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American Tactical Inc 1911


Moe T Vator

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Howdy All,

 

What is the scoop on the ATI 1911?

Are these $385 Pilipino made pistols on par with Rock Island, Ruger, S&W, Sig, Colt, Kimber, for a traditional WILD BUNCH side arm?

https://grabagun.com/american-tactical-imports-inc-fx45-1911-military-5-45acp-8rd.html?utm_medium=Email&utm_source=ExactTarget&utm_campaign=Daily Email

https://guncarrier.com/american-tactical-fx45-price-new-700-price-used-see-below/

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I believe it is made by ARMSCOR which makes for Rock Island and a few others as well. 

Ruger, Sig, Kimber do not make a 1911 that would fit in the Traditional category of WB only modern.

Remington makes one model of 1911 that if you black out the white dot sights is legal for Traditional.

 

The only thing I know about the Philippine made 1911s is the frame is sintered.  Not sure it makes a difference over cast.

The cheapest cast framed 1911 that I know of is the Taurus Pt1911.  That is good for modern only.

I use a Taurus pt1911 and it has run through everything I have feed it.  Round nose, flat point etc.  Never failed to feed, go into battery, fire, or stove pipe and at less than $500 can not complain, but again not a traditional WB 1911.

 

Got one pard that does traditional WB and won Winter Range and he uses the aforementioned Remington. I see Remington  R1 on some sights less than 500.

 

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  • I had a Citadel 1911 for a while, also a Filipino 1911 made by Armscor.  Very robust little pistol.  Wish I hadn't sold it.  For that price, I don't think you could go wrong with the ATI.
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There is more than just Armscor making guns in the Phillipines.  But if that one is made by Armscor then I think it would be just fine for WB.  The other companies there may be fine but I am not familiar with them.

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Yes, the ATI 1911 is made by ArmsCor in the Philippines.  Frame is not sintered.  Most of the small fire control parts (sear, hammer, thumb safety, mag release, disconnector) are made of MIM (sintered) steel.    I have one (Rock Island importer), it is one of the first year of production by ArmsCor, and I don't use it for either competition or self defense because of poor machining by the factory.   Later ones are pretty good, and are worth $400 to some folks for some purposes.

 

A $400 pistol is rarely the equal to an $800 or $1000 pistol.   They are bargains for a reason - less work by less experienced workers goes into them.  Can they be made to run well?   In my opinion, yes, with about $300 of parts replacements and some more for labor by a 1911 gunsmith.

 

Depends upon how reliable you depend on the pistol to be.   There's a ton of ways for a 1911 to fail you if it's not well made.   Wild Bunch is a reliability game almost as much as it is a mag-changing game.   All sorts of quality levels of  1911s have sold over the years.  The ones that last and hold value are ones that are quality. 

 

I shoot a Colt Series 70 gun in Wild Bunch.  I do OK.   The Springfield Mil Spec is a good gun.   The Remington R1 is a good gun.  AFAIK, Kimber, Ruger, Sig and S&W do not make a gun that would be out-of-box legal as a Traditional 1911.

 

 

After original post:

Correction: This gun is made by Shooters Arms Manufacturing of Philippines.

 

I'd recommend reading reviews from actual previous buyers, at least this thread with several good reviews by knowledgeable shooters.

https://forums.1911forum.com/showthread.php?t=278093

The level of breakage of fire control parts (which are MIM sintered metal) and the total ineptness of their customer service would be enough to scare me off.   But, as I said earlier, it all depends upon how good a level of quality you want to pay for.

 

(My Colt Govt 70 has now gone past 110,000 rounds with mostly just spring replacements, better sights, standard barrel bushing replaced the collet, action tuning, plus a few sets of grips)

 

Good luck, GJ

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14 minutes ago, Garrison Joe, SASS #60708 said:

... There's a ton of ways for a 1911 to fail you if it's not well made.   Wild Bunch is a reliability game almost as much as it is a mag-changing game....

 

That is certainly true.  My Cimarron (Armscor) 1911 is only used for Wild Bunch, so I only have 1700 rounds through it so far.  I guess time will tell how well it holds up.  And while I am very slow at changing mags, the gun has been extremely reliable.  I see much faster guys having a variety of ammo/mag problems but mine just never does (Lee Factory Crimp die helps, I'm sure.  I do not gauge my ammo).

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5 hours ago, Moe T Vator said:

Howdy All,

 

What is the scoop on the ATI 1911?

