A Colt Combat Elite has a blued slide and stainless frame. Three dot sights were not on the standard models but were on the Combat Elite. The front of the frame had grooves, the magazine well was ported. At the time, Colt claimed that all Government Models would shoot within 3.5 inches at 25 yards, the Gold Cup was 3.0 inches. The Combat Elite was in the 3.5 inch group category. I took the stock pistol to IPSC matches and it jammed. A gunsmith competitor told me there was a burr around the firing pin hole. I removed that, either with a big drill bit, or a dremel tool. After that the pistol fed correctly. It was not unusual for manufacturing defects to show up on period new Colts, and it was common knowledge that new 1911’s, regardless of maker, had to be fired enough, to find and fix problems, before the pistol could be trusted for function.
My Combat Elite was defective from the factory: it unlocked early. Because of early unlock the slide recoiled excessively and drove the recoil guide hard into the frame. The recoil guide peened the frame. I sent it back to Colt after 3000 rounds. My first couple of hundred rounds were ball equivalent loads, so I kept on cutting the loads and increasing the recoil spring strength, and yet this defective M1911 kept on peening the frame. All my efforts just reduced the rate of peening. . Colt replaced the frame but upon receipt of the “fixed” Combat Elite, I found that hard recoil was still going on. The warranty was going to run out soon, so I sent the Combat Elite to Wilson Arms.
I paid Wilson Arms to mill the slide for a “melted Bomar”, install a black front sight. My Combat Elite came with a three dot iron sight set. I also paid for the beavertail, a new Wilson match barrel, trigger job, new hammer, and asked for slide tightening. I was on a waiting list for a year, maybe two, and once the pistol was received, the work was completed quickly. Everything came back right, Wilson Arms understands the timing of unlock, the pistol does not have the excessive slide speeds that were pounding the frame with the Colt Barrel.
Several times the firing pin plunger dropped down on my Colt Combat Elite. I don’t understand what conditions caused this, to remove the plunger for cleaning I have to remove the firing pin stop and pull the extractor rearward. That creates the clearance for the plunder to drop, but with all the parts installed, I don’t understand how the plunger drops, or why it does not drop all the time. But drop it has.
When the plunger drops during firing, the slide won’t go fully forward, and it takes time to puzzle out the failure mechanism as the plunger is underneath the slide. To clear, I dropped the magazine, walked over to a table, placed the pistol butt up, and then had to find a pointy thing, (chop sticks will work!) and pushed the firing pin in, while pressing up on the plunger. Two chop sticks are needed for this. This failure mode effectively puts the pistol out of action, which is OK if you are punching paper, but would be catastrophic in an emergency situation.
Colts of this period got out the door with factory defects. A bud of mine had a Colt limited edition “Tactical” series 80 model, with a factory ring in the barrel. Must have been done while cutting the recoil lugs.
Have to remember the philosophy of the times, as expressed by a GM executive:
Manufacturing makes it, Marketing sells it, and Customer Service makes it work."
As a comparison, I probably paid a fourth of what I paid for the Colt Combat Elite for my Tisas Service Special, and I have not had any malfunctions caused by factory defects.
No function problems with this inexpensive 1911 either.
Pistols are made better today, than in the 1970's or 1980's. We have it good.
