New Taurus PT1911

bronko22000 · 01-24-2008, 07:03 AM

Finally, after a year of pondering, reading reports and forums, I broke down and got the PT1911 last night. Man do they put the anti rust crap on them! I took it home and stripped it down and gave it a thorough cleaning with gunscrubber and then re-oiled it down. The trigger is sweet. Can't wait to try it out this weekend.

Pavomesa · 01-24-2008, 08:29 AM

Hope you love yours as much as I do mine. This is the best value gun deal on the market today!

vaughnm · 01-24-2008, 01:11 PM

Don't forget to come back and give us an update after you've shot it some!

Pavomesa · 01-24-2008, 05:38 PM

I'll give you my update right now, Vaughn............one bigjagged hole per clipful off the bench. No jams. They shoot as good as they look and that was with a box of reloads I had laying around for the last ten years.

bronko22000 · 01-27-2008, 12:47 PM

OK here is the report. I went out yesterday and today. Shot a total of 400 rounds through the Taurus. Not a single hiccup. No jam, no stovepipes. It ran flawlessly.
Yesterday - At first I was a bit disappointed at the POI. Both factory and my handloads were printing 4" low and 3/4" right at 10 yds. But grouping well. Moved the target out to 25 yds, moved the sight to the left slightly. I adjusted my sight picture (rather than having the front sight dot directly on top of the rear sight dot I leveled the top of the front sight with the top of the rear. Firing all 8 rounds from the mag produced a hole a bit bigger than and inch with 2 flyers taking out the top half of the orange dot I was using for my aiming point.
Today - Pretty much the same as yesterday. The first 3 mags were shot from the rest with the proper sight picture and pretty much obliterated the orange dot. Enough of the shooting at paper. The next 3 boxes of ammo were simply playing. Someone was out shooting their shotgun and left a bunch of empth 12 ga hulls laying around. I tossed them up on the dirt bank and between 20 and 25 yds proceeded to hit them and send them flying or burying them in the bank on a regular basis.
I was impressed. Comfortable, nice trigger, accurate and reliable. Only problem is I spent the next 1/2 hour or so picking up all my brass to get ready for the next session.

bronko22000 · 01-28-2008, 02:55 PM

Didn't fair out so well today. Still no malfunctions but I had a lot more flyers than before. It was probably me. I had some kind of junk in my eye that just wouldn't come out and couldn't get a clear sight picture. And the sun in my eyes shooting so late in the day. Still, Shooting at 25 yds, I can't argue with 5 mags full (40 rds) in a 5" group counting all the flyers. There was a huge hole about 1 1/2" in the target and no telling how many went through there.

Pavomesa · 01-28-2008, 07:10 PM

Sounds like a pretty good testimonial to me, Bronko. Let me give you my address and you can mail me all that nasty once fired brass.

bronko22000 · 01-29-2008, 06:51 AM

No way Pavomesa. I reload too. What load do you use? My load is 6.2 gr of Herco with a 230 gr FMJ. The POI is exactly the same as the Federal factory load. I was at the local gun shop and got a Fobus holster for the 1911 and picked up 2 boxed of Fed ammo for 12.69 a box. The way I figured it, it cost me about .24 per round handloading. So I got 100 pcs of brass for about $2.

USNRETHunter · 01-29-2008, 02:42 PM

Glad to see the good range reports. I picked up my new PT1911 in stainless three weeks ago, but it has been too damn cold here in Iowa to hit the range. Today it's about 5 degrees with 40mph winds. I'm no pansy, but I'm no fool either. I agree Bronko, it was pretty grungy on receipt, mine even had some machining fines in it. But I gave it a thorough cleaning and a new set of grips (crappy plastic ones come standard) and I'm ready to hit the range as soon as the weather cooperates.

Pavomesa · 01-30-2008, 01:24 AM

Quote:

ORIGINAL: bronko22000

No way Pavomesa. I reload too. What load do you use? My load is 6.2 gr of Herco with a 230 gr FMJ. The POI is exactly the same as the Federal factory load. I was at the local gun shop and got a Fobus holster for the 1911 and picked up 2 boxed of Fed ammo for 12.69 a box. The way I figured it, it cost me about .24 per round handloading. So I got 100 pcs of brass for about $2.

Bronko - I haven't tried Herco but I like it as a pistol powder. What I am using is 6.5 grs of Unique and the 230 gr cast. It shot exactly where the sights said it should straight out of the box. I would rank this as pretty much a "factory duplication load." I've loaded up to 6.6 Unique with this but felt like it was just a wee bit hotter than necessary. In fact, I've just loaded some at 6.4 grs I want to try. I'm sure I'll end up sticking with the 6.4/6.5 load.

However, I'm also considering ordering some 200 gr truncated cone bullets. Some of the .45s I've owned over the years REALLY loved this bullet. I even had one odd 1911 government pistol that this was the only bullet it would even feed 100% of the time no matter what I tried with the round nose. Go figure.