Tuning the 1911

by JLF , Monday, January 09, 2012, 21:08 (4650 days ago)

Sarge's thread about his R.I. brought back a memory.(That happens a lot anymore) Whenever it might have been, the AMT Hardballer came out as the first affordable stainless 1911. Of course, I took the rent money and the grocery money and the any-other money and snagged one of the first to show up, serial # 000540, if I remember correctly. My pistol-for-life, oh happy day!(that should sound familiar)

My first clue was simply working the slide. The gun felt full of sand. Oh well, it was sand-cast! bada-bump... The first shooting trip to El Rancho De Powell revealed a pistol that would not feed a full mag of fresh hardball without numerous malfs.

Thus began a process of many months. I polished all the rough-cast slide and frame rails, then tightened them up a bit, something AMT apparently felt unneccesary. The gun ran *much* better, but hardly flawless. So I would go home, and perform another trick, then go shoot, and watch the gun improve. Over months of trial and error,I reached the point where hardball was flawless, many trouble free rounds. Then I switched to SWC handloads, and started over with still more tricks. At some magic point, the gun seemed to come into it's own, like an engine sounds when you finally get the carburetor dialed in just right. By then I had learned, and tried more tricks than I had ever imagined on tuning 1911s. We had no "drop-in" custom parts with the work already done. You young waddies have no idea what glorious gun times you live in.

I had the Hardballer many years, it always was accurate, but when my Dad came to shoot one day, he looked at his groups and confiscated it on the spot. It ran many rounds, and never missed another lick. Funny thing, it never was worth more on the market than any other Hardballer, maybe $350 back in their best days. It eventually went on down the road, but I have been applying all that I learned on that gun ever since, and necessity dictated that I learn a *lot*

JLF