WHAAAT!?! Colt is no longer?

Colt makes the Python and Anaconcda in batches. A Colt CSR reportedly told someone on another forum they plan to make another batch in 2005.

Colt's current 1911s are indeed made of superior materials, which is why they're so popular among pistolsmiths as a base gun. They also contain the fewest MIM parts of any mass market 1911. This is one reason they are perceived to be more expensive. Many 1911 fans, including me, believe the current Colts are about as good as they've ever made. Virtually all the complaints about Colts at the 1911 forum BTW is about cosmetics.

Colt handguns are backordered across the board. Dealers here in Houston, for example, can't obtain new Colts. This seems to be the case around the country. The reason for this is a mystery.
 
as to the conversation between AUG and Sammunition.44mag, im afraid ive heard much of the same... my father served in the vietnam war... special forces green beret 2 tours... he was on the 60 most of the time but had the 16 for a back up... the 60 was sweet and 99% reliable, of course nothing is totally reliable, but his experience is much like Sammunition.44mag explained it, you had to keep it clean, and basically it was a POS as for the AR15 i can vouch to say ive fired this weapon and it seems to be much more reliable... it is indeed a nice toy to play with =) i only put approx 200 rounds thru it and my father probably well over a thousand with no problems at all... perhaps theres some difference in design... how could it vary so much from the 16 to the AR15... as the AR15 is just a shortened 16 to my understanding... there must be more variation than that tho....

as far as this rumor about Colt going out of business... im willing to bet that its nothing more than a marketing technique.
 
M16/AR15 history

If I remember my facts correctly from a Colt history book and a History Channel special, here is the story on these rifles.
The M16 was designed by Fairchild Industries, an aviation firm. They were never a favorite of the military industrial complex. (If I remember correctly, another product of theirs is the A6 warthog, hated for being slow, and also for going outside the usual supply chain to create a relatively inexpensive aircraft. To bad its been so damned effective.) Fairchild was not in a position to manufacture the weapon, and it was controversial from day one due to the use of unusual and modern materials. Colt purchased the rights to the weapon, and in a surprise, won a competition against other arms manufacturers to replace the M1. (Reason for winning were varied, lighter weight, reduced recoil, far better accuracy, more ammunition can be carried for the same weight.) As originally created, it had a chromed bore and chamber, and used expensive powder (I think flake?) in the ammunition. Robert McNamara, wanting to cut costs, requested it be produced without the chrome parts, and switched the ammo to cheaper ball powder. The combination of aluminum parts that were not lined with harder chrome, and very dirty ball powder in a gun that depends on combustion gasses to operate was a disaster.
Modern versions have corrected these errors, and a few others, and by most accounts have produced a very dependable weapon.
Your opinion may vary.
Colt's odds of winning the new rifle contract do not appear to be good. By most accounts, Heckler and Koch is producing the favored weapon. There are strong rumors, however, that Colt will acquire, at the very least, H&K's U.S. operations.
Mike
 
I was surprised to find this thread. I thought Colt dumped all its DA revolvers 5 years ago. Did they come back into production?
 
M16 furor

Okay, Gents - I'm wading in on this one, having spent 13 months in Vietnam (69-70) at the An Hoa and LZ Baldy vacation spa's. Yeah, the M16 WAS the biggest P.O.S. going. It WOULD jam repeatedly when dirty... more often than the M14 did when coated with the same amount of crud. Troopies just weren't used to having to clean the thing as often or well as was actually required for positive operation of the weapon. Remedial classes in the field on weapons cleaning and correct cleaning gear helped. The chrome lined barrel was developed as an effort to resolve this problem, as well as an effort at curing the problem of the barrel overheating from continuous fire during firefights (as was the "heat dissipating" chrome insert to the handguard). Further, while the M14 had the gas piston to play with, which yes, would get fouled up by carbon under heavy and sustained auto/semi auto fire, the M16's little piston rings in the bolt would constantly align themselves and cause the touted M16 accuracy to go to ****. Troopies would have to break the bolt down and realign the rings in the field, often losing that damned cotter pin. You guys who have fired that puppy for a living know what I mean. That remained a problem with the M16A1 also. Further, that light assed round would deflect off of damn near anything. That is why they finally got off their butts and came out with the M16A2, with the heavier barrel, heavier round, 3 round burst selector v.s. full auto, etc. These new features improved the weapon way beyond the item we grunts had in our hands while "in country." Believe me, it was a sorry day when they took away our 7.62mm M14's and issued us the M16. WITHOUT proper cleaning gear and info.

