Kimber and Springfield 1911s…

[Philmo11]

It’s inevitable that one day I’d compare a Springfield to a Kimber. I did not know it was going to cause me to buy several… although, I suspect I would have anyway.

In January I ordered my first Kimber Stainless II in 10mm. The only real complaints I had were that the slide rails had been bead blasted and every moving part on it was really gritty. Required a complete tear down and meticulous cleaning which took care of most of it but not all. After 50 rounds, you have to oil it because of breaking in those bead blasted slide rails, flush the gunk out.

I had also ordered a Springfield Loaded in 45. It was pretty gritty too but not near as bad as the Kimber was. Fit and finish was pretty good but it was the CA compliant model so the main spring caused all the action to be a little heavier. That was fine. I could fix that swapping the spring and housing out with a standard set. Sat in my safe untouched for a while, unfired.

Shortly after I received the Springfield, I saw the same Kimber Stainless II in 45, so I bought it too. Surprisingly, everything was nice and smooth on it. Like the first 2, fitment was pretty good. I decided I wanted to do a comparison between the Loaded and the Stainless II. Long story short, Kimber had the upper hand across the board.

Some of the comparison was unfair as I said, the Loaded was a CA model. Some of it was justified though. Simple things like radius on the hammer where it roll up under the slide. Trigger was a little smoother. Forward motion of the slide where it contacts the disconnector was smoother. Fitment was a tiny bit tighter. The big one was the Loaded was shooting 6” high at 25 yards.

Long story short, I halted any further comparison and I sent it back to Springfield for warranty work. It’s still with Springfield. It’s only been a couple weeks though. I expect it back in a week or two.

Meantime, Anniversary rolled around and wife wanted to buy me a new gun. Despite the minor flaws with the 10mm Kimber Stainless II, I ordered another. This one was between the other two Kimbers in overall smoothness. It did come with some obvious signs of filing during fitment of the slide to the frame. Even the bead blast finish didn’t hide it. Not horrible but still there. This gun has never been fired yet. Was just received this week. No ammo available to run it. I’ll have to load some.

While I was waiting for that last Kimber, I found another Springfield Loaded. Ended up paying $157 less than the first one. Today, I picked that one up. Also brought the Kimber 45 with me and headed over to the father in law’s.

The new Loaded was tight, like, super tight. I expect after breakin, it should be a solid shooter. We only got to shoot one mag each due to the rain. Not really aiming at anything special just function testing. The Kimber, despite only having just half a box of ammo through it, ram fine. The Springfield had 3 FTF and didn’t lock the slide on the last round. That prompted me to disassemble it and look deeper.

Turns out, there are numbers hand engraved on the bottom of the slide. Those numbers have raised edges, which have to pass right over the disconnector. It’s causing enough drag that the slide doesn’t have enough umph to strip a round about half the time. That’s got to be fixed before it ruins the top of the disconnector. It’s got constant upward pressure on it and those engravings a chewing away at it. I think it may be going back to Springfield as well but the jury is still deliberating on that. I’d like to at least do a quick accuracy test before I call them.

Picture of the stupidness…

That area should be pretty smooth given what it does.

It actually pains me a bit to have to write this stuff as I am a big fan of Springfield Armory but these are some pretty big blunders in my book.

 

[Keystone19250]

It’s inevitable that one day I’d compare a Springfield to a Kimber. I did not know it was going to cause me to buy several… although, I suspect I would have anyway.

In January I ordered my first Kimber Stainless II in 10mm. The only real complaints I had were that the slide rails had been bead blasted and every moving part on it was really gritty. Required a complete tear down and meticulous cleaning which took care of most of it but not all. After 50 rounds, you have to oil it because of breaking in those bead blasted slide rails, flush the gunk out.

I had also ordered a Springfield Loaded in 45. It was pretty gritty too but not near as bad as the Kimber was. Fit and finish was pretty good but it was the CA compliant model so the main spring caused all the action to be a little heavier. That was fine. I could fix that swapping the spring and housing out with a standard set. Sat in my safe untouched for a while, unfired.

