I did not get my Colt Gov't Model in .38 Super because of its competition lineage.
I got it because I was researching the Prohibition Era and I like 1911's!
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As was evident from my post to the earlier thread, I DID get a .38 Super for it's competition lineage.
ReplyDeleteTo expand on that, here in West Oz, almost the only way to convince the authorities to allow you to purchase a handgun of ANY type is for it to be for competition. Carrying one for self-defence is Streng Verboten.
At the time I bought my first (alas long dead) .38 Super, I was using an ex-US Army 1911 in .45 ACP.
In IPSC competition, time to complete the course is so much a factor in the scoring system that others with higher capacity pistols (who spent so much less time reloading) would routinely whip my ass.
I bought a Para-Ordnance P16 frame kit, and had a .40 S&W built because IPSC was proposing to require 10mm projectiles in order to qualify for Major power factor. Of course this didn't eventuate, and when the Oz .gov got all pissy about civilian ownership of any handgun calibre larger that .38", I converted it to .38 Super. When that pistol died, I had my current .38 Super Comp built on a STI 2011 frame.
Of course then the Oz .gov got all pissy about magazines holding more than 10 rounds, so the extra capacity offered by the double-stack frame turns out to be moot, and I'm kind of back where it all started.
NOTE: That reference to .38" is accurate. The PTB and their lackies that wrote the legislation were (and remain) so ignorant WRT firearms, that they thought .38 Special was so named because the projectile was .38" in diameter. When lobbied by the most despised "pro-gun" group in the country to allow them to keep their .38 Special handguns (and ban everything else), they enshrined their ignorance in the new laws.
I watched from afar when Australia's gun laws went full-retard and thank my lucky stars we dodged that bullet here.
DeleteYou guys and Canada are examples of the wisdom of how the US separated from England, bloody though it was, and putting certain clauses into our founding documents.
The peaceful method seems to have left liberty even more fragile than it is here. And it's tenuous enough here!
I'm hoping you can manage to reverse it!
I doubt that we can reverse it.
ReplyDeleteThe new police minister in West Oz, is, in my opinion, a seething paranoid megalomaniac, and is pushing new legislation to limit firearms ownership even further.
The latest "consultation paper" ( a fiction for "this is what is coming - suck it") limits licensed firearm owners to 10 long arms (rifle or shotgun), and/or 10 handguns. It isn't clear whether 10 of each will be permitted.
There is no mention of compensation for those who are forced to surrender firearms to get under the new limits, so it is patently unconstitutional, but it would take $millions to fight it and win, just to get back to the current oppressive restrictions.
I think a .38 Super 1911 is uber cool. It was a magnum cartridge before magnum performance was even desired. A great conversation piece - many newer shooters aren't even aware the cartridge exists.
ReplyDeletejrg
.38 Super is also appropriate for Mexican Narco role play, although this requires gaudy decoration of your 1911 with Mexican flag colors and Catholic or Aztec imagery. Mexican gun law prohibits civilian ownership of "military calibers" like .45 ACP and 9mmx19 so .38 Super is very popular in Mexico for legally owned guns. Of course the Cartels don't care and import military weapons by the container load.
ReplyDeleteLast I checked, .38 Super has been added to the forbidden list in Mexico.
DeleteThat explains why Bi-Mart has some Narco style 1911s on sale, stuff Colt can no longer export.
DeleteNot because ammunition is cheaper?
ReplyDeleteIf you handload .38 Super ammo isn't going to be radically different than 9x19 and maybe cheaper than .45 ACP... However if you buy boxed commercial ammo, not so much. And of course in handloads the choice of components makes a difference. If you are buying new 38 Super brass is readily available from makers like Starline and it's similarly priced to most similar size cartridges. However, the more common cartrdiges you can get cheap once-fired brass. Bullet choices are same as 9x19 .355" or .356", primer prices and primers (small pistol) are the same. However many people will pick premium bullets for .38 Super if they are shooting competition vs. lesser priced offerings. .38 Super will use a tad bit more powder and to get best performance may require powders that may not be the cheaper buik powders I would usually use for 9x19 like Unique, Bullseye or Herco.
DeleteI’m fascinated by the Prohibition era, too. I loved Burroughs’ *Public Enemies*. If I ever win the lottery, I’ll be looking for a Colt Monitor. And a real Thompson.
ReplyDeleteA few years back at a gun show, I saw a Colt collector who had as part of his display, a book or magazine or journal or something dealing with “Prohibition era Colts”. I couldn’t get his attention to ask him what it was or where he got it. I’ve been hunting high and low since then, including ABE, but have never been able to find anything like that.
And I don’t have a .38 Super yet, but I want one. When Wilson Combat starts taking non-Wilson guns again, I have a Commander that I want to send them for a .38 conversion, new sights, and an accuracy work over.
Also for me, a large chunk of the .38 Super fondness is: Stephen Hunter and the Swagger novels. Especially *Havana*.
==Dwight Brown
stainles@mac.com
https://www.sportsfirings.com
No one needs a reason "why" when it comes to fun things. Have fun and you do you. -JKing
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