talking to shooter's apprentice

I'll let him tell it, but you guys would be amazed at his find today at the lgs, especially considering he's in Alaska!

May or may not have come home with 2 new 1911s, 20k LP primers, a case of 45 ACP and 2 8lb jugs of powder. It was a pretty good day. Primers ran me 60 bucks a prick and I got the powder for 10 per pound. Case of 45 ammo I got for about 30% off normal

Ok, finally got a chance to sit down and get some photos posted.

The Kimber is a Custom LW (Alloy frame) that is optics ready and also has a threaded barrel. Long story as to why I picked this one up, but I've got a 45 suppressor and wanted to be able to use it on a 1911. You will notice in the photo with the slide locked back that the suppressor is up tight against the full length guide rod. I don't know why kimber thought it was a good idea to put a full length guide rod on a suppressor ready gun, but I won't be able to use the gun with the suppressor until i swap it out to a GI style guide rod.








The second one I got on a whim because the owner was taking it out of the shipping box and I'm a sucker for alloy framed 1911s. This one is a current production Colt Night Commander (very limited runs every few years, usually about 250 per run). Really nice alloy framed commander with tritium night sights. I fit a Wilson combat ambi safety to it, and limited edition of not, its still just a colt commander in my eyes and I plan to carry and shoot it. I don't buy guns to stack on the shelf, I buy them to shoot. The checkered G10 grips on this gun are very aggressive which I like. Over all a pretty nice gun in my favorite 1911 configuration. Its hard to see in the photos, but the ambi safety is polished stainless and the rest of the parts are bead blasted, but I think it will all wear in and look ok. This gun is a series 80 and I will be doing a series 80 delete on it at some point.

Wow! The lgs owner must've found an old warehouse of powder & primers to sell them that cheap! Congrats on the new toys as well!

We figured the powder was from an estate. Both powders are unavailable for the last few years.

Playing with the suppressed 45 today. Not movie quiet by a long shot, but quiet enough to shoot without muffs and it’s a hell of a lot of fun to ring steel at 50 yards with the can.

I put about 200 rounds through each gun today. I had 1 malfunction from each one. Keep in mind the temp was hovering right around zero.

The Kimber was mostly shot suppressed and had 1 failure to lock back the slide on an empty mag with some older CCI blazer aluminum case ammo.

The colt had a failure to feed on the last round with a 8 round GI size mag, more of a failure to go into battery really. I don’t think the case went under the extractor properly. This was also with the Blazer ammo.

Both guns were ringing steel at 50 yards pretty rash, even the smaller 6x8” plates. The colt is the only one I shot for accuracy at closer ranges and it did decent, but not as good as my Ruger light weight commander, but I blame that on the sights and trigger.

Most of what I shot today was aluminum case ammo I got cheap. I did shoot some hand loads with 200gn SWC and some self defense HPs but hated to shoot too much of that in the foot deep snow where I wasn’t gonna get my brass back. I need to get the range plowed, but no longer have a plow truck and hate to pay to have it done.

Over all both guns are growing on me but I’m actually really impressed with the kimber.