Greetings and Salutations!
So yeah…
The Battle to Hydrodip the 1911 is over.
For now.
My patience has run out, primarily as the 1911 has been deadlined for so long. I’d like to keep trying, but honestly, I need the 1911 as my EDC. And yes, being as large/fat as I am, I can easily conceal a large frame automatic without too much effort. Before I got the 1911, I was running my Smith and Wesson 669 which is truly my absolute favorite handgun out of my collection… in fact it is point-blank period full-stop my favorite handgun ever.
So far.
For those unfamiliar, this is it:
This was the first 9mm semiauto I ever fired.
The one I fired, it belonged to my “Uncle” Fred, one of my ‘rents BFF back in the day. It was made from 1985 until 1988 and was essentially a weird mid-frame chopped version of the more famous Model 59.
This particular one is the second one I’ve owned, with the first one suffering the results of that ugly police encounter some years ago where due to the circumstance at the time, I lost ALL my firepower. After that incident, one night I was bemoaning the loss of the first one, as it was my absolute favorite of ALL my weapons. The discussion was with my bros, and Gretchen was listening. This happened while we were dating in our first year. In fact I was still on the “Thou Shalt Not Possess Any Firepower” prohibited list. Gretchen being Gretchen however, found this particular one on Gunbroker from an estate sale. It’d been a safe-queen, and pretty much like new. In fact like new-new.
She bought it under her name and her parents Addy so it was all nice and legal so to speak. Any wonder why I married this chick?
Like I said, she got a new-new piece. Any and all wear on it is from me. For a broad, she knew what she was doing… I’m still pretty impressed…
It -was- my daily carry until I got the derringer and then the 1911. The reason I don’t want to carry it anymore is mainly that they’re getting hard to find in pristine condition, and I would purely hate to have to use it in a self-defense scenario, and lose it to the fuzz as well. It’s a ’emotionally significant’ weapon now, not that I wouldn’t hesitate to use it if needed. It’s my immediate ‘bug-out-bag’ pistol, and when I travel, it goes as the ‘backup-to-the-backup’ piece.
That and it’s a cool fucking weapon.
Movie and TV famous.
It was Sonny Crockett’s ‘backup pistol’ on Miami Vice, and it was also in like ALL the ‘movies from the 80’s’ like Beverly Cops II, Last Action Hero, and Superbad. In fact there’s a bunch of articles out there that talk about the “Guns of the 80s” and this’s usually mentioned frequently as an Iconic Pistol.
So yeah, I need to get the 1911 back up to speed.
The final pics of how the dip went are as such:
Yeah
It could have gone better.
I still have no idea how I kept having it go wrong. The plan now is to just strip it, and refinish it in a plain Olive Drab Duracoat for now. I’m not giving up on the Hydrodipping however. I’ve got more than enough ‘stuff’ to keep practicing and experimenting, so I’ll do that, until I get what it takes to do the .45 on a first-time go. Maybe try using a $9.99 Faux-Yeti and ‘do the dip’ that way? Something… either way I’m not giving up per se… just ‘refocusing the efforts’ because as I said, I need to have the 1911 FMC i.e. fully mission capable.
I mean for real… even looking as bad as that does right now, you can tell that IF or I should say WHEN I pull it off, it’s going to look Pimp As Fuck as the youngin’s say. With all black accents? Meaning the slide lock, safety etc? Oh yeah. Even in Olive Drab I think it’ll look the shit. Y’all will see sooner rather than later as I’m going to start the strip-dip tonight.
So that’s the latest here.
I’ll have some ‘other news’ later as I did do a purchase today (on the DL from Gretchen who’s forbidden me from any more toy purchases… keep that under yer hats mmn’k?) that may-or-may not be affected by the Tariffs in the immediate future. I’m not sure if the item in particular will be, as Turkey is looking at a minimum 10% tariff on Turkish firearm imports.
Buy ’em while they’re cheap gang.
Jes’ Sayin’
So More Later
Big Country
Bro, next time you pull the 45 out of the strip have a pair of nitrile or more protective gloves on and a set of plain cotton gloves on over the rubber ones. As you reglove and rinse and dry it, PLAN on switching out the cotton so you can actually DRY the piece and not leave fucking FINGER PRINTS on the gun.
CLEARLY, finger oils “Protect” the gun from the coating.
I mean you KNOW all this, but you may have been either distracted or hurried on this one
Night driver.
Huh. Your Smith & Wesson looks an awful lot like the 3953. I don’t see a hammer on the end, so I’m guessing it’s DAO, as opposed to a DA/SA.
I carry a 5946 at work. It’s not a terrible sidearm; it’s a bit heavy, but it’s accurate. But I don’t care for the heavy trigger pull and that fucking magazine disconnect feature, which very nearly got me killed once.