Shortly after I received the Springfield, I saw the same Kimber Stainless II in 45, so I bought it too. Surprisingly, everything was nice and smooth on it. Like the first 2, fitment was pretty good. I decided I wanted to do a comparison between the Loaded and the Stainless II. Long story short, Kimber had the upper hand across the board.

Some of the comparison was unfair as I said, the Loaded was a CA model. Some of it was justified though. Simple things like radius on the hammer where it roll up under the slide. Trigger was a little smoother. Forward motion of the slide where it contacts the disconnector was smoother. Fitment was a tiny bit tighter. The big one was the Loaded was shooting 6” high at 25 yards.

Long story short, I halted any further comparison and I sent it back to Springfield for warranty work. It’s still with Springfield. It’s only been a couple weeks though. I expect it back in a week or two.

Meantime, Anniversary rolled around and wife wanted to buy me a new gun. Despite the minor flaws with the 10mm Kimber Stainless II, I ordered another. This one was between the other two Kimbers in overall smoothness. It did come with some obvious signs of filing during fitment of the slide to the frame. Even the bead blast finish didn’t hide it. Not horrible but still there. This gun has never been fired yet. Was just received this week. No ammo available to run it. I’ll have to load some.

While I was waiting for that last Kimber, I found another Springfield Loaded. Ended up paying $157 less than the first one. Today, I picked that one up. Also brought the Kimber 45 with me and headed over to the father in law’s.

The new Loaded was tight, like, super tight. I expect after breakin, it should be a solid shooter. We only got to shoot one mag each due to the rain. Not really aiming at anything special just function testing. The Kimber, despite only having just half a box of ammo through it, ram fine. The Springfield had 3 FTF and didn’t lock the slide on the last round. That prompted me to disassemble it and look deeper.

Turns out, there are numbers hand engraved on the bottom of the slide. Those numbers have raised edges, which have to pass right over the disconnector. It’s causing enough drag that the slide doesn’t have enough umph to strip a round about half the time. That’s got to be fixed before it ruins the top of the disconnector. It’s got constant upward pressure on it and those engravings a chewing away at it. I think it may be going back to Springfield as well but the jury is still deliberating on that. I’d like to at least do a quick accuracy test before I call them.

Picture of the stupidness…
View attachment 26934
That area should be pretty smooth given what it does.

It actually pains me a bit to have to write this stuff as I am a big fan of Springfield Armory but these are some pretty big blunders in my book.

Hmmmm I never thought to look to see if there is numbers engraved into that area of my Emissary 45, I’m going to the range this morning with my M1A but when I get home I’m going to look.
I will say the fit between the slide and frame are incredible and not rough at all.
Thanks for the report.

 

[HansGruber]

Yeah, that’s a build number, and it’s a pretty common spot to put it. A lot of manufacturers do it.

It’s really not going to cause a problem…that’s a whole lotta noise about very little signal, there.

Kimber & Springfield are pretty much equal as far as their 1911’s, imho. Decent lower middle tier pistols, a little overpriced right now. The only real difference is firing pin safety vs no FP safety.

 

[Onewolf426]

Hmmmm I never thought to look to see if there is numbers engraved into that area of my Emissary 45, I’m going to the range this morning with my M1A but when I get home I’m going to look.
I will say the fit between the slide and frame are incredible and not rough at all.
Thanks for th

It’s inevitable that one day I’d compare a Springfield to a Kimber. I did not know it was going to cause me to buy several… although, I suspect I would have anyway.

In January I ordered my first Kimber Stainless II in 10mm. The only real complaints I had were that the slide rails had been bead blasted and every moving part on it was really gritty. Required a complete tear down and meticulous cleaning which took care of most of it but not all. After 50 rounds, you have to oil it because of breaking in those bead blasted slide rails, flush the gunk out.

I had also ordered a Springfield Loaded in 45. It was pretty gritty too but not near as bad as the Kimber was. Fit and finish was pretty good but it was the CA compliant model so the main spring caused all the action to be a little heavier. That was fine. I could fix that swapping the spring and housing out with a standard set. Sat in my safe untouched for a while, unfired.

Shortly after I received the Springfield, I saw the same Kimber Stainless II in 45, so I bought it too. Surprisingly, everything was nice and smooth on it. Like the first 2, fitment was pretty good. I decided I wanted to do a comparison between the Loaded and the Stainless II. Long story short, Kimber had the upper hand across the board.

