Just a follow up: Cobb watched me shoot it and we've decided that I'm not causing the problem, nor are the mags. The slidestop is being contacted by both ball (230gr winchester white box) and hollowpoints (230gr Federal HST) using both the factory Colt 7 round magazines and the Wilson 8 rounders. Cobb also pointed out that the plunger tube is loose and needs to be staked properly.

I called Colt this morning and they said I should ship it to them, on my dime. If the problems turn out to be covered by warranty they'll reimburse shipping charges.

Turn around time is quoted to be at least 30 days.

sorry to hear about the wait time. in any event, having it fixed up and back in your hands will really be a great outcome. i haven't had the pleasure of meeing Cobb yet, but thanks for pitchin' in to help out. it really is great to see people in the community reaching out to lend a hand. some day i'll be a 1911 wiz, but this is still a work in progress.

keep us posted on results from colt please.

D

I think it'll be worth the wait to get it back 'fixed' properly....even if you have to eat the shipping charges.

A properly functioning 1911A1 is (to me), the best carry gun a guy could have/want. Of course, as a 1911A1 owner, my opinion might be a tad bit biased.

Kudos to Cobb for helping you out.

rudy, my offer still stands, I have a loner carry for you to use until your Commander comes back from Colt, just let me know.

But you will have to buy your own carry ammo.

If you'd like before you send it off, Staking the plunger tube is a 4 minute job. and relieving the inside nob of the slide stop is pretty easy, I have a couple that you can try as a swap and see if they stop the problem.

Granted I am in the cities, but perhaps meeting somewhere in the middle is possible.


If you wish to send it to colt, do so, rumor has it that they are turning things around faster than they say.

option three, and probably the best for you, buy Kuhnhausens book, order a action block and a staking tool (or make one, mine started out as a 1" open end wrench which I reground to the shape necessary.) and do the job yourself with guidance from those here There is less work and know how needed on this job than changing the oil in your car.

I have a friend who went to ahlmanns instead of sending his gun in for warranteed service. Ahlmanns did the work while he waited and the charge was less than it would have been to ship the gun to the manufacturer.

Aren't ALL of our attitudes biased when it comes to a fine sidearm?

Not to be biased myself of course.

The problem with the home gunsmithing is that the gun is only a month or so old. Any home gunsmithing and the problem isn't fixed or another problem is caused, Colt will most likely void his warranty, then what? If the gun was used, that is a different situation, but since the gun is new, I advised to send it in to Colt to get things fixed under the warranty to protect the warranty.

Ahlmans is a thought, but that is a whole nother story.

I talked to Scheels this morning about maybe shipping it back for me since I bought it there. It turns out that Scheels warrantys all of its guns for 1 year, the same length as the Colt warranty.

Since it's a new gun, I'd rather have warranty work be done on it. So, do you guys think I should send it to Colt, or does Scheels do good work?

Also, I'd like to thank all of you for the replies, and especially Cobb, you've all been extremely helpful. Thanks.

You could call ahlmans, for a while they were a factory authorised warranty center for lots of the manufacturers.


As far as voiding the warranty by doing some work on your own. Thats up to you, but i believe places have to honor warrantees no matter what. it goes back to Car dealers saying that if you did a oil change your self, you voided the warranty/ now it says the time of the warranty is the full time provided no alterations are done to the product.

I'm willing to bet you'll get it back faster from Scheels than Colt.

And thus, more time to put it through it's paces and get it back for more service if it needs it.

You'll also probably be able to talk directly to the guy fixing it.

We are not talking about gereral maintenance, changing the oil, fluids and filters in a car or cleaning and lubing on a gun, all general maintenance. We are talking about a modification that should be done by the dealer/factory because the gun is new and under warranty. I know you all mean well, but are you going to pay for the factory repairs or buy it off rudy if the factory says they know someone not authorized did work on it and now want to charge to fix it? OK, OK, maybe a little extreme, but wanna bet if it has happened or not?

Anyway, I would go with maybe the Scheels route, probably the cheapest and easiest. Do you even know if Scheels are going to do the work or just ship it back to the Colt factory? Maybe they will just ship it over to Ahlmans since I think they are still a Colt authorized repair depot, either way, is will hopefully get fixed right with minimal effort and cost.

The right thing to do is to make Colt fix it, but I sense some skepticism. Let me demonstrate how to prove it to yourself how important strong magazine springs are in a 1911. Chamber an empty pc of brass and with no magazine in pistol, manually eject it. Try it several times. Then with pistol pointing in a safe direction, try manually ejecting the spent case with a fully loaded magazine under it. Big difference, and your not even operating at the pressure and forces of live fire or the millisecond time constraints. Oh, by the way, that's a hot gun in your hand so be careful. In a Commander size gun I only get maybe 6 months of reliable use out of a set of Wilson magazines if I'm lucky and personally I can't tell by looking at them witch one is starting to weaken. I would end up changing springs in the whole set just to be safe. The lighter sprung guns aren't as sensitive to issue. Keep trying though, once you get it figured out you'll be smiling like a clam.