to drop in. The Cheely was closer to drop in so I actually ended up using that instead as well (hence the second one). I do some minor blending but I just want them comfortable, not beautiful.

 

Lastly I've several Ed Brown memory groove grip safeties, and I hate the memory groove. So I keep removing them and installing Cheely fixed safeties instead.

Edited February 20, 2019 by Aiden

[Aiden]

My next build I'd consider doing an EGW. It has the most meat so I could pin it from the start and blend it in the fixed position. It'd potentially have that cool seamless look. 

 

But I've been very happy with the Cheely ones. Reasonable price, fixed works great with polymer MSH, and generally they're a decent fit and can be blended okay to most frames.

[ezra650]

I have a JEM fitted to an edge. It took a lot of sanding even with a dremel, plenty of material to work with. It was also a little tight on the sides and had to be lightly sanded to fit in the frame. I hate the "memory bump" style GS. That and the fact it is barstock is why I went with JEM, as ZZT pointed out. Wish the JEM fit a standard 1911 frame.

 

That cheely looks perfect, I  like how flat it is. Was unaware of those until now.