Some of the comparison was unfair as I said, the Loaded was a CA model. Some of it was justified though. Simple things like radius on the hammer where it roll up under the slide. Trigger was a little smoother. Forward motion of the slide where it contacts the disconnector was smoother. Fitment was a tiny bit tighter. The big one was the Loaded was shooting 6” high at 25 yards.

Long story short, I halted any further comparison and I sent it back to Springfield for warranty work. It’s still with Springfield. It’s only been a couple weeks though. I expect it back in a week or two.

Meantime, Anniversary rolled around and wife wanted to buy me a new gun. Despite the minor flaws with the 10mm Kimber Stainless II, I ordered another. This one was between the other two Kimbers in overall smoothness. It did come with some obvious signs of filing during fitment of the slide to the frame. Even the bead blast finish didn’t hide it. Not horrible but still there. This gun has never been fired yet. Was just received this week. No ammo available to run it. I’ll have to load some.

While I was waiting for that last Kimber, I found another Springfield Loaded. Ended up paying $157 less than the first one. Today, I picked that one up. Also brought the Kimber 45 with me and headed over to the father in law’s.

The new Loaded was tight, like, super tight. I expect after breakin, it should be a solid shooter. We only got to shoot one mag each due to the rain. Not really aiming at anything special just function testing. The Kimber, despite only having just half a box of ammo through it, ram fine. The Springfield had 3 FTF and didn’t lock the slide on the last round. That prompted me to disassemble it and look deeper.

Turns out, there are numbers hand engraved on the bottom of the slide. Those numbers have raised edges, which have to pass right over the disconnector. It’s causing enough drag that the slide doesn’t have enough umph to strip a round about half the time. That’s got to be fixed before it ruins the top of the disconnector. It’s got constant upward pressure on it and those engravings a chewing away at it. I think it may be going back to Springfield as well but the jury is still deliberating on that. I’d like to at least do a quick accuracy test before I call them.

Picture of the stupidness…
View attachment 26934
That area should be pretty smooth given what it does.

It actually pains me a bit to have to write this stuff as I am a big fan of Springfield Armory but these are some pretty big blunders in my book.

Well, I think this might be the "new normal" for a while.
As I have stated in previous posts, I am in manufacturing, I print labels on a printing press. I have been in the printing field for over 20 years, manufacturing over 30. I have never seen things like this. Material shortages, material allotment, transportation issues, all these things have created the "perfect storm".

We were having a discussion the other day at work about a job I was getting ready to produce. Our art department guy was talking about how he was walking through the store and just happened to glance at a box of cereal on the shelf. He noticed that there was a lot of trash in the black print on the box. And it was glaringly obvious, even to the untrained eye. There are reasons for this.

In manufacturing, you have certain standards to maintain, one of the most important being quality control. In the "good old days" (think @ 2 years ago) quality control standards were such that a certain amount of waste was acceptable to maintain quality. There were times when issues arose that drove the waste up until the issue was corrected, and the product was sorted through to pick out what was "acceptable" to go to the customer while the rest was trashed. Manufacturing is driven by production and waste. Production is based on industry standards of setup time, run time, downtime, waste, quality. This is all based on material supply and costs, along with man hours, etc.

You already have stress trying to meet minimum production standards, especially with equipment problems, etc. Now we have not only supply chain issues, we now have to meet the same production standards with less material, less time, less waste and less manpower than ever. Never have I seen the printing industry like this. Sure, we had some delays of getting materials due to acts of nature, accidents, etc. Those would be maybe a day or two. Now? The industry is now being allotted paper. We cannot take on any new customers, or produce a new label for the same customer if it cuts into those allotments. Even the paper manufacturers cannot take on any new clients. And to make matters worse, a lot of companies, including my company, are having our allotments pushed out as much as 6 months away! They are doing this to the smaller companies more so than the larger ones.

