1911 Reliability Surprise!

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Doc M

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Ladies and Gents -

I hope this post might help those among us who, like myself, have experienced difficulties with their 1911 pistols.

I purchased a Kimber SIS Elite this fall, and haven't had a chance to shoot it until just the other day. So I loaded up a few boxes of CCI Blazer Brass, headed to the range, and was so excited to test out the 16 (not a typo, SIXTEEN) mags I had purchased over the past few months.

Well, it failed to chamber the first round. Gave it a tap from the rear, and it chambered - then BANG. BANG. Fail to chamber. Tap, no dice; rack, feed, BANG. FTC. And so forth.

Boy was I pissed.

So I thought, "alright, it's the mag." Changed mags, same problems. And again, and again, and again. Not a single mag ran this gun properly. These were Chip McCormick mags x 15 (2x8-rounders, the rest 10-round CMC powermags), plus the one factory 8-rounder that came with the gun.

I disassembled the gun, and checked it over well for any machining defects, burrs, etc. I bought another box of ammo, CCI aluminum-cased, and it fed great - for about 7 rounds, then it started FTCing again. Same hang-up every single time.

Well, I took it as a good training session for malfunction clearing... but on the whole, I was extremely disappointed - especially after buying what's supposed to be a high-end 1911 that won't put more than 3 or 4 rounds together without serious issues! I'm talking in the neighborhood of 50 malfunctions in 150 rounds, without exaggeration. The CCI Blazer aluminum was the best, but still terrible - imagine if this were a competition or a defensive situation?!

Noticing that the chamber was a bit rough, and that most of the mis-fed rounds had a "hang-up" mark on the case, due to the back end of the chamber, I went to work polishing it to a mirror shine; while I was at it, I throated the chamber a bit more aggressively and brought it up to snuff polish-wise... and that improved feeding (non-firing, just feeding by hand racking/releasing the slide) about 30%. I could now feed 6 or 7 rounds, most of the time... but I still wasn't satisfied. Well, I didn't want to take any more off the throat - worrying about a blowout, and knowing that the 1911 design doesn't need a retardedly generous throat to run well.

So I did some more reading, Jerry Kuhnhausen's great shop manual for the 1911, and it dawned on me that the extractor could be the culprit. I rounded it as per directions in Kuhnhausen's manual and this link/image from the page:

http://www.brazoscustom.com/magart/ejection%20perfection.htm
ejection1.gif


Turns out that Kimber DOES chamfer the bottom end of their extractor GROOVE, but hadn't rounded the CLAW on mine at all! A quick chamfer and slight rounding of the claw's edges, combined with a mirror polish... well, that SIS just hums along fine right now - as far as manual chambering goes, anyway. I can nurse the slide forward at a snail's pace and she still feeds just fine... whereas before, I had to slam it forward full-force just to get into battery!

I haven't been able to shoot it live-fire yet, with the ranges being closed for Christmas, but I wanted to post this for anyone looking to increase the reliability of their 1911. DON'T OVERLOOK YOUR EXTRACTOR! I know guys like Gunnar at ARMCO will be laughing at me for not realizing this straight-off, but I'm an HK and Beretta guy up until this 1911 purchase - external, spring/pivot extractors are what I'm used to... I'm just glad I realized my mistake before I went and ruined a barrel (or worse!) by over-throating etc.

On the PLUS side, when it DID shoot, this gun was a KEEPER. Most accurate pistol I have by far, and the 1911 weight makes it so controllable... I know we'll get along just fine after this, but what a rocky start to our relationship! She's gonna make it up to me after Christmas though, I'll tell ya what - no more sass-back! :D

-M
 
Inexcusable and unacceptable on such an expensive firearm. It seems to be a trend with US manufacturers lately. Probably letting quality slide as they rack up the $$$ meeting demand.

I'd be sending them a "WTF!!!" email followed up by a !!@##$%^&!!! letter.

Good advice on the extractor. Thanks.
 
I purchased a new 1911 Colt Gov't series 70 repro awhile back, that while cycles okey sends a good grouping of brass back into the forehead.
I believe it to be the extractor also. I'm going to try the tension test with a dummy round under it, with the slide removed from the frame & proceed from there. Rounding/stoning/polishing the claw might be in order as well...
Should be fairly easy to rectify,...I hope!:popCorn:

One would expect a gun that comes from the custom shop from any manufacturer to work properly,.....some don't! :slap:
 
Stevo said:
So, how expensive was this "premium quality" 1911 wouldn't run?
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About $1,400 all-in. Enough that I was some kinda pissed off that I had to "tune" it by hand... but now that all's said and done, I'm glad it's a shooter - and it's a lesson learned the hard way.

