Colt O1070CQB Vs. Springer TRP shooting results
A few of you may have seen a few of posts I did during the last few months asking about different 1911’s as I recently went back to them after a 20 year hiatus. FWIW I still carry Glocks every day but after growing up on 1911’s and carrying them on duty for a decade (1990-1999) till I was forced by policy to carry Glocks. Now, I’m looking at retirement in a few years and am in a position to play with what I want.
Initially I purchased 3 9mm 1911’s as I have lots of ammo and wasn’t too sure about adding .45 back into the mix but that’s a different post. Anyway……….
A few months ago I went ahead and pulled the trigger on a Colt Model 45 01070CQB in two tone black/gray cerakote finish. I actually really liked it and it shoots and handles as it should. Shortly afterwards I found a local Springfield railed TRP in their black/gray armory kote and traded for it. It was a safe queen and the owner told me had only put about 200 rounds through it. I’ve been slowly adding to the ammo stash through trading and hitting the stores when I can and felt like I had enough to do a comparison of these two similar pistols. They both are railed, 5 inch, ambi safety, nite sighted, somewhat fitted pistols that fill the same niche. The Colt is from the custom shop and has the CCS stamped under the left grip panel.
The Colt is 42 ozs. and the SA is 45 ozs. with an empty magazine. I imagine the barrel is the reason as it’s huge.
I very much prefer the bushing and GI guide rod of the Colt over the bull barrel and one piece guide rod. I forgot why I removed these from my 1911’s back in the day. I went ahead and ordered a GI spring guide and captive reverse spring cap from 10-8
Interestingly the rail on the Colt is massive, much larger than the SA and also has 4 slots vs the SA’s 3 slots. My Surefire X200 and X300U both hook up and fit nicely on both either way.
The Colt looks nicer but that’s not worth much. Of notice the Colt gray finish on the frame includes the MSH, safety, and mag release, which the SA does not. The Colt is slightly darker but they both look good visually, if you like gray.
The TRP is definitely fitted tighter but the Colt is still fairly tight, with no rattle. I still needed a wrench to remove the bushing initially. The Colt seems to me to be more in line with a duty or military pistol, it’s tightly fitted but not as tight as the TRP. No surprise there.
I prefer the sight picture on the SA but prefer everything else on the Colt factory Novak nite sites. They were both able to hit zero very adequately at 25 yards. I just prefer the lock screw adjustable rear site on the Colt. Of note the Colts vials have a circle around them making them easier to pick up in daylight.
As far as the checkering on the frame there’s really much difference to me. They are both functional and well done and let you know something is abrasive when shooting ball. The slides both have forward grooves with the Colt being coarser with 7 grooves in the rear and 6 up front and the TRP has 11 in the rear and 9 up front.
The Colt does not have a mag well and the SA does, they both have grips that appear to be from the same manufacturer, maybe VZ? The Colt has the standard slotted screws and SA has the smaller diameter allen screws on the grips. The Colt grips are beveled and the MSH pin is exposed. One thing I noticed is that the TRP’s grips actually stick out a small amount past the magwell. It looks a little off and I’m not sure why as I’ve seen several like this. Also the Colt has a lanyard ring paying tribute to the military contract. They’re both look like black/gray micarta with thumb cuts on the port side and give a good purchase.
The trigger on the TRP is an adjustable aluminum unit with the holes has a very slight amount of creep and breaks 4 lbs, 2 oz’s over 10 pulls from my Lyman gauge. The Colt’s actually averages 4 lb’s, 5 ozs. but is not quite as crisp. It also appears to be aluminum, black in color, without the speed holes or adjustment. The reset on both is great. Nothing to choose from here. They are both excellent and useable.
They both have ambidextrous safties and both are fitted nice, audible clicks both going off and on, no mushiness. The Colt has narrower ears if that matters at all. They’re also shorter, I prefer the Colt safety but the grip still has to cut down on the Colt, but not on the TRP.
As far as reliability there’s nothing to choose from. I broke them down and lubed generously before shooting. The SA factory 7 rounders, and the Colt 8 rounders, along with 4 Wilson 47 D’s worked all the time, every time. I put 50 rounds of Winchester white box 230 ball, 100 rounds of Remington 185 SWC’s, 100 rounds of Sellier and Bellot 230 FMJ, and 25 rounds of Hornady critical defense through both pistols over the course of 2 weeks. I never had a FTE, FTF, or malfunction of any kind. I was surprised to say the least. The extractor seemed to be properly set up on both pistols and extraction was consistent on both.
The accuracy was somewhat surprising but there was not as large an accuracy advantage as I thought there may be. The Colt had a test target included that showed a bit under an inch for 5 rounds at 15 yards and I was able to almost approximate that from a rest. With the SA I absolutely could duplicate it. At 25 yards the groups opened up a bit but were still better than I can do with my Glocks. Actually shooting from a rest for the first time in years I found that the eyes aren’t what they were. I can see the sights or the target clearly, but not both………FWIW the best 5 shot groups with the Colt were right at 3.5 inches and the Springfield did a little better at about 3. I suppose I could have used a micrometer but with pistols it seemed silly to me, so the tape was OK. I thought it interesting that the Honrady did best with the TRP but the Colt shot better with the 185 SCW’s. There wasn’t enough difference to matter for the purposes of these weapons. With the various ball ammo the groups did open up but not much and still below 4 inches.
Conclusions: After all the reading I’d done I fully expected to conclude that the TRP was superior in every way. I came away thinking there’s not much difference. The Colt is not quite as tight, and the TRP seems to have an accuracy edge but not enough to matter in most situations. The TRP feels like the slide is on glass, it runs so smooth and there is a noticeably lighter recoil impulse. The flip side of that is the Colt is not as muzzle heavy and would seem to me to have an edge if ran dirty, as it should with the USMC pedigree. Either one would make an excellent bedside or possibly duty weapon but I wouldn’t want either for concealed or plain clothes carry. They’re heavy and I’m not sure I like the rails as they make the pistols feel blockier than I remembered. The older 1911’s were certainly heavy but slim, when I carried one for duty I generally carried 2 mags in each mag pouch on my duty belt for 40 rounds total. When I carried it off duty I generally carried one spare next to my wallet and never felt under gunned. When you add rails, ambi safeties, and magwell the old 1911 does grow, kind of like taking a bare 6920 and add to it to the point it's heavy, bulky, and not as easy to shoot. I'm actually enjoying shooting pistols again with these 1911's. They're just fun and the crisp triggers are nice.
