Works Great At -45 Celsius On Colt 1911A1
ALWAYS have a tube of graphite in your pistol kit.
As above, during an IPSC Level I Match in February 2003 at the Lakehead, I found that my 1911A1 Colt 45 loaded with commercial FMJ would not cycle at its normal rate. The temperature was -30 Celsius with a gusting wind of 20 to 30mph. The "wind chill" was in the -50Celsius range eh!
I shot the match with my parka on the whole time using a stock GI Rig full flap holster on a web belt with its five mag pouches. I used fine cotton gloves inside my regular ski gloves.
For the match I lubed my pistol with breakfree lube; on the first stage the pistol would fire and cycle BUT you could watch the slide go back and forth with an 18 lb or so recoil spring installed.
Slide fit seemed very tight after wearing my holstered pistol standing outside around a windy firebarrel at -30 Celsius for 30 mins waiting for the OUTDOOR IPSC Match to start.
After the first stage with my "slow motion Colt" I went to the safety table after taking off all my ammo and disassembled my Colt 1911 Govt, wiped off the breakfree lub and used graphite to re-lube it.
In the subsequent fiive stages, the pistol functionned flawlessly. My best performance was a two shot stage on a single target at 7 metres. I was able to,on the beep, draw and fire two shots from a full flap US GI type holster in 1.45 secs total time and get one Alpha and a Charley eh!
Have some graphite as an ace in the hole. Use it on a pistol in REALLY cold weather..when "even steel shrinks"...