So, with the firearms manufacturers, not only are they probably going through the same issues, their demand has increased exponentially due to this administration and the increased violence and cutting back of policing. More people are buying firearms than ever before. This is taxing an already volatile situation. Being in production, you are now stressed out trying to meet even more stringent production demands. You are pushed to produce more with less waste and less mistakes. This leads to more mistakes, more quality issues and more waste. Now the companies are in a position to where their quality standards are having to be modified as far as what is and isn't acceptable. "Minor" imperfections that should be filed down, re-bead blasted, etc. are being re-classified as "acceptable", to be addressed by customer service at a later date. Companies have to do this to make any money, as the prices have gone up exponentially on top of the supply shortages/delays.

I apologize for the long post. This is just what I am not only witnessing, but experiencing personally in my daily workday in the industry. Will things get back to "normal"? I hope so. But for now, we kind of have to have a little more patience and understanding with the products we purchase, not including food safety of course. Never in my 30 plus years in manufacturing have I seen it like this.

 

[fatjimmy]

Well, I think this might be the "new normal" for a while.
As I have stated in previous posts, I am in manufacturing, I print labels on a printing press. I have been in the printing field for over 20 years, manufacturing over 30. I have never seen things like this. Material shortages, material allotment, transportation issues, all these things have created the "perfect storm".

We were having a discussion the other day at work about a job I was getting ready to produce. Our art department guy was talking about how he was walking through the store and just happened to glance at a box of cereal on the shelf. He noticed that there was a lot of trash in the black print on the box. And it was glaringly obvious, even to the untrained eye. There are reasons for this.

In manufacturing, you have certain standards to maintain, one of the most important being quality control. In the "good old days" (think @ 2 years ago) quality control standards were such that a certain amount of waste was acceptable to maintain quality. There were times when issues arose that drove the waste up until the issue was corrected, and the product was sorted through to pick out what was "acceptable" to go to the customer while the rest was trashed. Manufacturing is driven by production and waste. Production is based on industry standards of setup time, run time, downtime, waste, quality. This is all based on material supply and costs, along with man hours, etc.

You already have stress trying to meet minimum production standards, especially with equipment problems, etc. Now we have not only supply chain issues, we now have to meet the same production standards with less material, less time, less waste and less manpower than ever. Never have I seen the printing industry like this. Sure, we had some delays of getting materials due to acts of nature, accidents, etc. Those would be maybe a day or two. Now? The industry is now being allotted paper. We cannot take on any new customers, or produce a new label for the same customer if it cuts into those allotments. Even the paper manufacturers cannot take on any new clients. And to make matters worse, a lot of companies, including my company, are having our allotments pushed out as much as 6 months away! They are doing this to the smaller companies more so than the larger ones.

So, with the firearms manufacturers, not only are they probably going through the same issues, their demand has increased exponentially due to this administration and the increased violence and cutting back of policing. More people are buying firearms than ever before. This is taxing an already volatile situation. Being in production, you are now stressed out trying to meet even more stringent production demands. You are pushed to produce more with less waste and less mistakes. This leads to more mistakes, more quality issues and more waste. Now the companies are in a position to where their quality standards are having to be modified as far as what is and isn't acceptable. "Minor" imperfections that should be filed down, re-bead blasted, etc. are being re-classified as "acceptable", to be addressed by customer service at a later date. Companies have to do this to make any money, as the prices have gone up exponentially on top of the supply shortages/delays.

I apologize for the long post. This is just what I am not only witnessing, but experiencing personally in my daily workday in the industry. Will things get back to "normal"? I hope so. But for now, we kind of have to have a little more patience and understanding with the products we purchase, not including food safety of course. Never in my 30 plus years in manufacturing have I seen it like this.

I think you are on to something. I am in mfg as well. 2021 was a major record year for us, and we are up 145% YOY in new orders. Our backlog is at a level no one could have ever imagined and it grows larger every day. If you think there were supply chain issues, it will be worse in 2022. Much of China has been shutdown for weeks. Empty containers are stacking up. When those containers get filled over the next few months the ports will be more backed up than ever. The global supply chain functioned like a watch. It is now out of sync and will take a very very long time to fix. This does not even begin to address labor shortages and other raw material shortages not caused by the supply chain breakdown.

 

[Old_Me]

Picture of the stupidness…
View attachment 26934
That area should be pretty smooth given what it does.