IMO, having seen most of these improvements to the M16 service rifle during my 14 years in the regular service, (plus 2 in the reserves), the M16A2 is an ideal weapon for guarding flight lines or rear supply areas, where a pistol is not authorized or desired. HOWEVER. The M16, in any current form, cannot compete with the long distance knockdown power and accuracy of the heavier 7.62mm. The street and house fighting being done in Iraq today requires something that will PENETRATE and REACH OUT to touch someone, when such critters are beyond the 5.56mm's close fighting characteristics. And yeah, I qualified Expert with the M16(xx) at 200, 300 and 500 yards/meters every year (7x) until I went to the pistol as my issue weapon. But with all the civilians in the world praising the M16(xx), it still does not make that dog hunt...especially when there are better weapons available to use for the designated purpose. :)
 
Opinions have been many and varied as to the dialog on the M16. One thing I did notice, however...nobody that has written in has said anything about the "forward assist" feature on the rifle. Its the "funny uncle" nobody wants to discuss. Wonder why? ;)
 
Ol' Thunder said:
The M16, in any current form, cannot compete with the long distance knockdown power and accuracy of the heavier 7.62mm. The street and house fighting being done in Iraq today requires something that will PENETRATE and REACH OUT to touch someone, when such critters are beyond the 5.56mm's close fighting characteristics.
Click to expand...

Huh?

Nobody disputes that the 7.62 has more knockdown power than a M16.

Why would you need more penetration and "reach out" capability when fighting in close mostly urban areas?

Granted my training is not of the military nature but I can think of many weapons better suited to urban combat than a 7.62 rifle the size of a M14.

I have some experience and training in a urban/residential setting and I can't imagine where a full size battle rifle would be suitable as a general purpose weapon.
 
Sammunition.44mag said:
Opinions have been many and varied as to the dialog on the M16. One thing I did notice, however...nobody that has written in has said anything about the "forward assist" feature on the rifle. Its the "funny uncle" nobody wants to discuss. Wonder why?
Click to expand...

I didn't say anything about it because I have never had to use it. :p
 
This kind of reminds me of how my dad puts down the 1911 pistol.

My dad served 66-70 and was started on the M14 and then transitioned to the M16 after he was deployed. His stance on the rifle issue was that the M14's were fine weapons. He said they did malfunction rarely. He said he was tickled to have the M16 because it was so much lighter. He also said his worked ok.

The thing I find funny is the fact that he bit c h es and nags about the 1911 just like you guys go on about the M16. He claims that guys would do anything to get a revolver instead of the 1911 when he was in the Army.

I showed my dad a Wison Combat 1911 one time and he said "nice gun, if they worked they would be great". Without ever shooting the gun he declared it unreliable.

I think it is safe to say that the guns in the military are sometimes kept in service longer than they should be and I have a sneaking feeling that common armorers in the military are not exactly the best at what they do compared to those in the civillian sector.

There has got to be a explaination why SWAT teams all over the USA and AR enthusiasts don't see the same problems you guys describe. I can see the sand in Iraq causing a problem with any gun but there are guys who shoot AR's thousands of rounds at a time without cleaning (just re-oiling) that don't have problems.
 
AUG...so the forward assist is on there "just in case" eh?

I would absolutely agree with the above...if someone were criticizing a gun and/or declaring it unreliable when they havent even fired it, much less carried and used it on a regular basis, I would say that person didnt have a clue. I was merely speaking from my own experiences and the input of other soldiers I knew back in the day in regards to the M16A1 and the M16A2( I carried and used both and qualified 35 out of 40, one target shy of expert ). Admittedly, Eugene Stoner was a visionary and a genius! The use of synthetics and light weight aluminum was ahead of its time. Having said that, when the M16 made its debut in Vietnam, there existed better rifles with which to equip our troops, and IMO this still holds true today. When you are talking about the lives of service members depending on a gun's performance, there is simply no room for politics or lobby influenced decision making. Not alot of politicians or lobbyist doing the low crawl and getting their butts shot off on the battlefield. So, what about the FAL, which had the added advantage of being a full powered battle rifle? Why did we not, for example, take the AK design and adopt it for use by our own troops? It was and is a superior assault rifle. Well, I'll tell you...we didnt adopt it because it was designed by some genius in the U.S.S.R., thats why. Forget about the fact that its cheaper to manufacture. Nevermind that its a better, more durable, vastly more reliable weapon. Who cares that we couldve used the ammunition in the enemie's ammo dumps. How about parts interchangability with captured enemy weapons? What about the tactical advantages of not being able to detect the presence of our guys by the sound their weapons make when fired? Why give any weight to such issues? After all, its only the lives of lower enlisted men that we are talking about for the most part. Ever has it been so. :(

BTW, my personal rifle is a MAK90, and I drive a Toyota truck (for some of the same reasons) :cool:
 
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Colt Rumors & Snubbie DAs

Something that has bothered me is that Colt would seem to have a good market for it's now discontinued revolvers and semi-autos. The number of "shall-issue" states is quite large and people are still buying small 2" .38 or .357 revolvers.

