Buying another 1911

R

rebs

New member
I have a 70 series colt gold cup and looking to add another 1911. I will use the new one for range firing and maybe occasion CC. What are your recommendations ?
Are Para USA' s or Rock Island Armory's a valid choice ? Maybe the Range Officer ?
 
RIs are good entry level guns and I think they have an excellent CS reputation. I've owned two.

All I know about Para is what I've read on the Internet.

The SA RO is a gun I've owned and certainly do recommend it, although, foe CC use the rear site is a little large with rather sharp corners.
 
Regarding concealed carry, have you considered something in the "commander" size, i.e. Colt, Ruger, Springfield. especially in 9 mm? Guns of that size, which are also light weights, shoot very well and are not unpleasant to shoot either.
 
Para's out of business, absorbed by Remington, but they never had a great reputation when they were making guns.
Rock Islands are a great value, but I consider them the "work truck" of 1911s, and wouldn't spend any money to change or upgrade.
I'd happily pay another couple of hundred to get a Range Officer, instead.
That said, the RO isn't much different from a Gold Cup; 5", all-steel .45, adjustable sight.
Maybe look into the Range Officer Compact, which is shorter, lighter, more of a carry, than range gun.
 
I Rock Island full size daily because it is a plain jane work horse pistol. I retired my more valuable 1911s from daily carry.
 
I have a RIA full size. I have never carried it, except deer hunting/woods gun a few times. I have abused it something horrible though (lots of 200gr XTPs at 1000 FPS+), and it still shoots and functions flawlessly.

For the price I paid, I would buy another.
 
I bought a RIA Tactical 1 (now known simply as the Rock) full size in 9mm as my first 1911 with the plan on upgrading to "better" 1911 later. When I got it the parkerized finished look good to me and it has performed flawlessly and it is very accurate. I no longer feel a need to buy a "better" 1911 and I will spend my money elsewhere. If you don't feel the need to impress anyone, why spend money needlessly.

I broke bad today and bought a Mossberg Blaze 47. It is a very and mostly polymer AK 47 looking 22 semi-auto rifle with a wood stock. It is a blast to shoot and is more fun than my Marlin 60, Henry lever action and Marlin 25MN.
 
I had a Para P13 (was an idiot and sold it) for over a decade and during that time it was my most reliable handgun. It ate everything I put in it and a lot of that was junk ammo, as my budget couldn't afford better. It had decent accuracy, maybe 5-6 inch groups at 25 yards. About half that at 15 yards. I always thought it was a good, reliable gun.

However, later, after I'd sold it, I heard many tales of woe about Paras in general. I guess I just got lucky.

As for R.I.A., I've never fired one, but I handled a few and came away impressed with how smooth the slide worked and how crisp the trigger broke. That GS had several models and all of them were the same in those aspects. As they had several makes of 1911s, I did a quick comparison and to my surprise found that the slide was smoother on the RI than a SA RO, a Colt 1991 S80, and a Ruger 1911. The same was true for the trigger break. There was a little more take up in the RI vs. the Colt, but if there was a difference in trigger break between those two I couldn't detect it.

Alas, none of the shooting ranges I frequent carry much in the way of 1911s, so I never got a chance to shoot an R.I. But I am curious now.

I do own a Ruger 1911 LW Commander and it's a pretty good work/CCW type gun. Accurate enough (2-3 inch groups at 10 yds), and so far has eaten four different makes of ammo and my reloads without issue. It has had a few FTFs and one stovepipe, but most of those FTFs were on my reloads which might be a tad too long, and I think the stovepipe was my fault. I'm planning on running at least 300 rds of store bought ammo through it to verify my theory.
 
It's not a .45....but I picked up a Roger 1911 LW Commander in 9mm back in August. Wonderful pistol, accurate and a joy at the range. No failures of any kind. Just for fun, I added some rosewood grips, but the original hard rubber checkered grips are both good looking and functional.

It's a fine pistol and the Commander size - 4.25 inch barrel as opposed to 5 inch barrel - along with the aluminum frame, makes it easy to handle, easy to shoot and potentially easy to carry.

Just my 2 cents. Good luck with your choice.
 
For the money buy another Colt. I happen to have a Gold Cup plus Government model -- pleased with two solid shooters. Terrific resale on Colt imo.

.02

David. :)
 
I like the older Kimbers a lot, I am not much of a fan of Para at all. I like the Rugers pretty well and the RO is another great choice.
 
I had a Para. Was a 1 shot pistol with ammo storage compartment in grip . 2 trips for warranty and sometimes became a 2 shot pistol with ammo storage compartment in grip

Get a Colt LTW Commander in 9mm :D
 
Para-Ord is out of biz, bought by Remington to resolve
their 1911/R51 issues.
On the upside, if you like the LDA platform,
they're available from SARCO for low $$
 
This is very confusing. There must have been two Para-Ordnance companies. I see all these complaints about Para pistols, yet over the past twenty years I have owned ten (I think) of them, and the only one that was ever a problem was the P13.45 I bought used and then found it had been subjected to Bubba's tender ministrations. Once I undid Bubba's handiwork, that one was also flawless.

CDNN has also been selling off Para pistols. If I had some disposable income, I wouldn't hesitate to buy a couple more. Of course, I wouldn't mind another Colt or three, either, and I heard that CDNN also has some Colts.
 
This is very confusing. There must have been two Para-Ordnance companies.
Click to expand...
Yeah, at one time it seemed just about every open class pistol was either a high capacity Para or a Caspian.
And they worked and worked and worked....
 
Citadel 1911's seem to be gaining a good reputation in the last year or so...some even come with some nice hogue grips. Might be worth checking out?
 
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