Talk:M1911 pistol series

Colt Government Model Section

With regard to the following sentence:

"Aside from Colt selling the M1911A1 to the US military, the gun was also sold under the name "Colt Government Model" to the civilian market, and called the "Pre-Series 70" guns today."

First, the Colt Government Model was introduced in 1912, and as such, it was originally in the M1911 configuration. When the U.S. Military switched to the M1911A1 configuration in the mid 1920s, Colt began manufacturing their Government Models in the M1911A1 configuration as well. So early Government Models parallel the military's M1911 configuration, while later Government Models (after the mid 1920s) parallel the military's M1911A1 configuration. Additionally, not only pre-Series 70 guns are Government Models. Series 70 and Series 80 guns are both Government Models. In fact, Colt still makes the Government Model to this day in various configurations.

With regard to the following sentence:

"For IMFDB purposes, this can also be referred to as an M1911A1. In this manner, there is no need to list film, television, anime, video games in this section."

It is sloppy to refer to a Colt Government Model as an M1911A1. "M1911A1" is the U.S. Military designation for a particular type of gun, and most of them were not even made by Colt (Remington Rand [the typewriter company] made most of them). I can see referring to a gun as an "M1911 type" or "M1911A1 type" if the manufacturer can't be determined, but when you simply type "M1911" or "M1911A1" you are referring to a U.S. Military contract pistol.

On top of that, the pictured gun in the Colt Government Model section is not even a "Pre-Series 70", it is a pre-enhanced Series 80 Government Model.

--MaximRecoil 21:44, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

So it's like how we don't call it the Beretta M9, we call it the Beretta 92FS. -Gunman69 03:52, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

With the M9 vs. 92FS situation, it is next to impossible to tell the difference between the two onscreen, unless there is a closeup allowing one to read the markings. In such cases I would say, if a civilian character is using the gun, it is probably intended to be a 92F or 92FS. If a military character is using it, it is probably intended to be an M9, regardless of what the actual prop is. I would assume that most—if not all—movie and TV props are actually 92Fs or 92FSs, because I don't believe that actual M9s have ever been made available for civilian sale.

With the M1911 or M1911A1 vs. the Colt Government Model (or other brands of 1911-type guns), it is usually possible to tell the difference onscreen without being able to read the markings. For example, the Colt Government Model does not have a lanyard loop. Most M1911A1s were parkerized, while no Government Models were parkerized. When dealing with more modern Government Models, there are even more differences. For example, starting in 1950, Government Models started coming with a full-shelf thumb safety; while all M1911[A1]s had partial-shelf thumb safeties. Also at this time, Government Models started being given a finish with polished flats and matte radiuses, while blued and Du-Lite (similar to bluing in appearance) M1911A1s had polished radiuses and brushed flats or entirely polished (depending on the manufacturer and/or time of manufacture); and of course the more common parkerized M1911A1s were simply all matte.

Additionally, the newer Government Models as mentioned above have narrow hammers with polished sides left "in the white", and polished chamber hoods also left "in the white". Many M1911A1s had wide-spur hammers, and the ones that had narrow hammers were fully finished (no polished "in the white" sides) and they all had fully blued barrels, including the otherwise parkerized ones (no polished "in the white" chamber hoods).

Most of the Government Models you see onscreen from the early 70s to the mid-to-late '80s were actually 9mm versions, though they were usually representing a "forty-five" onscreen. This had to do with reliable functioning with readily available 9mm blanks. Colt introduced the 9mm version of the Government Model when they introduced the Series 70 in the early 1970s, and the 9mm version of the CGM had a lowered ejection port (while the .45 ACP version still had the standard military style ejection port). With the introduction of the Series 80 Government Model in 1983, the .45 ACP version also got a lowered ejection port. No M1911[A1] had a lowered ejection port.

I'll give an example. In the show Magnum, P.I., his gun is blued with polished flats and matte radiuses; polished "in the white" chamber hood and hammer sides, and a lowered ejection port. It is clear from looking that the gun is a Series 70 Colt Government Model chambered for 9mm (though it was always addressed as a "forty-five" in the show's dialogue); and is definitely not an M1911A1. Recently the gun came up for auction and is now in the NRA's National Firearms Museum, and it has been confirmed that that is exactly what the main prop gun was (serial # 70L33101 to be exact).