It actually pains me a bit to have to write this stuff as I am a big fan of Springfield Armory but these are some pretty big blunders in my book.

i have several guns with numbers engraved on that part of the slide. many of my guns were bought just before the pandemic sales frenzy, and during and after. if any maker was concerned about the connector wearing out, i'd imagine they wouldn't engrave anything there.

in regards to the "roughness" of the action, it is usually a good idea to take the gun(s) home from the store, strip them, clean and lube.

 

[Annihilator]

It’s inevitable that one day I’d compare a Springfield to a Kimber. I did not know it was going to cause me to buy several… although, I suspect I would have anyway.

In January I ordered my first Kimber Stainless II in 10mm. The only real complaints I had were that the slide rails had been bead blasted and every moving part on it was really gritty. Required a complete tear down and meticulous cleaning which took care of most of it but not all. After 50 rounds, you have to oil it because of breaking in those bead blasted slide rails, flush the gunk out.

I had also ordered a Springfield Loaded in 45. It was pretty gritty too but not near as bad as the Kimber was. Fit and finish was pretty good but it was the CA compliant model so the main spring caused all the action to be a little heavier. That was fine. I could fix that swapping the spring and housing out with a standard set. Sat in my safe untouched for a while, unfired.

Shortly after I received the Springfield, I saw the same Kimber Stainless II in 45, so I bought it too. Surprisingly, everything was nice and smooth on it. Like the first 2, fitment was pretty good. I decided I wanted to do a comparison between the Loaded and the Stainless II. Long story short, Kimber had the upper hand across the board.

Some of the comparison was unfair as I said, the Loaded was a CA model. Some of it was justified though. Simple things like radius on the hammer where it roll up under the slide. Trigger was a little smoother. Forward motion of the slide where it contacts the disconnector was smoother. Fitment was a tiny bit tighter. The big one was the Loaded was shooting 6” high at 25 yards.

Long story short, I halted any further comparison and I sent it back to Springfield for warranty work. It’s still with Springfield. It’s only been a couple weeks though. I expect it back in a week or two.

Meantime, Anniversary rolled around and wife wanted to buy me a new gun. Despite the minor flaws with the 10mm Kimber Stainless II, I ordered another. This one was between the other two Kimbers in overall smoothness. It did come with some obvious signs of filing during fitment of the slide to the frame. Even the bead blast finish didn’t hide it. Not horrible but still there. This gun has never been fired yet. Was just received this week. No ammo available to run it. I’ll have to load some.

While I was waiting for that last Kimber, I found another Springfield Loaded. Ended up paying $157 less than the first one. Today, I picked that one up. Also brought the Kimber 45 with me and headed over to the father in law’s.

The new Loaded was tight, like, super tight. I expect after breakin, it should be a solid shooter. We only got to shoot one mag each due to the rain. Not really aiming at anything special just function testing. The Kimber, despite only having just half a box of ammo through it, ram fine. The Springfield had 3 FTF and didn’t lock the slide on the last round. That prompted me to disassemble it and look deeper.

Turns out, there are numbers hand engraved on the bottom of the slide. Those numbers have raised edges, which have to pass right over the disconnector. It’s causing enough drag that the slide doesn’t have enough umph to strip a round about half the time. That’s got to be fixed before it ruins the top of the disconnector. It’s got constant upward pressure on it and those engravings a chewing away at it. I think it may be going back to Springfield as well but the jury is still deliberating on that. I’d like to at least do a quick accuracy test before I call them.

Picture of the stupidness…
View attachment 26934
That area should be pretty smooth given what it does.

It actually pains me a bit to have to write this stuff as I am a big fan of Springfield Armory but these are some pretty big blunders in my book

It’s inevitable that one day I’d compare a Springfield to a Kimber. I did not know it was going to cause me to buy several… although, I suspect I would have anyway.

In January I ordered my first Kimber Stainless II in 10mm. The only real complaints I had were that the slide rails had been bead blasted and every moving part on it was really gritty. Required a complete tear down and meticulous cleaning which took care of most of it but not all. After 50 rounds, you have to oil it because of breaking in those bead blasted slide rails, flush the gunk out.

