what pistols did the 1911 and beretta 92 compete against?

The Beretta became the M9. The Sig P226 tied with Berreta and while the per unit cost was lower than the M9 Sig could not match or beat the overall deal for spare parts, maintenance, etc. However the P226 was too good to be let go so it was soon after also adopted for use by the U.S. military and designated the M11. Initially is was used by the Navy, particularly the SEALS. But became dispersed through the Coast Guard, Air Force and in a number of special forces groups.

The Sig P228 is also in use by the SEALS.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIG_Sauer_P226

http://navyseals.com/weapons-demo/m11/

tipoc
 
I seem to remember the P228 being adopted by Army C.I.D. as a plain clothes/ concealement gun.

This, after hyping the 1911 replacement winner as the "be all, do all, we really don't need anything else" sidearm. Well, that lasted for a few months.
 
While I agree, the 1911 didn't need to be changed, I disagree that the military didn't have to replace the ones on hand.
Everytime I got to shoot one it was horrible. now it may just have been luck of the draw, but it put me off 1911's for years afterwards.

It is funny, but I interviewed at one of the places that did the endurance type tests on the m9. Way after it was already selected. They issued them to the CG before we got any on our ship, but it was already selected.

Anyway, they told me about the days they went shooting. I thought it would be a lot of fun, but they basically said it sucked.
I guess you do anything fun long enough and it isn't fun anymore.

They would spend all morning loading mags. One giant box of empty mags on one pallet and they would load mags by hand and dump them into another box on a pallet.
They would drag them both to the range and just empty the guns down range.
no aiming, no accuracy tests, just keep pulling the trigger till it was empty and load and do it again.
If it jammed, or had some other malfunction they logged it but that is what they did.
At first they would try to shoot stuff. cut a log in half and stuff like that, but it was taking too long to get to the required round count screwing around like that.
I didn't take the job, even though they were testing a 5 inch gun sight. doesn't focus till 1 mile out. lol.
 
Hi, KyJim,

I think we are trying to say the same thing, that "1911" alone is not any sort of official nomenclature, and calling any pistol that even resembles the former service pistol a "1911" is not really correct. As for the Army's full nomenclature, I think the latest standard nomenclature list shows "Pistol, Automatic, Caliber .45, M1911 and M1911A1."

Jim
 
tipoc said:
The Beretta became the M9. The Sig P226 tied with Berreta and while the per unit cost was lower than the M9 Sig could not match or beat the overall deal for spare parts, maintenance, etc. However the P226 was too good to be let go so it was soon after also adopted for use by the U.S. military and designated the M11. Initially is was used by the Navy, particularly the SEALS. But became dispersed through the Coast Guard, Air Force and in a number of special forces groups.

The Sig P228 is also in use by the SEALS.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIG_Sauer_P226

http://navyseals.com/weapons-demo/m11/

tipoc
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SIG 228 = M11. SIG 226 has another designation, IIRC.
 
"The only pistol that made it to the finals with what became the Colt M1911 was the Savage M1907."

The Savage model 1907 was the pocket pistol in .32 and (later) .380. AFAIK, the .45 pistol submitted for the Army tests had no company model designation. It has been written that the Savage M1907 was "scaled up" to .45 caliber for those tests, but the reverse is the case. Savage submitted the .45 Searle pistol to the 1907 tests, in which it did quite well. After those tests were over, with no decision made, Savage decided to scale the pistol down to compete on the commercial market with Colt's highly successful Pocket Model .32.

Savage did not, however, give up on the idea of a military contract and continued to submit improved models until the Colt pistol was finally chosen.

Jim
 
I didn't know savage made handguns:eek:

I saw a video called" tales of the gun-automatic pistols" on YouTube and there was a luger in 45 made for testing but didnt make. Sadly only two were ever made.
 
Gov' model/Beretta/Sig

GRIF:
Ruger threw their hat in the ring with a version of the P85/89, I believe, But the whole thing was political and already decided upon before all the facts and final testing results were in.
The 9MM decision was for aligning with NATO (European) ammo sources and arms chamberings.

I think the DA version of the .45 with a FP or TFP bullet 200-230gr would have been a sufficient, if not ideal, combo with which to contend.... But for the [9MM]/NATO BS.
But...Whom am I to question the [infinite?] wisdom of those in charge?

WILL.
D@MN, I hate it when I'm off my meds.
 
Savage did not, however, give up on the idea of a military contract and continued to submit improved models until the Colt pistol was finally chosen.
Click to expand...

I was watching the NRA antique gun show with Supica and they did on the competition and said that Savage didn't listen to Army suggestions for modifications.

I guess the truth is lost in the depths of history. If they had chosen the Luger or Savage half the content of Internet gun forums would have disappeared.
 
As the proud owner of several Beretta's I have always wondered why they didn't go with a 1911 in 9mm. The armorers, training and spare parts would have been almost the same and the problem with shooters with smaller hands would have been a non issue. You would have been giving up 5/6 rounds capacity?
 
As the proud owner of several Beretta's I have always wondered why they didn't go with a 1911 in 9mm.
Click to expand...

Because they wanted a gun that carried more rounds than a 1911 and they wanted a da/sa pistol with a decocker and one that was lighter than a 1911, among other things.

The decision to leave the 1911 was a long time in the coming.

tipoc
 
Despite its size, I distinctly remember reading how some shooters......including women.......liked the "feel" or "heft" of it during the original trials.