You guys are full a shit! They’re all variants of the 59 – and that thing is an unforgivable piece of shit!
AND – it’s fuggin 9mm!
Tiny you need to throw that POS in the garbage poost-haste! Shame on you!
😂😂😂
Hahaha. They weren’t the coolest guns at the time. I went to the Smith and Wesson armorers school. I got to build like 10 of them and then was allowed to purchase one.
I shot that thing a long time and it’s never skipped a beat.
You get used to the action on them. I’ve had quite a few of the others. The 645 is great Also any of the 4 digit guns
Not in the movies or Tv as much as Beretta or Sig but plenty functional and accurate
9mm is MOAR than enough if you’re using the right boolit let me tell you… (personal experience and yeash a Hydrashok makes a BIG hole in flesh)
And I just love that it’s a weird mid-size. Not too big, not too smol. Everyone has their preferences. It also was descended from the CIA S&W ASP. Google it if you want to see a cool 1960s James Bond style piece.
When my agency issued the 6906 to the plain-clothes folks, it did not take long before the admin wonks were recipients of a massive “Aw shit!” from the rank and file. The trigger was gritty and truly awful. The grips were a joke. Since we were limited to 9MM, I switched to a Sig 225 until the wonks banned single-stack mags. Then I went to a Glock 19. It shot just fine, but I always had a New York reload handy: S&W Model 37. Life is a vale of tears.
BC, crazy question but you seem to have looked into this coating stuff. I am looking for a tool coating for outdoor tools like axes, shovels etc. Sticking to the metal under impact and flex, high resistance to abrasion and low coefficient of friction would be my first choices over ease of application.
What would you recommend?
Thanks for all the good reads,
Trumpeter
I suggest quality spray paint
Or even shitty spray paint. Touch-up as you go!
I was supposed to inherit a pair of S&W 645’s from my father-in-law. One was his original duty pistol, and the other was gifted to him by his twin brother so he’d have twin pistols. Of course, when he died, they disappeared and I never saw them.
I did inherit his S&W 457 that he used to off himself after my wife picked it up from the police station where they had to hold it for 2 years. After I cleaned it up, (no pitting from the blood, either) I ran a box of .45 ball through it, and it is pretty accurate. I just don’t like the DAO mile long trigger pull on it. It did confirm to me that he didn’t pop his melon with it on accident. Guess I’m a sick puppy that way, but my wife was okay with it, too. At least we got the mag back with it. Cops didn’t want to give us the mag and gun together, because the mag was loaded. I told them to, “Well, unload it and keep the ammo!” After a bunch of hmming and hawwwing, that’s what they did, then escorted us to our vehicle with it as if it was going to jump out of the case I’d brought and shoot up the entire town.
Wish I could find spare mags that didn’t cost so much. Guess that’s a pipe dream, as it is discontinued and I haven’t seen any aftermarket mags having ever been made.
My mistake, it was a pair of 4506 S&W’s I was supposed to inherit.
They got these out there: https://www.omahaoutdoors.com/promag-s-w-457-4516-45-acp-7-round-magazine/
Also, have you checked any local “Cop Supply Shops”?
We have one in Tampa that does ALL police only ‘stuff’ (my DotMil ID gets me in the door) and that’s where I got all of my spare mags (4 of them) for the 669. B/C the 669 as well as that 457 you have were popular ‘backup pieces’ for cops, you might find spare mags that got traded in when they sold the weapon itself. I got 2x in Stainless and 2x in Blued for like less than $20 a throw.
This’s the shop that does all the harnessing and wiring and installs the ‘cop stuff’ on the Tampa PD vehicles BTW.
Ya done fucked that up! Ya camo it up so ya lose it in the tall grass? Deep blue or parkerized, how 1911’s meant to be.
B/C it’s the Turkish $400 special from PSA, I used it to learn how to (unsuccessfully) Hydrodip.
It’s soaking in stripper right now to start to get it back to something cleaner.
Fuck a bunch of that.
OD green frame, flat black slide. That’ll look titties.
I have the big brother 5906(I think that’s the model number). Got it brand new years ago and put a couple thousand rounds through it. It never malfunctioned. Never. It is solid and heavy and it’s like shooting a .22
The best thing about the older S+W is that if you run out of rounds you can crush somebody’s skull with the pistol.
I tried the model 5906 years ago, as a rental to see how I liked it. Didn’t like the trigger or how the safety operated. Seemed illogical to sweep a safety up/forward on the draw. I like the 1911 safety much better. Push down as you grab the gun then draw. But to each his own. The right carry piece is the right one for you.
The first 9mm I owned was a 669. Bought it new in 86. Talk about a lemon. No matter what ammo I tried it choked. Finally got rid of it after a decade and never looked back.