Gunsmithing Storm Lake Threaded 1911 Barrel fitting

[sirhrmechanic]

Got a threaded barrel for my SS Colt 1911 Series 80. It's going to get a suppressor when the paperwork clears.

I've fitted quite a few 1911 barrels. But never had one that went in this easily!

Minor work to the hood (did the rear in a lathe to take from 1.316 to 1.300 (to match the Colt Factory Barrel). And trimmed the sides with a file. The bushing was a perfect fit out of the box. And the lower lands were a drop-in fit... MUCH tighter than the original Colt Rattler. More like the fit in my GCNM.

Anyway, for anyone who is contemplating one of these barrels (I also have one in a suppressed Glock)... both the Glock and the Colt units are really nicely done and are certainly easy to fit! Color me impressed!

Cheers,

Sirhr

 

[chrismartin]

I have had great success with Storm Lake 1911 barrels as well.

 

[PatMiles]

When a barrel fitting goes that easy you are always looking over your shoulder to see what's gonna jump up and bite you.

 

[Sam Dunham]

When working for an NW Arkansas Pistol shop I installed/fitted, literally hundreds of the SL Barrels. They came in two configurations, one a semi-drop in and one a full fit version with more lug material and rear engagement material in the hood and rear slide locks for firing pin primer adjustment. The full fit barrel tended to give a better overall fit but on the range at 25 yards on Ransom rest and even in the single shot pull fixture, very little to no difference in 5 shot groups. Where the difference was noted? In pistols that lacked the right slide aggregate and slide to frame fit. Course tests were done with both jacketed and lead and the SL barrels rifling were cut deep enough to grab lead really good also. Most pistols in that era had the std firing pin hole and had not been changed to the smaller 38 super FP at that time. A check with a range rod and primer height on the full fits but seldom was a "Drop in" showing a high or low hits on primers in our slides. I did though see some guns that needed a full fit barrel installed "Not the companies" on customer Custom work for center hits. I have also witnessed the opposite happening on series 70 guns and others of course that I had fitted the slide to frame actually cause a thinner lug height on barrel fit and have the right lock up and timing. Slide to frame and barrel fit is made easy with a quality slide and frame and not advertising but when I left, the company I worked for had the very best I had ever seen after handling many thousands of 1911's on my bench.