-M
 
CenturionX said:
Inexcusable and unacceptable on such an expensive firearm. It seems to be a trend with US manufacturers lately. Probably letting quality slide as they rack up the $$$ meeting demand.

I'd be sending them a "WTF!!!" email followed up by a !!@##$%^&!!! letter.

Good advice on the extractor. Thanks.
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Agreed 100%, Centurion.

I'm taking my time drafting a proper letter, but rest assured I'll be sending it to Kimber America and letting them know how far their QC has gone down-hill. When you buy ANY firearm, you expect that it will WORK out of the box... a 30%+ failure rate is absolutely inexcusable, even in the much-maligned but quite dependable Norinco 1911's - let alone a "supposedly" high-end Kimber fighting pistol!

-M
 
TDC said:
I thought 1911's especially high end ones were 100% reliable out of the box????

TDC
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So did I... until now! Some guys have told me "just break 'er in, she'll run fine." Well, even after 150 rounds it was still basically an expensive paperweight - so I figured I'd get to work with the abrasives and take care of business!

I can understand that it might mis-feed 1 in 100 or be a bit "sticky" going into battery until the very precisely-fitted (which this one is, REALLY tight bushing - which I like, and which shows in the accuracy) parts wear in... things like locking lugs on the upper barrel, the bushing and the barrel doing a final "lap" under pressure, etc. But MAN, 30%+ mis-feeds are just a gross lack of quality control.

But like I said, with a throating job I would have probably done eventually anyway, and with literally 10 minutes using the Dremel and a rubber fine-abrasive tip/felt bobs with polishing rouge... well, I hope that's the end of the misfeeds.

-M
 
Most of the more expensive 1911's that I have been able to fire have functioned flawlessly. But every gun maker produces a "lemon", less often with expensive or custom 1911's. My base Norinco has never malfunctioned and I did not have to use Chip McCormick mags. Enjoy the Kimber, they are a fine firearm. Sorry to hear that yours had problems, nice to hear that they are rectified. Cheers.
 
Kimber SIS Elite, If i'm not mistaken, I think these are the ones issued to LAPD's Special Investigation. Supposedly one of the best 1911s.
 
Doc M, I've got a Kimber TLE/RL and have to say it's my favorite North American pistol. I'm glad you got yours up and running, but should you ever need to use Kimber's warranty services they will always make things right (and then some). That was my experience when mine needed a bit of tweaking. My issue was also with the extractor, but they also replaced the 4 year old night sights for nothing while it was there.
 
Sounds like an honest mistake by the maker to me.

Like cars, computers, TV's etc., every now and then you get a lemon, or something that needs some "adjustments" to make it work the way it was designed to.

I'd let Kimber know that something slipped through their QA process and that you had to fix it. Maybe they'll do something nice for you - like send you some t-shirts, spare parts, mags?
 
Owned a Kimber Pro TLE stainless, I bought used that jammed all the time. I returned the slide to Kimber and it came back perfect.

I bought a Kimber TLE new and it would jam once every 50 rounds. I returned the slide and it came back jamming constantly. Sent it to Gunnar at Armco and he fixed it.

Bought a new Les Baer Premier new and it took 700 rounds, the removal of the recoil bumper and the purchase of 5 new magazines to make it work properly.

I bought a new STI Edge that could not get through a magazine without jamming. I returned it to Armco, Gunnar fixed it and it has not jammed since.

The only 1911 I have owned that worked out of the box is my COLT Special Combat, which doesn't know what a FTF is. It is also the only 1911 I've owned that does not need a bushing wrench, with the bushing easily removed with just my fingers. That makes cleaning a breeze.
 
buddy1911 said:
Kimber SIS Elite, If i'm not mistaken, I think these are the ones issued to LAPD's Special Investigation. Supposedly one of the best 1911s.
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Yes, you're absolutely correct - the condition of Kimber producing the SIS for the LAPD's SIS squadron is that they could use the design exactly as-is for a retail pistol. If anyone here hasn't handled one of them, just pick one up and you'll see it's a pistol meant for business and not flash. And, now that it runs, I believe it will make a fine addition to my handgun "family."

I agree with shredder above; this is just an honest mistake I'm sure. People who say it just needs to "work in" are probably experiencing a relaxation of an overly tense extractor... well, I figured I'd go with the smoothing route rather than the re-bending/un-bending route and it seems to have worked for now (again, pending live fire).

I'll probably send a friendly email to Kimber letting them know I love everything about the pistol except the extractor work; detailing my problems etc. as above... and as shredder mentioned above, maybe they'll send me some logo gear by way of compensation for my hassles and for updating their quality control logs. :D

(Hey, a guy can hope... :p )

-M
 
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