I had also ordered a Springfield Loaded in 45. It was pretty gritty too but not near as bad as the Kimber was. Fit and finish was pretty good but it was the CA compliant model so the main spring caused all the action to be a little heavier. That was fine. I could fix that swapping the spring and housing out with a standard set. Sat in my safe untouched for a while, unfired.

Shortly after I received the Springfield, I saw the same Kimber Stainless II in 45, so I bought it too. Surprisingly, everything was nice and smooth on it. Like the first 2, fitment was pretty good. I decided I wanted to do a comparison between the Loaded and the Stainless II. Long story short, Kimber had the upper hand across the board.

Some of the comparison was unfair as I said, the Loaded was a CA model. Some of it was justified though. Simple things like radius on the hammer where it roll up under the slide. Trigger was a little smoother. Forward motion of the slide where it contacts the disconnector was smoother. Fitment was a tiny bit tighter. The big one was the Loaded was shooting 6” high at 25 yards.

Long story short, I halted any further comparison and I sent it back to Springfield for warranty work. It’s still with Springfield. It’s only been a couple weeks though. I expect it back in a week or two.

Meantime, Anniversary rolled around and wife wanted to buy me a new gun. Despite the minor flaws with the 10mm Kimber Stainless II, I ordered another. This one was between the other two Kimbers in overall smoothness. It did come with some obvious signs of filing during fitment of the slide to the frame. Even the bead blast finish didn’t hide it. Not horrible but still there. This gun has never been fired yet. Was just received this week. No ammo available to run it. I’ll have to load some.

While I was waiting for that last Kimber, I found another Springfield Loaded. Ended up paying $157 less than the first one. Today, I picked that one up. Also brought the Kimber 45 with me and headed over to the father in law’s.

The new Loaded was tight, like, super tight. I expect after breakin, it should be a solid shooter. We only got to shoot one mag each due to the rain. Not really aiming at anything special just function testing. The Kimber, despite only having just half a box of ammo through it, ram fine. The Springfield had 3 FTF and didn’t lock the slide on the last round. That prompted me to disassemble it and look deeper.

Turns out, there are numbers hand engraved on the bottom of the slide. Those numbers have raised edges, which have to pass right over the disconnector. It’s causing enough drag that the slide doesn’t have enough umph to strip a round about half the time. That’s got to be fixed before it ruins the top of the disconnector. It’s got constant upward pressure on it and those engravings a chewing away at it. I think it may be going back to Springfield as well but the jury is still deliberating on that. I’d like to at least do a quick accuracy test before I call them.

Picture of the stupidness…
View attachment 26934
That area should be pretty smooth given what it does.

It actually pains me a bit to have to write this stuff as I am a big fan of Springfield Armory but these are some pretty big blunders in my book.

That area has little to nothing to do with what your thinking it does, that’s just where the disconnector rides, smooth, rough makes little difference there since the disconnector is spring loaded, also the bottom of the rails also means little or nothing, lots of 1911’s are like this, normal

 

[Annihilator]

Yeah, that’s a build number, and it’s a pretty common spot to put it. A lot of manufacturers do it.

It’s really not going to cause a problem…that’s a whole lotta noise about very little signal, there.

Kimber & Springfield are pretty much equal as far as their 1911’s, imho. Decent lower middle tier pistols, a little overpriced right now. The only real difference is firing pin safety vs no FP safety.

I agree here totally with Hans, will add this though, both Kimber and Springfield have about the same amount of MIM parts, now Colt only has 5 MIM parts, and if I remember right, Sig uses machined parts, I may be wrong on this now, also Kimber has the plastic mainspring housing, my main grip is Kimber uses a MIM slide stop, not sure about Springfield, all in all, both good guns and I own both makes

 

[Philmo11]

I agree here totally with Hans, will add this though, both Kimber and Springfield have about the same amount of MIM parts, now Colt only has 5 MIM parts, and if I remember right, Sig uses machined parts, I may be wrong on this now, also Kimber has the plastic mainspring housing, my main grip is Kimber uses a MIM slide stop, not sure about Springfield, all in all, both good guns and I own both makes

The stainless II has a stainless mainspring housing but there are a lot of Kimbers that do have plastic main spring housing including the Raptor.

