The 1911; she sings.

Since some jerk (whoops) jerk screwed up my travel plans, I had to cut the vacation a few days short. I returned Friday morning instead of Sunday evening. But with the new Buckmark and 10/22, I was more than happy to spend those two extra days at the range. Saturday was reserved for pushing paper plates all the way back to 50 feet at the local indoor, and seeing how small I could make the groups. I averaged 4" groups at that range, and look forward to making them smaller. I'm still getting the hang of the Buckmark, and I'm beginning to notice little things about my shooting. Like how I need the lane light on so I can clearly see the sights, and how the black sights on the white paper plate in front of the black backstop cause the light to bend weird. I enjoy shooting the paper plates for cheap, but I think I need more light to properly focus on the sights. Also of note was the fact that even at my current skill level, returning to the basics improves my shooting. Focusing on the front sight, target blurry, brain thinking "front sight front sight front sight" as the tip of my finger applies steady pressure to the trigger, resulting in a surprise break: always produces the best groups.

I was looking forward to Sunday when I could see how the Buckmark had improved my 1911 shooting.

Sunday was for expensive trigger time. Well, comparatively expensive. The 1911, S&W 442, and GP100 were loaded into the range bag along with two (sigh) boxes of ammo. (totaling $70 :|) The 442 was still giving me infrequent weak hammer strikes. I think I'm going to send it in considering it is still under 300 rounds new. (though it has been dry fired quite a bit) My GP100 shooting had a few cobwebs that disappeared after a few cylinders, then it was back to shooting clovers because that never gets old.

Then the 1911 came out to play, and I do so relish it when I have the ammo to invite her to the sock hop. I set the paper plate to 35 feet to start, and worked out some unexplained weirdness I was having with my grip. After a few magazines I sent the target back to 50 feet, and failed to produce improved groups. Then I remembered my Buckmark lessons, turned on the light, focused on the front sight, and steadied my trigger pressure. The result was better groups, and among them, the best 8-shot group I've shot with my 1911. After grinning at the perforated paper plate for a few seconds too long, I put it back in my range bag so I could post it in my closet. Nothing incredible, but I'm certainly going to post a picture of it.

No significant changes in the feel of my 1911 shooting to report. The feel is quite good, but no better than it was at last report. With all the recent talk about new exciting 1911s, I felt a bit infidelitous (new word!) eyeballing all the fancy 45 caliber JMB shrines. Do I need another 1911 now? Can I justify a target 1911 with some better sights? After this recent range visit, I realize I am quite satisfied with my GI45, and don't think I need bigger this or polished that to become a better shooter. The only issue is reliability, and since broken in, the only issue I've had is the occasional failure to feed, (Failure to battery, hardball round angled up into the chamber, but not completely fed. Fixed with a rap to the back of the slide) but without Wilson Combat mags (currently using Chip McCormick 8 rounders), I can't be sure it's not a magazine issue. Need to suck it up and buy at least one! This range trip of 100 rounds saw two of the aforementioned feeding malfunctions. These failures become accentuated after the feed ramp dirties up (WWB 45 gets it dirty fast). I'm reluctant to polish it to any degree because 1: it still feeds HP ammo well. 2: I don't have WC mags to test for mag malfunction. 3: it works pretty damn well right now. This "starters" 1911 has been preforming strongly, and has been improving my shooting ever since I bought it.

I refrained from getting a WC barrel and bushing because the stock barrel and bushing didn't have much slop, and because I knew I wasn't accurate enough to even be able to tell the difference! After the last range visit, I'm beginning to think I might almost be there.

Xavier was who I read for inspiration on my 1911 selection, and who's part selection I mimicked when I didn't know enough about 1911s to know one from the other. Even now I've hardly begun to scratch the surface of 1911 knowledge, but I know I trust Xavier's judgment. He also loves to revisit his selections, and I love rereading his thoughts.