Why doesn't Colt start producing their excellent Detective Special and the Cobra/Agent snubbies again? I'd love to see a Cobra/Agent in .32H&R Mag. :D

At one time, briefly in the 80s, Colt produced an alloy framed 4" verson of the Detective Special named the Viper. Lovely gun and would be a great carry gun with a 3" barrel. And let's not forget the Diamondback .38 that was the little brother of the Python.

Colt's .380 Mustang is a great little gun and a perfect light carry gun too. Goes just about anywhere in the Mustang Plus II version. :cool: I'm betting that they could make a "pocket 9mm" not much bigger than the .380 if they wanted to try.
 
Why would you need more penetration and "reach out" capability when fighting in close mostly urban areas?
Mainly because a "general purpose rifle" needs to be pretty good at both.

The cry and whine of the M-16 lovers/haters seems to be alive and well. So far as reliability goes, I'd bet more malfunctions are caused by bad magazines than anything else. We learned from the guys who had been in country a while that you keep the chamber and bolt clean and not to worry so much about the barrel. Seemed to be good advice, as I never experienced a malfunction not related to a mag. The closest I ever came to operating one in the desert was at Ft Bliss, but I think the sand in Iraq might be more trouble. Never been to Iraq, but if its anything like the sand in Saudi, what a testing ground!

My only issue with the M16A2 is weight. The 16 and 16A1 were touted as being so much lighter, and now the A2 weighs nearly as much as the M-14 it replaced.

I can remember relatives who served in WWII talk about the M-1 Carbine and how handy it was. Lots of troops tried to get their hands on one until it came time to use it. That Garand was lookin mighty sweet then, at least according to a cousin who was a combat engineer from Guadalcanal to Okinawa.

I do get a bit tired of the Colt rumors, especially when they come out of the gunshops-a salesman in Rays Gunshop tried to steer me off a commander I was lookin at to a Kimber, saying "Colt is down the tubes-you won't get any warranty work if you buy a Pony". I thanked him kindly for his advice and have not been back since. Have bought a few Series 80's since then, and thankfully have not had to have any warranty work done on them. The dimpled feed ramp on the barrel seems tailor made for hard to feed semi-wadcutters, and my Gold Cup Trophy (Eliason sight blued) has never failed to feed, fire or eject. Not once. Totally stock parts, right down to the mags. My ORM commander and government model the same.

I'd really like Colt to bring back its revolver line to full production-I'm not going to fork out custom shop money for one of their six-guns, although they are probably worth it to some. A fried had a King Cobra a few years back-nice shooter, and cries about selling it!
 
Penetrate and "Reach out & Touch someone"

:D Thank you, David! I had to go to work and didn't get a chance to answer Aug. The general purpose battle rifle has GOT to do both to be effective. And I agree with you about the magazines.
 
Colt does use MIM parts on the internals. Not very many though. There's a list in the Colt forum on 1911forum.com .

I think it's about 6 parts total. Colt was using a MIM extractor for a short while, but stopped using them when they had so many breakage problems. The new Series 80's are nice for the money. There's a few parts I prefer to change in them though.
 
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Nevermind that its a better, more durable, vastly more reliable weapon.

And I WANT my weapon to sound different than the enemies, thank you. There are going to be times when troops are going to shoot at sound, and I do not want to sound like THEM at all. And please do something about the selector on the AK-my kid could hear it while he is listening to Eminem on his headphones.

No doubt the AK has its followers, but I don't think that either the AK or the AR is a true general purpose rifle.
Any rifle we issue to the troops has to be by definition a compromise. A rifle like an AK, which is very suitable for close combat is going to be a hindrence at long range. If you are getting such fantastic accuracy out of your own, you might try competing at Camp Perry with it and show these people whats what.

Fact is, we might be in a long range contest with the enemy, such as afghanistan where the AK does not do so well. We could very well be in the jungle in he next fight-if you guess and go too far one way or the other from center, you got the wrong stick in your hands.

I don't think the AR really got a fair shake at the start anyway. It was not run through normal channels, i.e., the Infantry center at Benning, where people who know would have taken their time and wrung the thing out. They would have learned its not a "self cleaning" action as the troops were told, and they would have also learned that substituting ball powder, while giving a higher velocity for the same pressure, burns dirty.

