After ~3 years hiatus from pistol competitions and just plain shooting in general, I decided to dust off this half-rusted workhorse gun from my stockpile and had it re-blued by a talented local gunsmith Dave Lawver who was introduced to me 14 years ago by one of my Bianchi Cup shooting mentors. This gun is based off a Springfield Armory 1911 originally chambered in .45 ACP, but converted to shoot 9mm so that the gun is still "regulation-legal" for Bianchi Cup competition and NRA conventional 3 gun aggregate (aka bullseye pistol shooting). Extensive work had been done to this gun and it took no less than 5 trips back to Dave to get it "right".
And it's well worth it!!! This gun REALLY shoots, even though my skills were rusty from lack of practice for the last 3 years. After some initial sight adjustment/zeroing in, I was able to keep 9 of 10 shots within 1 1/2 inch circle at 75 feet offhand/unsupported (see accompanying pic below). That one lone first round flyer was inevitable as such is typical of autoloaders. I believe the gun is a tad more capable than my shooting ability and I wouldn't be surprised to find the potential of this gun + ammo combination to print under 1 inch at this distance if I were to use Ransom Rest to do my testing. The trigger is set at about 3.5 lbs. so it's not as light as it can go, but good enough for what it's intended for.
Bullet used:
--Winchester 115 grain Hollow Point bullet
--4.1 grain Winchester 231 powder
--Federal F100 small pistol primer
--mixed 9mm recycled brass
--medium taper crimp on bullet
**Reloaded on a Dillon 550B progressive reloader**
More details to follow.....
