1911 Help Please

[Yourgrandma]

I just bought a Springfield Mil Spec 1911 from a coworker for $280. Its my fourth handgun and ive always sort of wanted one so whe he offered it to me, I couldnt resist.

As im sure youve guessed, it has some issues. Most importantly, the safety isnt working, probably due to a poor instalation of an aftermarket trigger. I'd take it apart to look at it, but it has a compensator that I cant seem to remove. The set screw hole is empty. It looks like the barrel is longer than stock, so it might be threaded, but I didn't want to torque on it too much.

The parkerized finish isnt perfect, but I'll probably hit it with guncote in bright blue and black to match my motorcycle (why not).

I wont be shooting it until i fix the safety, so any help would be pretty cool.

[mnglocker]

I just bought a Springfield Mil Spec 1911 from a coworker for $280. Its my fourth handgun and ive always sort of wanted one so whe he offered it to me, I couldnt resist.

As im sure youve guessed, it has some issues. Most importantly, the safety isnt working, probably due to a poor instalation of an aftermarket trigger. I'd take it apart to look at it, but it has a compensator that I cant seem to remove. The set screw hole is empty. It looks like the barrel is longer than stock, so it might be threaded, but I didn't want to torque on it too much.

The parkerized finish isnt perfect, but I'll probably hit it with guncote in bright blue and black to match my motorcycle (why not).

I wont be shooting it until i fix the safety, so any help would be pretty cool.

Have you ever taken down a 1911 before?

I'm located just south of you in Delano and I'm pretty handy with stuff that goes bang. I actually just bought a Springfield .45GI myself.

[Yourgrandma]

I had a friend's apart once, but I have to get the compensator off first.

You know, I was just on the phone with my friend Mitch who said you'd be willing to help. Funny how that works.

Would you want to meet up and help me fiddle with it?

[cobb]

I had a friend's apart once, but I have to get the compensator off first.

You do not need to remove the compensator to disassemble it.
Or is there a specific reason you have to take the compensator off?

A lot of 1911 barrels come with the comp permanently attached. Make sure the 1911 is empty, slightly move the slide to the rear, this should help you to rotate the bushing to remove the recoil spring and cap. Then align the slots for the slide stop, remove the slide stop and remove the slide and barrel. Now with the slide removed, remove the short guide rod, pivot the link pin forward, rotated the bushing to align the bushing tab and slide the barrel out and off the slide. The bushing stays on the barrel and comp assebly, that is the only real difference in disassembly.

[Yourgrandma]

Mine has an allen head on the spring guide rod end. I cant push it in to turn the bushing. Should I just pull it out and pivot the bushing? I'll try that. I guess my memory of how they come apart was off. Thanks for setting me straight.

[Yourgrandma]

Alright I got it apart, that thread in guide rod threw me off.

I'd like to take the comp off though, just because I dont need it.

Now I need to take a look at the safety.

[1911fan]

if you need help feel free to ask

[mmcnx2]

I'm pretty familiar with 1911 and am located in Hanover. If your saftey is not working my first question is what do you mean. Will the gun fire when the safety is engaged, will it not fire when the grip safety and thumb safety are depressed, or are you getting hammer follow when you rack the gun.

Each issue can be caused by different mechnical changes. It sounds like someone got a little happy with a file on one of the sear surfaces or tried bending some springs to much.

Let me know if you need another set of eyes to look it over.

[Yourgrandma]

I disassembled and reassembled it just to make sure I couold, and while i was in there, I didn't see anything blatently wrong with the safety, but it still doesnt work. It really doesnt want to go up. If you push the hammer back further to where it pushes down the grip safety, the safety will go up, but not all the way and with a good deal of effort. If you brush it, it falls down and trips the hammer. Probably not a good thing. It only drops it to half cocked though. I have a decocker 1911! Hah! I havent seen any hammer follow though. Full auto can be fun, but maybe not the best thing with other people around.

That allen head spring guide combined with the compensator really makes putting the top half back on a pain.

[Stradawhovious]

Sell it and buy a Glock. 1911's suck.

[Yourgrandma]

No way dood, Ima get a hipoint!

[bofe954]

If you reassemble it with no grip safety a lot of times you can see what is going on with the thumb safety.

[cobb]

You got me thinking, if this is a Mil Spec, then there has been several things change. The Mil Spec does not have a full length guide rod. The other thing, you said there is an allen screw to remove the comp, if there is, then most likely isn't the factory barrel, there wouldn't be enough barrel protruding out past the bushing to attach a comp. If the allen screw is not visible until the slide is moved backwards slightly, then it could be attached to the factory barrel, but then the bushing had to be replaced or modified for the comp to fit. Are you sure the comp comes off, it could have been bought as an assembly from Clark, or other such manufactures.

[Yourgrandma]

The barrel is definately longer than normal. You can see that the rifling goes past the end of the slide almost an inch. The set screw is missing, so I'm guessing the barrel is threaded.

[Pinnacle]

Get a pipe wrench and crank that sonofabitch off there..... Make sure to place the chamber end in a good pipe vice first...

If the set screw is missing that attaches the compt to the aftermarket bbl - my best guess would be that it is locktited on there - likely with RED - before you apply a lot of pressure to the thing - heat up the comp a bit and do place the chamber end in a vice and apply a little lefty to it and see what happens - it may just come off

As for the safety - you may just need to replace it with a better part - or better yet replace all of the internals with better parts that fit properly.