I would bet the farm that if we had that much trouble with the M-1 Garand on initial issue that some would be yelling about it to this day. Understand that the M-1 action was developed over a period of a few decades-subject to government meddling, while the AR action was barely out of the prototype stage in comparison, and was shoved down our throats by a pencil pusher.

I think the AR is an okay rifle, but certainly not the ideal, and certainly was not a mature design. In order to get some range out of it, they went to a heavier bullet that, while it does get better range, the terminal ballistics are not as good as the old 55 grain M198.

I'd guess the ideal for general purpose would be in the neighborhood of 6-7MM in an intermediate sized case. It would need enough velocity to reliably kill out to 700 yards-meaning about 2700-2800 fps., and a shape allowing the bullet to retain energy sufficient to penetrate an issue helmet.

Barring some modern day John Browning to come up with a completely different action, a gas piston in a cylinder, plus an action designed to keep as much crud out as possible would be necessary. Could an AR action be redesigned to do this? Probably. Could better magazines be procured for our troops? Absolutely. Should better rifle marksmanship be taught to our troops? That should not even be a question any of us should have to ask. The absolute minimum should be what the Marines get now, and preferably better/more of.
 
But David...

What about the FAL or some other full power battle rifle? It can be had in shortened versions, fires a heavier hitter with legs long enough to "reach out and touch someone". That sounds like a good compromise to me. :)

And still nobody mentions that forward assist. As I said, its the "funny uncle" nobody likes to talk about. Aug said he didnt mention it because he never had to use it. Thats some pretty fuzzy logic, partner! I guess if the rifle is so good, it doesnt need that dubious feature and it should therefore be eliminated from the rifle's design. :rolleyes:
 
As to the forward assist, I never personally had to use it, but I understand why it is there. Simple stuff really-the charging handle has no connection to the bolt other than to pull it back, so if the chamber is dirty or you have a slightly bent case, you can force the round to seat in the chamber and spin the bolt head far enough to lock and fire. No big thing to me, and having it does not indicate to me an inherent design flaw. On other rifles, the "forward assist" is banging on the charging handle with your fist. With the AR handle where it is, I'd be a bit disturbed by having that handle flying out into my dental work every time I fired-a direct connect to the bolt is not a good thing.

The FAL is a pretty nice design too, but the opening cut for the charging handle is pretty long and uncovered, which means sand in the action. From what I have been told by the people who used them, plus sand cuts in the bolt were not so effective, and actually trapped more crud. I suppose you could design a cover for the charger handle, but the AR clears that issue with the way their charging handle is designed into the receiver. Much better than the original with the charging handle inside the carry handle.
 
M16 Forward Assist

Okay! Okay! The forward assist is (usually) rarely used but it IS a good idea on the military version of the AR. Over the years at the range, I've had to use it only on a couple of occasions, mostly when shooting the rapid fire part of the requal course if I remember correctly...its been 20 (damn!) years since I left the service...sigh.

When chambering a new round from a magazine there's a particularly good feeling when that bolt slams home after pressing the bolt release, but on occasion the round being stripped from the magazine simply did not feed into the chamber for whatever reason. (Probably something I didn't do which caused the malfunction). And at the time, a quick jab at the forward assist "pushed" the round in far enough into the chamber for normal operation. This immediate action allowed me to quickly obtain my sight picture and fire the round downrange without losing too much time from the time available to me during that course of fire. Soooooo, in that respect, its a good idea.

In country, I carried the M16 until I got rid of it and started carrying my shotgun. Then my T/O weapons were the shotgun and the 45 pistol. And on a slightly humorous side note, after I got back from being medevac'ed and started my new career driving a jeep on convoys to Da Nang, a buddy(?) of mine who was known for practical jokes "loaned" me a M3 "grease gun" to carry instead of my shotgun while driving. He was the Battalion armorer. The only problem with THAT ol' lead hose was the sear was worn and after a couple of short bursts would suddenly empty the magazine before ceasing fire! No problem with constipation when that happened! :o . I got rid of that thing and went back to the shotgun for the remainder of my tour. (I DID get even. Heh! Heh!)

My issue 45 served me well all through my tour, even if it did rattle when you'd shake it, and later in life when I became a police officer, I carried a 45 Colt Combat Commander when given the option. I've carried police issue 38 revolvers due to department regs, shot and would have felt better armed with a 357 revolver, but had to make do. Later of course, moving to another department, I was able to carry my 45 Colt. Through it all, I have felt best armed with the 45. (With my 380 Govt Mdl as last ditch backup). :D
 
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