The 1911 design suffers from being too popular

by anachronism, Tuesday, August 14, 2012, 20:10 (4485 days ago) @ Rob Leahy

When demand was high, but the 1911s only had a few manufacturers, quality was good. Then came IPSC, and everybody had to have a 1911, and a predictable thing happened. More companies started making them. Some of them shouldn't have tried it, because they gave the marque a bad reputation. It didn't matter, they were churning out 1911s at a frenetic pace. The more, the better. It didn't matter if they were crap, they were cheap, and they were available. Colt had a lengthy backorder on the desirable models. Then the higher line manufacturers were losing sales, so they relaxed quality on some models to increase manufacturing capacity, and lower manufacturing costs. Think of the poorly finished "1991A1" Colts for example. Everybody was sending them to gunsmiths for custom work anyway, let them sort it out. Them there was the ammunition revolution. New Super-Duper manstopper bullets were developed, often with bullet designs outside the 1911s design parameters. More work for the gunsmiths, and less effort for some manufacturers. And the 1911 became what Hackathorn called "King of the feedway stoppages". All true, and all of it because of the 1911s success. Still, I've had 9 different Glocks now, and 3 Springfield XDs. The plastic guns got no soul, no sign of life. I can't warm to their cold, unromantic design. I have several 1911s, and never hesitate to help when I see one that needs a good home.