Are these $385 Pilipino made pistols on par with Rock Island, Ruger, S&W, Sig, Colt, Kimber, for a traditional WILD BUNCH side arm?

https://grabagun.com/american-tactical-imports-inc-fx45-1911-military-5-45acp-8rd.html?utm_medium=Email&utm_source=ExactTarget&utm_campaign=Daily Email

https://guncarrier.com/american-tactical-fx45-price-new-700-price-used-see-below/

The one I took in on a trade had a broken sear. Won’t buy another 

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IMG_20170820_123857.thumb.jpg.8517319d7b4325593c970108c8f192db.jpgMine was made by SAM (Shooter Arms Manufacturing) for ATI. It is a great traditional 1911. Run it as such. I can run standard 230 gr rn over 6 gr Unique and for speed I run 5.8 gr Unique under my 200 gr rnfp bullet I use in all my 45 colt cases. Chip McCormick shooting star 7 rounds blued work just fine. 

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I bought an ATI Commander (Philimander lol) when they first hit the market for $275 (with the coupon lol). 

It struggled with HPs when new, but I polished the feed ramp and put a mild bevel on the the slide where it met the disconnector (and deep cleaned and oiled it) and she runs now with damn near everything.  I can't bear to sell it, actually, and if I did it would be for $400.

 

They are reputed to not be as stout in the frame as the mainliners that sell at double the price, but shooting CAS lead .45 ACP making roughly half the muzzle energy? I'd say they might be the perfect Wild Bunch gun (on the cheap) if they can hold up.  Don't have more than 300 +/- rounds through it, but again it runs w/o fuss.  The local CAS guys here might let me shoot it competitively, since they are more about the fun and less about the rules.

 

Others may chime in further, since maybe they are only good for a few thousand rounds?

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13 hours ago, John Barleycorn, SASS #76982 said:

Yep, one pull shot the whole mag, took it home and put a zip tie with big letter tag saying broken. I don’t have a class 3 license 

 

WHEW... I bet that was an exciting event, of which you could have done without..... :o

 

..........Widder

 

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Since I carried a 1911 back in the military always wanted to have one. So, I got one of those Filipino 1911 made by Armscor. When I first got it broke it down completely every screw/pin and was satisfied for the money how it was made. Maybe put 50 rounds through it. Last year I thought I would shoot my very first Wild Bunch which also happen to be the Missouri State Championship. I am now the Missouri Senior Modern State Champion. I made no modification to the thing, had to shoot Modern because I use 2 hands on the gun. Just the way I always shot one of those things, so with that I beat all those fancy guns with a really cheep one with nothing done to it.

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The Metro Arms guns made in Philippines are pretty nice if the quality is still being held. I have one with thousands of rounds thru it.

 

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My understanding is after WW II the Philippine people took the GI 45 and made copies of it for production. Hence a copy of the GI 45 1911. 

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I have the ATI 1911.  It most definitely requires break-in but shoots well.  Mine makes reasonable groups out to 25 yards... and would probably do better if someone more practiced was shooting it.  My biggest complaint is that it isn't good about holding the slide when the clip is empty (I'd estimate it locks it back only 1 in 4 times).

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Sintered parts & forged parts actually have the same strength if the metal alloys are the same.  Sintered parts are used to reduce machining required to finish the part.  An example of high strength sintered part are the rear accessory drive gears of CAT 3500 series engines.  CAT in 1995 replaced forged gears with sintered gears.  This was done when digital fuel control models were added which use Electronic Unit Injectors that have higher injection pressures than the mechanical injection models.  The camshaft power increase required larger diameter camshafts and wider rear accessory drive gears.

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15 minutes ago, J.D. Daily said:

Metal Injection Molding, MIM, is not sintered. 

 

Sorry, wrong.  Here's a brief description of process after the metal particles and binder are injected into a mold to define the shape of the part.

 

Quote

To improve handling often the debinding and sintering are combined into a single process. Sintering heats the powder to temperatures near the melting point in a protective atmosphere furnace to densify the particles using capillary forces in a process called sintering. MIM parts are often sintered at temperatures nearly high enough to induce partial melting in a process termed liquid phase sintering.

 

Wikipedia article on MIM

 

 

Sintering is the final formative step in making MIM parts, unless further heat treating is needed.

 

The problem the Phillipines factories have had seem to come from the high tech nature of MIM processing.   Their technology base is not real strong.  I believe that is made evident by the fairly high breakage rates and part porosity we have seen in at least the Armscor products.   Read the review I posted earlier - about half the failures in that review were rooted in fire control or magazine retention parts failures.   Yes, MIM can make complex shapes cheaper than machining forged steel.  But, there is a possibility that a failure to get the MIM process correct ends up making a weak, porous part.   Hammer, sear, thumb safety, mag release - none of those parts are convenient to successful operation of a 1911 when they break.    JMB designed the 1911 for machined forged steel.   Colt 1911s have run for 100 years now with original fire control parts in them.   Reviews don't show the high quality 1911's breaking those parts very often at all.   My experience and research.  Your experience may vary.

 

Good luck, GJ

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