by Virgil Tripp
Steel, Titanium, Aluminum, and Polymer are often the material building blocks of custom 1911/2011 type pistols. By weight, if steel is 100%, then titanium is 57%, aluminum is 34%, and polymer is 17%. This can be handy to know. More on this later.
John Moses Browning (1855-1926) created the 1911. All 1911/2011’s and clones share a common hole location pattern as viewed from the side. The hole pattern is composed of slide stop, plunger tube posts, ejector cross pin, sear pivot, hammer pivot, grip safety post, mainspring housing cross pin. As viewed from the top, ejector post locations and disconnector hole break out at top of frame are located equal on both the 1911/2011. The disconnector hole is rotated six degrees CCW as viewed from the left side.
Back around 1989/1990, the IPSC/USPSA open competition world saw the need for higher capacity, .38 super, scopes, and a stronger dust cover for frame mounted scope mounts. The first scopes were tube dots.
Para Ordnance ready had a 13 + 1 .45 cast steel frame pistol. Glock had hi-cap offerings but no foothold in IPSC/USPSA. Caspian was just getting their cast .38 Super width optimized frame only going.
As a gunsmith, clamping a cast frame in a mill vise is a mess. Nothing is orthogonal, repeatable or solid. I knew an upper machined from bar stock would allow gunsmiths everywhere to perform precision work. The upper was born.
I had previous injection molding experience and was comfortable with the process. Ed Minshew was a rare talent in mold design and fabrication. As soon as he realized it was an impossible project, he was on it. Only Glock combined the grip structure with the gripping surface. The steel lower frame people slapped grips on to the structure which added width but no strength. Polymer tech was sufficient back then for DuPont Zytel to survive. Polymer tech has even improved since then.
Now, the question was where to make the division between steel upper and polymer lower. I knew all trigger/hammer/sear /disconnector functions had to remain in steel. The division was born. There was already an example of shared functions with the Browning High Power where there was unacceptable trigger “monkey motion” between slide and frame.
The next problem was how to repeatably attach the grip to the frame. Early live fire tests did not have the steel grip inserts which socket into the frame pockets. The male grip polymer filled the pockets. It worked well enough to prove the upper/lower split. Now it was time for over molded steel keys. Ed Minshew to the rescue. The steel key/frame interface was worked out at a SHOT SHOW lounge between Strayer and me.
The next question was what happens when a double charged .45 explodes. I, like others had wood splinters in my hands as the classic 1911 grips blew off.
The test was on a Ransom Rest around the corner of the building. It was triggered by string out of maybe harm’s way. We looked around the corner and saw no carnage. The grip had simply split beneath the sear leaf spring.
