50,000 (now 88K) rounds and counting: Springfield Operator

[Norseman]

in for updates.

[JohnK84]

It has been a long time since this has been updated and it gives me a sads.

[Ned Christiansen]

It has been a long time since this has been updated and it gives me a sads.

Yeah me too!

Even though Rob lives closer now he's been so busy that classes I'm involved in, usually don't coincide with what he's doing. I saw him a couple months ago but we really didn't get time to get everything out and discuss / take pics but no reports of anything needing work (I usually get the call like right away). Of course I presume he is on idle at this time.

[Ned Christiansen]

So since our regular programming is on pause, maybe I sprinkle a few things in here as place holders. I recently posted this on LTW:

On Originality

Customizing 1911's has not been what I would call "lucrative" for me, but it's what I love doing (pretty sure that’s part of the lucrative problem :shock: ). I think I can say without bragging that I have brought some original ideas to the 1911 world-- not earth-shattering, not revolutionary perhaps, just utilitarian tweaks, logic and experience-based things, mostly. When someone takes my ideas without attribution / compensation / permission, they may think they are going around me, excluding me. But it actually makes me their consultant-- their unnamed, unpaid consultant. Their no-charge R&D service. It’s not no-charge to me— I put a lot of time into R&D…. a lot. That costs me, and naturally the idea is that somehow what I come up with, what I do with my mind and my hands, maybe some of it somehow helps me keep the lights on. Plus it’s me that hangs it out there and does whatever it may be on a 1911 to find out if people are going to like it, say ho-hum, or outright puke. So I’m doing their market research for them too! Let’s take FRAG for example. Although I had done it previously, the first time I put it out there publicly that I can find, on a forum, and called it FRAG, was at least twelve years ago. Without making a project out of it, I found this one from a couple years later where I am introducing the VZ grips featuring FRAG:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=8297&hilit=FRAG+Out%21. ….

And although there are earlier posts talking about it, the pics are gone.

I think the fact that FRAG has been one of VZ Grips’ very top sellers and that Guncrafter Industries has also had a lot of demand for it (both use it via an agreement with me), and that Dan Wesson thought enough of it to come to me for an agreement, show FRAG to be appealing to gun people. Plus the fact that of my own orders for custom guns in the last dozen or more years, maybe 85% of them have not requested checkering or Conamyds, they have requested FRAG.

I’ve had a few 1911 ‘smiths ask me to do FRAG for them to guns that they would finish for a customer who had requested FRAG. Nothing at all wrong with that! In fact, I tried for three or four years to find a trustworthy source for doing a production-friendly version of FRAG so that I could offer exactly that service to other smiths and to individuals. I never found an outfit that wanted the work and that I felt confident in. Ultimately I chose quality over quantity—and money. I could have got this done, but quality and delivery would probably have been issues. I declined doing FRAG myself for the ‘smiths, 95% for scheduling reasons: I am in a constant struggle to get things done for guys that have been waiting, in some cases, a decade. These ‘smiths requesting FRAG have been guys whose work and whose ethics I know and respect, or, in one or two cases, guys I didn’t know anything about but I sure appreciated their courtesy in asking. At least one other smith has just outright copied it as if originality and scruples did not exist, and credibility didn't matter. A fan of my work, I guess, and of some others too.

To guys that operate that way I will just say, may I suggest not trying to make your name on being a “really good imitator”. Your signature work should be recognizable as your own, not other people’s. Do I know that’s not easy, after all these years of the 1911 being the focus of other customizing niche-carvers going back to, for cryin’ out loud, the ‘30’s? Yup! I know that. And yet I and many of my 1911 contemporaries have managed to tease out new ideas, to create signature styles, to innovate and invent, to find something new. And something new is usually not something you just stumble over when you weren’t even trying. You try. Again I say, this is not just me; I’m not trying to set myself apart because there are many original thinkers out there and LTW happens to be rich in that way, but there are others that are not involved with LTW. Individuals and companies. Some companies will be found to have a whole cadre of smart, free-thinking people who are very capable at design and marketing. Even then, sometimes, they may reach out and acknowledge someone else’s idea as being the right thing, the thing they were looking for. Or they may just take it and pretend it’s theirs.

I have patented several things over the years, and if cost was no object I’d have a lot more, but— it’s damned expensive. I seem to have more ideas than money. One has to choose which to patent (Conamyds was one). I have two more that recently went from “pending” to being given a “notice of allowance”, in other words, once I pay the final fees a patent will be issued. Keywords here as far as the Patent Office is concerned, “pay fees”. Once you’ve paid them you’re not out of the woods. There are maintenance fees too “or we’ll take your patent away”:
Time intrvl Large Entity Small Entity
3.5 years: $1600.00 $800.00
7.5 years: $3600.00 $1800.00
11.5 years: $7400.00 $3700.00

So once you have your patent, if you want it to stay in force, you pay a ransom every so often. If it was gangster movie the patent office would send somebody by in a pinstriped suit to say “Geez, that’s a nice patent ya got there. Be a shame if sumpin’ happened to it.” As a one-man outfit with only a handful of patents, I still don’t qualify to pay “only” the small entity fees of $6300, not a very good way of encouraging inventiveness by the little guy, right? It’s like the patent office thinks only Big Pharma and outfits like Apple and GM should be getting patents. So, many of my products, methods, and patterns aren’t patented.

If I was making a ton of money at all of this, I guess it might make less difference to me when I see something I designed or something I did first, something very much associated with me, get used without so much as a “F-you Ned”. But it’s not just about money. I try to maintain a clear conscience in the way I deal with people; I am not claiming to have reached perfection but I'll just say it is rewarding to deal with scrupulous people who are willing to acknowledge the source of something new and useful. So, I'm saying "thanks VZ, GI, and DW" for doing the right thing.

[Ned Christiansen]

Also, Rob's Commander mentioned in post #95, there is more on it and some info on the progression of it, pics etc. But I think it's bad manners to post a link...... anyway it's on the above mentioned site and the thread is titled, "Combat Commander As It Happens". If I'm in violation of etiquette here or being too sneaky let me know and I'll make it go away. But LTW is a 501c charity....

[Hulkstr8]

Sorry to hear about people copying your work. I've always appreciated your willingness to help and answer questions. The patent "fees" are absurd.

[Ned Christiansen]

So the old Colt in post 211 (and others) that got a whole new top end in November 2017, the ejector broke the other day. The gun has a pretty well documented 35000 rounds through it since the new slide and barrel. We think this ejector was its third; it broke at the front post. We don't recollect or have a record of what brand it was, but 35000 plus probably tens of thousands prior, no complaints.

[Uni-Vibe]

I didn't read the whole thread, but here's a question:

What's the clean and oil regimen?

[Ned Christiansen]

The owners of the Colt and the Operator have different approaches. I'll just say that one is more regular about it than the other, but at this point both know that it doesn't need a ton of attention every 100 rounds and the lube type matters little. The Colt guy, like me, uses "whatever's within reach that's oily", pretty sure that's what the Operator operator does too.

[JohnK84]

I'm a nobody in terms of a 1911 driver but as I have done classes, as long as the gun is oiled every 500-700 rounds, they just keep on trucking along. I'm not as concerned about a clean gun or barrel in training and competition. But I keep my carry gun relatively squeaky clean.