Gary Reeder
I had a young fellow call a while back and ask me
Saturday, November 24, 2018, 17:42

what did I consider the best 1911 on the market in a lightweight commander. I told him I thought the Ruger lightweight commander was the most dependable commander on the market. He immediately got all huffy and asked me why I didn't say the Kimber was the best. I told him because it isn't. The older kimbers were great guns. The newer ones are sloppy and not at all as smooth and fit as the older guns. When you have a company that needs to put out nearly 1000 guns a month just to meet demands you are going to cut corners and in my humble opinion that is what Kimber has done. We don't even carry them in our gun shop anymore due to customers bringing them back in with feeding and reliability problems. Before he moved to Phoenix Kase wouldn't touch a Kimber due to their sloppyness. And they are not the only ones. The Remington R1 was so horrible they finally pulled it off the market. The new owners are bringing it back out using Para slides and parts from their buy out of Para recently. The new head honcho at Remington has his act together and will bring them back to where they should be, but the older R1s were junk. But back to the phone call. The fellow got all pissy and told me I didn't know anything and that I was full of shit and hung up.
What this is getting at is because a gun is a high priced gun doesn't make it any better than a lower priced gun. The Rock Island that a lot of people put down because they aren't made in the states is one of the best buys on the market. They give you all the special features and are still under $500. And the people that put the Rock Island down because it isn't made here brag about their Springfield Armory that is made in Brazil. So forget where a gun is made and look at the gun itself. You can spend a lot less and get a good reliable 1911.