 

[HansGruber]

Honestly, a plastic (or MIM) MSH doesn’t bother me, as long as it’s decent quality.

It really doesn’t make much of a difference, function-wise.

 

[Philmo11]

i have several guns with numbers engraved on that part of the slide. many of my guns were bought just before the pandemic sales frenzy, and during and after. if any maker was concerned about the connector wearing out, i'd imagine they wouldn't engrave anything there.

in regards to the "roughness" of the action, it is usually a good idea to take the gun(s) home from the store, strip them, clean and lube.

Just to be clear, when I reference grit and roughness, they are different things in my mind. Manufacturing debris I consider grit. Lack of smooth surfaces after cleaning is roughness in the action. Field strip and clean is pretty normal procedure. Having to remove the trigger and sear isn’t normal. Those areas can usually be flushed with a spray in cleaner and oiled. Of the 80 or so handguns I’ve purchased in the last few years, the first Kimber Stainless II I bought is the only gun I had to go to that level.

As for the engraving on the bottom of the slide. I’m not going to pretend I’ve encountered every brand/model out there but I’ve had a few RIA, Citadels, couple Springfields, Kimber, S&W and MetroArms. None of them have engravings there. Not even the other Loaded. I can tell you that the end of the disconnector is pretty chewed already from the little action it’s seen.

That area has little to nothing to do with what your thinking it does, that’s just where the disconnector rides, smooth, rough makes little difference there since the disconnector is spring loaded, also the bottom of the rails also means little or nothing, lots of 1911’s are like this, normal

You just stated it does exactly what I think it does.

I don’t know what you mean by the bottom of the rails. If you are referring to the bead blasted Kimber rails I referred to, I am not talking about the bottom of the rails, the entire slide rail, including the channel the rail rides in are bead blasted. It does make a difference when breaking it in because those two surfaces have to essentially sand each other down during breakin. Makes a lot more metal byproduct during the breakin, enough that it causes the gun to start having failures to feed after about 50 or so rounds. Extra oil and working the slide a few times will free it back up and function normally.

 

[Philmo11]

Honestly, a plastic (or MIM) MSH doesn’t bother me, as long as it’s decent quality.

It really doesn’t make much of a difference, function-wise.

Personally, I think the plastic MSH is just distasteful corner cutting when you are spending over $1000 on a gun. As far as I know, Kimber is the only company that does that.

 

[Philmo11]

Yeah, that’s a build number, and it’s a pretty common spot to put it. A lot of manufacturers do it.

It’s really not going to cause a problem…that’s a whole lotta noise about very little signal, there.

Kimber & Springfield are pretty much equal as far as their 1911’s, imho. Decent lower middle tier pistols, a little overpriced right now. The only real difference is firing pin safety vs no FP safety.

I agree that Kimber and Springfield are a very close representation of each other. As for the engraving, if it weren’t for the raise edges, I would agree that the disconnector would probably glide across just fine. In this case, there are sharp raised edges that are preventing that from happening.

 

[HansGruber]

Personally, I think the plastic MSH is just distasteful corner cutting when you are spending over $1000 on a gun. As far as I know, Kimber is the only company that does that.

Colt has been using plastic MSH’s for a long time.

 

[Annihilator]

My Colts both have metal…..hmmmmm

 

[Philmo11]

Well, I think this might be the "new normal" for a while.
As I have stated in previous posts, I am in manufacturing, I print labels on a printing press. I have been in the printing field for over 20 years, manufacturing over 30. I have never seen things like this. Material shortages, material allotment, transportation issues, all these things have created the "perfect storm".

We were having a discussion the other day at work about a job I was getting ready to produce. Our art department guy was talking about how he was walking through the store and just happened to glance at a box of cereal on the shelf. He noticed that there was a lot of trash in the black print on the box. And it was glaringly obvious, even to the untrained eye. There are reasons for this.

In manufacturing, you have certain standards to maintain, one of the most important being quality control. In the "good old days" (think @ 2 years ago) quality control standards were such that a certain amount of waste was acceptable to maintain quality. There were times when issues arose that drove the waste up until the issue was corrected, and the product was sorted through to pick out what was "acceptable" to go to the customer while the rest was trashed. Manufacturing is driven by production and waste. Production is based on industry standards of setup time, run time, downtime, waste, quality. This is all based on material supply and costs, along with man hours, etc.

