I had the chance to take my Brother to the indoor range at Strictly Shooting yesterday (I am hanging out with him in Evansville this weekend). We decided to take three 1911s to the range and see how they compared:
1) A commander sized lightweight S&W Gunsite Edition. This is a very good production 1911 for those looking for an EDC.
2) A used (but new to me) Les Baer TRS. This is a full sized all steel gun. Considered a semi-custom piece it is towards the top third of Baer's designs
3) A slightly used (but new to me) custom Caspian build. This gun is built by pistolsmith (Jess Gypin) and is the closest to a total custom build that he has done. It is heavy, railed, and full sized for sure
Good news: all three shot well and we had a great time. We alternated between shooting slowly for accuracy, quickly for controlled pairs and emptying a magazine as fast as we could effectively, and at various different distance including taking it past 30 yards.
The Smith performed well for a smaller and lighter gun. I think it is easy to control and out of the box has a decent trigger. I am not a fan of the sights and will likely replace them with a single tritium front ant plan rear. We were still able to put 3 or 4 out of 7 seven in tight to the center of mass of the charging zombie targets at 40-50 feet with the other still landing in the chest area.
The Baer fired everything we gave it even though it had been used and we went into the range session without having done much more than a function check after receiving it in a trade. It is tight (ridiculously so when trying to clean and remove the barrel bushing) and shot close groups out to 60-70 feet. We were putting nearly every shot in the first few circles of a target stuck to a Zombie's chest at 40-50 feet. The front sight on this gun is dim and the white around the tritium has faded while the white is still bright around the rear circles. This makes for the opposite of what you would want for a sight picture as the eye is drawn to the rear and has to be over-rided to focus on the front. I will be replacing with a new front and plain back.
The Caspian was insanely accurate and exceeded already high expectations. It is the most accurate 1911 I have shot. Its size and wide rear sight made it is easy to stay on the front sight for follow up shots. Not only were we putting all 7 rounds in tight groups at 40-50 feet, I put four out of seven into the head of the Zombie at the full distance (30+ yards...around 100 feet). I loved the 10-8 rear sight (opened to .156) and may be changing out all of my other guns to that setup.
All three of the guns were a blast (pun intended). I think it will be interesting to compare the Caspian to the Baer once the TRS has the changed sights. I can't complement Gypin's work highly enough on this Caspian. While the finish is very good (a few areas where the hand serrations or checkering were not completely uniform [have to look to find them]), the function is flawless.
I hope to have some pictures of the groups, my Brother took them with his phone. All in all, a great day. By the end we were only shooting the targets in the head, after all, that is the only way to slow done a Zombie...
1) A commander sized lightweight S&W Gunsite Edition. This is a very good production 1911 for those looking for an EDC.
2) A used (but new to me) Les Baer TRS. This is a full sized all steel gun. Considered a semi-custom piece it is towards the top third of Baer's designs
3) A slightly used (but new to me) custom Caspian build. This gun is built by pistolsmith (Jess Gypin) and is the closest to a total custom build that he has done. It is heavy, railed, and full sized for sure
Good news: all three shot well and we had a great time. We alternated between shooting slowly for accuracy, quickly for controlled pairs and emptying a magazine as fast as we could effectively, and at various different distance including taking it past 30 yards.
The Smith performed well for a smaller and lighter gun. I think it is easy to control and out of the box has a decent trigger. I am not a fan of the sights and will likely replace them with a single tritium front ant plan rear. We were still able to put 3 or 4 out of 7 seven in tight to the center of mass of the charging zombie targets at 40-50 feet with the other still landing in the chest area.
The Baer fired everything we gave it even though it had been used and we went into the range session without having done much more than a function check after receiving it in a trade. It is tight (ridiculously so when trying to clean and remove the barrel bushing) and shot close groups out to 60-70 feet. We were putting nearly every shot in the first few circles of a target stuck to a Zombie's chest at 40-50 feet. The front sight on this gun is dim and the white around the tritium has faded while the white is still bright around the rear circles. This makes for the opposite of what you would want for a sight picture as the eye is drawn to the rear and has to be over-rided to focus on the front. I will be replacing with a new front and plain back.
The Caspian was insanely accurate and exceeded already high expectations. It is the most accurate 1911 I have shot. Its size and wide rear sight made it is easy to stay on the front sight for follow up shots. Not only were we putting all 7 rounds in tight groups at 40-50 feet, I put four out of seven into the head of the Zombie at the full distance (30+ yards...around 100 feet). I loved the 10-8 rear sight (opened to .156) and may be changing out all of my other guns to that setup.
All three of the guns were a blast (pun intended). I think it will be interesting to compare the Caspian to the Baer once the TRS has the changed sights. I can't complement Gypin's work highly enough on this Caspian. While the finish is very good (a few areas where the hand serrations or checkering were not completely uniform [have to look to find them]), the function is flawless.
I hope to have some pictures of the groups, my Brother took them with his phone. All in all, a great day. By the end we were only shooting the targets in the head, after all, that is the only way to slow done a Zombie...