--MaximRecoil 21:58, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Primary M1911 description

Who wrote this? The historical paragraph (on the background of the M1911) implies that the M1911 was replaced by the U.S. Military AFTER Operation Desert Storm (1991) which is not true. The Beretta M92 (M9) was already approved and adopted by 1985.

Image Sizes

The dimensions on a lot of the images are rather large. I'm tinkering with reducing them by 100 pixels each for the sake of conserving page length. Since a lot of people here are familiar with the wiki technology, they know they can click on the images to enlarge the images if they wish.

68.167.206.53 04:27, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Please don't change the page format. Everything works together now and it took me a long time to fix. - Gunmaster45 02:20, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Uh sorry, but it's FUBARed again. I am going to try a weird little formatting trick, please bear with me MoviePropMaster2008 04:30, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Hold on, I'm gonna see if I can make this work out better... -MT2008 00:49, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

OK, I have fixed it. From now on, it won't matter if anyone hits "Edit" to one pistol (instead of the whole page); the edit won't remove all the other paragraph spaces automatically (which is what was causing the problem). -MT2008 01:32, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Para-Ordance

Shouldnt these guns get their own page? Sure they are a 1911 varients, but their made by a totally different company.The Winchester 00:38, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, but their 1911 variants. This is the M1911 pistol series page, and they are 1911s. That's why they are on here. - Gunmaster45

I would prefer the Para Ordnance series of pistols have their own page due PRIMARILY to the fact that the Paras have a whole slew of different calibers that other M1911 makes and models don't have MoviePropMaster2008 06:40, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

The M in the page title

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the M in the page title incorrect? These are Colt 1911s (or 1911a1s, etc.), not Colt M1911s, unless referred to by US military nomenclature, just the same way that a Beretta 92f is an M9 only to the US Army and a SIG Sauer P228 is an M11 only in USAF terms. Just because it's the model of 1911 doesn't make it an M1911, any more than a '67 Shelby GT500 is an M67 Shelby GT500.YourMessageHere 08:09, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

No. The Colt pistol was formally adopted by the Army on March 29, 1911, thus gaining its designation, M1911 (Model of 1911). Only examples or prototypes prior to the year 1911 would NOT have the M designation (which is extremely rare). Between the years of 1907 and 1910 the Colt pistol was constantly being modified and re-designed to win the Army's trials for adoption of a new handgun. The gun was only mass produced AFTER winning the Army's pistol trials. The Beretta 92FS was already famous world wide and was commercially available as the 92F/FS for YEARS before the Army adopted it. Every 1911 design came AFTER the M1911 (aka Model of 1911) so it is the correct nomenclature. MoviePropMaster2008 07:20, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Using "1911" to refer to any and all pistols based on the M1911 design has only been popular for about fifteen years. Prior to that, the vast majority of such pistols were Colts, and were usually called "Colt .45s", even if they were pistols made by wartime contractors like Remington Rand. Those commercial guns that weren't made by Colt, as made by Vega, Randall, Federal Ordnance, Essex, etc., were called "clones", as they were generally close copies of the Colt. When makers started adding previously "custom" features to production-line guns, and branching into areas that Colt hadn't, a new name was needed, and "1911" became popular. The problem that I have with the various names on the site is the mixing of military and commercial designations; a gun cannot be a "M1911A1 Government Model", as M1911A1 is a military designation, and Government Model is what Colt has always called the civilian version of the "M" military pistols. Colt has made M1911s (1912-circa 1924), M1911A1s (circa 1926-1945), and Government Models (1912-date), but you can't mix or combine those names without confusing the issue.

WHO KEEPS ON F#$%KING WITH THE FORMAT?

I noticed yet AGAIN, the pictures are not aligning with their sections. We need to tell these anonymous members not to mess with a page's format if they don't know what they are doing!!!!!!! MoviePropMaster2008 07:13, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Caliber question

I thought I would ask permission before making this change considering how important this article is: in the specifications category the caliber is listed solely as .45 ACP. I was wondering whether or not that should be changed to include .380 ACP, .38 Super, 9mm, and .40 S&W?

-Anonymous

M1991 Series

I was wondering: what exactly is the difference between the 1911 series and the 1991 series? -Gunman69 17:18, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Colt introduced (announced) the M1991A1 in 1991 as a sort of economy version of the Government Model, resembling the military M1911A1, and with the serial numbers picking up where the military gun left off after WWII. The gun was made in that form until about 2003, at which time the finish was changed to polished blue rather than matte blue, and the black rubber grips replaced with checkered wood.