Tisas M1911A1 ASF versus WW2 Remington-Rand

The Turkish Tisas company has decided to replicate the WW2 M1911A1 pistol, specifically the one made by Remington-Rand. Did they succeed in this? Read on and you decide.

(This has been a desire for collectors for some time, since the price of originals in good condition has exceeded $2,000. A Tisas can be had for less than a quarter of that.)

In this thread, we will compare my recently acquired Tisas M1911A1 ASF ("Armed Services Family") to my original mid-WW2 excellent-condition Remington-Rand.

Overall Impression

In the following picture, we see the Tisas, as arrived out of the box (upper gun), alongside the Remington-Rand (lower gun).



It really is a remarkable resemblance. Indeed, the degree of finish (lack of machining marks) is much better than the originals!

It's been said that the finish on the Tisas is manganese phosphate (dark) whereas the finish on the originals is zinc phosphate (gray). (These are both types of Parkerizing.) However, placed side by side, I don't see much discernible difference.

Other people have remarked that the grip safety has been reconfigured so that it pinches the hand. Again, I don't see much difference in the grip safeties.

The Markings

Here are the Tisas markings on the right side of the frame:



As compared to the Remington-Rand markings:



Note that the serial number has been moved to the left side of the frame:



Note also that the Remington-Rand manufacturer's information was on the slide. The Tisas has no slide markings whatsoever.



Needless to say there is no "FJA" inspector's mark or crossed cannon Ordnance logo on the Tisas.
Finally, the country of origin has been placed discreetly on the bottom of the dust cover:



To be continued....

Part 2 --

The Grips

The Tisas comes with two sets of grips: Turkish walnut in a diamond pattern, and plastic.

The following picture shows, from left to right, (a) the Tisas walnut grips, (b) the Tisas plastic grips, (c) original WW2 plastic grips, and (d) postwar GI replacement grips.



The walnut grips are fairly nice, but they're not correct for a WW2-maufactured gun. The Tisas plastic grips are not only a little off in color, but they're also notched for a nonexistent ambidextrous safety. Putting the GI replacement grips on the Tisas is actually a great improvement. It's going to be wearing these grips from this point on.

The Magazines

The Tisas comes with two Italian-made Mec-Gar magazines. These are fine magazines, but they're not correct. They have 6 witness holes, plus the followers are wrong.

This picture shows the two Mec-Gar magazines (to the left), an original WW2 magazine (center), and two Check-Mate replacement GI magazines (to the right).



I'll be keeping the GI replacement magazines with the gun.

At this point I should mention a quirk of the gun that I noticed. It's impossible to push the slide release down if an empty magazine is fully inserted. (It doesn't matter what kind of magazine.) Maybe this will loosen up over time.

The Front Sight

This may be nitpicking, but the Tisas has a half-moon front sight. This was used on early-war Colts, but all the Remington-Rands used a ramped from sight.

Here's the Remington-Rand front sight:



And the Tisas:



This could be remedied with some judicious fling and cold blue, but why bother?

Series 70 Internals?

One of the advertised features of the Tisas is that it has Series 70 internals (in other words, no firing pin safety). Functionally, this is true.

But look at this. The Tisas firing pin and firing pin stop (on the left) are Series 80 parts! Those are going to need to be replaced.



(This is important because the previous "best WW2 clone" title holder, the Kahr/Thompson/Auto Ordnance M1911A1, had almost everything correct except that it used a Series 80 firing pin safety.)

CapnMac said:

It's funny, I've not seen any of the ASFs at gun shows, I'm guessing they get snapped up in the Friday night horse trading.

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I was specifically looking for one at the recent Nation's Gun Show in Chantilly, Virginia (which is a huge show). No vendor had one, and of course they weren't at the local shops either. So I finally went on Gun Broker and bought one from a seller in Wisconsin, who had it drop-shipped directly from the importer in Tennessee to my FFL. This roundabout distribution system tells me that Tisas/SDS doesn't have its act together.

vanfunk said:

Nice. These are forged, aren’t they?

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Yes, everything except the recoil spring plug. I didn't see any problem with that.

JTQ said:

That would be my expectation of every 1911 with an empty mag inserted. That is how they are designed to work. They are designed to lock back on empty.

It indicates you have a magazine with a good follower, and good spring, and a gun with a good slide stop.

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That's reassuring to know. So my Tisas is correctly fitted.

However, on all of my original WW2 guns (Colt, Remington-Rand, and Ithaca, all in excellent condition), the slide can be released with an empty magazine fully inserted. Yes, they lock back, but that can be overridden by pressing down on the slide stop. Can't do that on this Tisas.

ETA: I checked my other clone guns. The Kahr/Thompson/Auto Ordnance ones can release the slide on an empty magazine, whereas the RIA (Philippines) ones cannot. These are more data points. It appears that this issue is not a hard-and-fast rule either way.

silicosys4 said:

I'm curious why the comparison with a RR.

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Only because Tisas themselves are making a big deal about copying specifically a mid-war Remington-Rand. Certain parts, such as the 8-rib arched mainspring housing, and the hammer, are markers for R-R.

Slamfire said:

Plus, shooting it won't ruin any collector value.

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Don't assume that clones and reproductions will never have collector value. We've already seen this with muzzleloaders -- some of the early Italian percussion revolvers are worth more than some originals. And as originals reach unapproachable price levels, the reproductions will follow right along behind them.

The Tisas quality is truly impressive. Look again at some of my close-up pictures, above. No visible machining marks, whatsoever. This is just as good, or better, than peacetime Colt production.

They're a great bargain, right now, largely because of the weakness of the Turkish lira combined with the strength of the U.S. dollar. The prices of Tisas are clearly going to go up as currency conditions normalize. Buy them now or regret it later.

The underlying quality is very good, and the price is below what it "should" be, based on that quality. These would make a good speculation, if you wanted to set a few aside.