Ugly Gun Sunday

This little custom carry gun presents a conundrum. Pretty is as pretty does. It's a single action 1911 style pistol highly modified for carry. The question is whether the man modifying it understood it's purpose. It appears to be stainless steel. Corrosion resistant. That is good. It is likely .45 ACP, also good.

The gunsmith flattened out the slide stop to a checkered panel, to decrease the width of the gun. Good in theory, until one realizes the thumb safety is still sticking out there. Hard to remove much of that though....... But this gunsmith did. The big problem with removing the means to manipulate these controls is the gun will be difficult to take off safe to fire, and then difficult to reload quickly. In other words, difficult to use.

The gunsmith ported the pistol, and moved the rear sight forward, effectively decreasing the sight radius, and making sure the owner would be injured if he was forced to fire the weapon close to his body, or blinded if he used it at night.

Then, he trims off the hammer. This is a technique used frequently in double action only pistols to make them more snag proof. The only time it makes sense on a 1911 is when the 1911 is double action only. Cocking and locking such a pistol only makes it more likely to snag.

The ejection port is hogged out in an unusual fashion, leading one to believe extraction problems plagued this design. The gunsmith modified the frame of the gun with great relish, but he neglected to trim down the dust cover to match the slide cuts. The really telling indicator that the gunsmith did not understand the problem is the brass knuckle style trigger guard and grip. Years ago, men familiar with gun fighting would trim away their trigger guards in a conversion known as a Fitz Special. the idea was that the first accurate shot in a gun fight often is the defining one. These knowledgeable men wanted the trigger guard out of the way so their finger could make it to the trigger first. Now we have a pistol not only with two trigger guards, but also a hook at the bottom of the grip frame ala' the Beretta 1934. Again, the gunsmith in his zeal to create a unique solution made the pistol difficult to use. Trying to get your second finger through a false trigger guard while keeping the first off the trigger on a draw from concealment is a skill few people are likely to have, and one that would deteriorate quickly if they ever achieved it.

This pistol was apparently used by Angelina Jolie in the movie Mr. and Mrs. Smith. But while it was used in the movie, it is no plastic fantasy movie prop gun. It was built 15 years prior. This pistol would not only be difficult to grasp and draw quickly, but also difficult to take off safe and fire quickly. The magazine, if stuck,could not be stripped out using the forward tab, and the porting would blind the shooter. Like Hollywood, the gunsmith knew some techniques and executed them skillfully, but he failed to understand the problem. That's why this pistol is ugly.