80 series parts removal to 70 series ???

D

Dust Monkey

New member
I know it can be done. A small frame slot from brownells, removal of the 80 series parts. My question: the half cock on an 80 series hammer vs a 70 series hammer is a little different. For safety concerns, if I were to change a 80 to a 70, would I need to change out the hammer as well?

Thanks I'm advance.
 
80-70 series

Sir;
I usually change the sear and hammer in that conversion, and, of course, the firing pin safety.
That intermediate notch in you hammer isn't a "half-cock" notch - it's a safety notch so that if you "follow" your sear is caught there, many are just flats.
Harry B.
 
Please clarify for me the urge to dump the 80 series guts. I know that if you are trying to set up a very light target type trigger, it might complicate getting it nice and crisp, but for combat pistols, what is the drawback? Just one more thing to prevent a drop discharge IMO. If you had a prewar gun with the scarce firing pin block safety feature, would you take that out too? Or is that considered classic as compared to the 80 version? I have had a prewar gun with that feature and a current 80 series gun. Is it something like the S&W lock we all hate, some claims that it will mess up and jam?
 
Even though Series 80 is the most proven of the 1911 firing pin blocks, it still adds parts to the gun, and additional parts means less reliable function. The likelihood that a well-maintained 1911 will discharge if dropped is so close to zero, for a number of reasons, that compromising the gun's reliability for the hypothetical safety isn't a fair swap. That's the major reason people don't like it. I don't like it because it makes detail stripping a pain (actually, it's the reassembly that's a pain).
 
Well can anyone cite an instance where an 80 has not worked due to a firing pin safety malfunction, not due to improper assembly of the linkage, or is it theoretically that the added safety could maybe cause a problem like that? I don't think people are going in droves to have comparable internal safeties removed from Walthers, Berettas, Sigs, etc. to "improve reliabilty" although I do know about yanking the mag safety in HP's. There is a safety notch in the front of the 1911 hammer to engage a dropped hammer fall, is there not, and so is there on a Colt SAA. But no one seems to trust the safety notch all that much on a SAA, claiming it might shear off or be worn from use.
 
I worked for a shop that built a couple of hundred 5" and compguns based on the Series-80 system. The Series-80 guns all left the shop with the series-80gear, and had triggers appropriate for the task (competition or defensive use).

The ONLY time I ever saw an issue was when someone would attempt to "improve' on their trigger job by reducing the overtravel adjustment in the trigger, which would cause the S-80 plunger to get beat up.

I also knew a dedicated carrier who dropped his Series 70 gun on concrete in an encounter, causing a discharge when the gun landed on the muzzle. Kinda made me think.
 
The series 80 parts are really no big deal, a very nice trigger can easily be had with them.

HOWEVER if you don't want them, it does make the gun easier to work on, and the trade off is very minimal. Just how minimal the risk of a ND is the subject of a number of threads and has been done to death in my opinion.
 
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