You already have stress trying to meet minimum production standards, especially with equipment problems, etc. Now we have not only supply chain issues, we now have to meet the same production standards with less material, less time, less waste and less manpower than ever. Never have I seen the printing industry like this. Sure, we had some delays of getting materials due to acts of nature, accidents, etc. Those would be maybe a day or two. Now? The industry is now being allotted paper. We cannot take on any new customers, or produce a new label for the same customer if it cuts into those allotments. Even the paper manufacturers cannot take on any new clients. And to make matters worse, a lot of companies, including my company, are having our allotments pushed out as much as 6 months away! They are doing this to the smaller companies more so than the larger ones.

So, with the firearms manufacturers, not only are they probably going through the same issues, their demand has increased exponentially due to this administration and the increased violence and cutting back of policing. More people are buying firearms than ever before. This is taxing an already volatile situation. Being in production, you are now stressed out trying to meet even more stringent production demands. You are pushed to produce more with less waste and less mistakes. This leads to more mistakes, more quality issues and more waste. Now the companies are in a position to where their quality standards are having to be modified as far as what is and isn't acceptable. "Minor" imperfections that should be filed down, re-bead blasted, etc. are being re-classified as "acceptable", to be addressed by customer service at a later date. Companies have to do this to make any money, as the prices have gone up exponentially on top of the supply shortages/delays.

I apologize for the long post. This is just what I am not only witnessing, but experiencing personally in my daily workday in the industry. Will things get back to "normal"? I hope so. But for now, we kind of have to have a little more patience and understanding with the products we purchase, not including food safety of course. Never in my 30 plus years in manufacturing have I seen it like this.

I agree. It’s notable that customer support after the fact is important, however, frustrating to have to go through it.

 

[Philmo11]

Colt has been using plastic MSH’s for a long time.

I don’t have one yet. The one I ordered has been on backorder for a while.

 

[Bassbob]

Colt has been using plastic MSH’s for a long time.

True, but Colt also hasn't been manufacturing tier 1 1911s for a long time now.

 

[Annihilator]

Just to be clear, when I reference grit and roughness, they are different things in my mind. Manufacturing debris I consider grit. Lack of smooth surfaces after cleaning is roughness in the action. Field strip and clean is pretty normal procedure. Having to remove the trigger and sear isn’t normal. Those areas can usually be flushed with a spray in cleaner and oiled. Of the 80 or so handguns I’ve purchased in the last few years, the first Kimber Stainless II I bought is the only gun I had to go to that level.

As for the engraving on the bottom of the slide. I’m not going to pretend I’ve encountered every brand/model out there but I’ve had a few RIA, Citadels, couple Springfields, Kimber, S&W and MetroArms. None of them have engravings there. Not even the other Loaded. I can tell you that the end of the disconnector is pretty chewed already from the little action it’s seen.

You just stated it does exactly what I think it does.

I don’t know what you mean by the bottom of the rails. If you are referring to the bead blasted Kimber rails I referred to, I am not talking about the bottom of the rails, the entire slide rail, including the channel the rail rides in are bead blasted. It does make a difference when breaking it in because those two surfaces have to essentially sand each other down during breakin. Makes a lot more metal byproduct during the breakin, enough that it causes the gun to start having failures to feed after about 50 or so rounds. Extra oil and working the slide a few times will free it back up and function normally.

I am not going to get into a he said issues here, all mass produced guns will have some roughness and maybe, just maybe some small shavings, that’s quite normal in a mass produced gun, any manufacturer, I don’t dwell on small things like that, after break in, this goes away, I never tear down any of my 1911’s looking for this, I clean them, lube them and try to get them broken in, so in ending, I will comment no more, enjoy your guns, 1911’s can be addictive

 

[Philmo11]

Also understand guys, it seems like I’m nitpicking, because I am. With two manufacturers so very close in quality, nitpicking has to be done. I think both were high enough in quality to buy multiples of the same brand/model.