I dunno, sometimes the government screws up, and sometimes we are so used to the government screwing up that we have to assume they did so again. Its what makes us Americans.

By the way, Happy Independence Day!:D
 
The Beretta and SIG tied. The Beretta won based on price.
Click to expand...

http://gao.gov/assets/210/208564.pdf

Per the GAO report, the SIG failed the performance tests (specifically the dry mud test) but was allowed to continue to the bid phase because it was considered to be a good pistol in spite of the failure, because the evaluators weren't sure that the dry mud test was a truly practical, real-world test, and, more importantly, so there would be a competitive bid (at least two companies bidding against each other) to help keep the final price down.

Given that the SIG entry did fail part of the test, it's probably not entirely accurate to state that the two entries were tied going into the bid.

Beretta won the bid, however their pistols were actually MORE expensive than the SIG entries. Beretta won the bid based on cheaper mags & spare parts.

Ironically, the government initially chose to go with a third party magazine supplier rather than buying them from Beretta. If you look at the cost of what the government actually did buy (Beretta guns & spare parts) vs. the cost of the SIG guns & spare parts it turns out that they paid more than they would have had they gone with the SIG bid.
 
This was the list of guns from the XM9 Trials of 1984/85

Beretta 92 SB-F
Colt SPP (never a production gun)
FN Double Action
HK P7M13
Sig P226
SW 459
Steyr GB
Walther P88

The Steyr failed first, (did not meet the minimum mandatory reliability test)
Then FN voluntarily withdrew their pistol from the competition.
Then Colt did the same for the SPP.
Both the HK and Walther failed the salt water corrosion test. Walther also failed the wet/dry mud test.
SW failed the endurance test (somewhat bogus test really) and firing pin test.


Slide breakages on some 92's and Smith and Wesson made a big fuss that eventually ended in another pistol competition in 1987/88 called the XM-10 trials.

Ruger's P-85
CZ 85
SW 459
Beretta 92 F

Sig declined to take part in the re-test and Glock was not allowed to test as it did not meet the Army's definition of a double-action pistol, that allowed a second strike on a defective primer.

Beretta won the retest as well.

Beretta also won the earlier 1979-80 Air Force trials (the one where the Army pitched a fit and forced later competitions)
Beretta 92S-1
Colt SPP
Star 28
SW 459A
FN High Power (three different versions including a DA/SA version)
HK P9s
HK VP 70 (the original polymer)
 
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As the proud owner of several Beretta's I have always wondered why they didn't go with a 1911 in 9mm. The armorers, training and spare parts would have been almost the same and the problem with shooters with smaller hands would have been a non issue. You would have been giving up 5/6 rounds capacity?
Click to expand...

In fact the GAO did offer a compromise before the XM9 trials showing that existing 1911's could be converted to 9mm, a simple substituting a 9mm barrel, magazine and recoil spring, took 10 minutes and cost less than $100 per gun.

GAO Report March 8, 1982

Congress did not budge and basically ordered the Army by cutting some funds to pick a 9mm pistol. XM9 followed.

Remember the context of the early 80's, the cold war was in full swing, President Reagan was building up the armed forces which had been allowed to lag after Vietnam and under President Carter, the arms race was in full swing, from MX and Trident Nuclear missiles to a new high capacity 9mm pistol.
 
One more test did occur the original XM9 tests of 1981

The Army made the requirements so tough that no pistol won or was deemed acceptable.

Only 4 guns tested

Beretta 92SB
HK P7M13
SW 459A
Sig P226

Congress was furious with the Army for unrealistic testing and spending a lot of money (nearly 2 million) to do nothing. They even noted that the USAF had at least picked a winner in 1979.
 
Also remember that Beretta had one big advantage over Sig in the final bidding as well.

Beretta had a fully functional factory producing guns at Accokeek Maryland. To get around the 1968 gun control act they acquired the factory in 1978 to produce their Model 950 and Model 21 which they could no longer import.

Sig had no such facility at that time. And did not for many years.

The terms of the Contract required that the guns, by year 3, be made totally in the US.

Year 1 of the contract all were Italian made 92's (M9) (I got one of these issued to me in 1986)

Year 2 all were made in Italy but assembled in the US and finally the next year Beretta USA was fully up and producing all US made M9.

Sig would have had to build or acquire a factory in the US and that cost had to be factored in. Sig declined to enter the XM10 tests as it knew it would not be competitive in price and still had no factory in the US.
 
roman3 said:
In fact the GAO did offer a compromise before the XM9 trials showing that existing 1911's could be converted to 9mm, a simple substituting a 9mm barrel, magazine and recoil spring, took 10 minutes and cost less than $100 per gun.

Congress did not budge and basically ordered the Army by cutting some funds to pick a 9mm pistol. XM9 followed.
Click to expand...

Maybe Congress turned it down because they realized that by GAO claiming to be able to convert a .45 to 9mm without changing the extractor and ejector, and remachining the slide to clear the 9mm ejector, GAO was blowing smoke up their nether regions!
 
Not sure I would give congress, even in the early 80's that much credit. ;)

Or the GAO for that matter.

I just know the GAO submitted that report and they found a willing accomplice in the Army, whose heart was never into the 9mm pistol. Congress, with the power of the purse, got the Army to comply. :cool:
 
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