Rock Island 1911

[SeabeeMan]

Looks like my brother is sending a Rock Island 1911 with a half dozen mags my direction for some work I did on a vehicle. This will be my first 45 so I'm wondering if anybody has any boolit experience with these? I've been doing some reading on molds for this thing and will pick up a Lee of some sort before I put some real money into a NOE or HM2 mold. The big questions I have at this point are:

Lube - Is tumble lube good enough at 45 velocities, or do I need to use my Lyman 450?

Alloy - I've always ran straight wheel weights through my 9's, mainly because I didn't have enough pure to cut it, but now I do. WW, pure, or mix?

TC vs RN - In a Lee mold with this gun...any difference?

[Blammer]

I have a RIA. It is a good shooter but has NO "lead" in the barrel.

This one shoots the best in it.

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g81/blammer8mm/Cast%20boolits/45ACP/DSCN7746-1.jpg (http://s54.photobucket.com/user/blammer8mm/media/Cast%20boolits/45ACP/DSCN7746-1.jpg.html)

I would recommend using your standard alloy and water dropping them, just because...

I have never had luck with TL, so I will have to recommend the lyman 450

I'd get a 10C from NOE, but if he doesn't have one available, I'd get this one.

http://noebulletmolds.com/NV/product_info.php?cPath=41&products_id=323

[sidecarmike]

I've shot around 3,000 rounds out of my Remington R1. I use the TL452-200-SWC Lee mold with wheel weight lead over 8 gr. of Power Pistol. The last 100 or so have been powder coated, but all tumble lube before that.

[Bohica793]

I have a Rock Island that is my daily carry. I shoot the NOE 453-200 SWCs, Lyman 452374 LRNs and am now running rounds out of my new Mihec 453374 HP mold through it. Unlike my other 45 with its snobbish Austrian pedigree, the Rock Island eats these loads like a fat boy with a bag of M&Ms. I haven't put anything through it that it doesn't like.

[Animal]

In my RIA Govt. 1911 I have found the Lee 452-228-1R to be very accurate. I use COWW +1%tin, air cool, tumble lube with straight LLA and size to .452. This particular boolit is tricky to load and is usually loaded short. It is a round nosed boolit, so I like to think it should feed well in any 1911. This boolit is not the same design as what you see in ball ammo and should be treated differently. I only size it to .452 because my guns throat just likes it better that way.

[tomme boy]

Cut your WW with 50% lead. You do not need them hard at all. Just use your 450 luber. Don't mess around with the alox. I'm another one that could not get it to work. Get the LEE 200 SWC. It runs really well and it will stretch your alloy even longer.

[sandman228]

ive had a ria 1911 a2 about 5 years now I bought it new and at 1st forget about even trying anything other than round nose bullets. I have the lee 6 cav .452 230 lrn mold,a lee 6 cav 200 gr swc mold, and a lee 2 cav 230 gr truncated cone mold. all are tumble lube molds I don't size them they drop 451-452 ish I just lube with alox load and shoot accuracy is good to 25 yrds (ive never tried farther)and now that its broke in it functions well with any bullet. my favorite load is 4.0 gr of bullseye with any of the bullets mentioned or ive used 5.2 gr unique with the 230 rn bullets. good luck I hope this info helps

[scattershot]

I have two of them. Congrats on your acquisition. My favorite load is the H&G 200 SWC or a clone over 4.0 Red Dot. Never a bobble, and it's the most accurate 45ACP load I've found.

Good shooting!

[c1skout]

I tumble lube the Lee 230rn and it works well out of my Springfield and every other 45 I've tried it in. I just started trying the Lee 200rf and I like it as well, plus it eats less lead. My RIA is in 38super and it works well with everything I've tried in it... except 158gn semiwadcutters and 125gn rn, but those were sized a little too small for my gun. Enjoy your RIA!

[ksJoe]

Lee SWC (90379) and TC (90310) both feed fine in my RIA. The SWC won't feed in my Tommy gun though.

BTW, RIA has great customer service.
An inexperienced shooter was shooting my Dad's recently and kaboom'd it. He had a squib, and didn't know what it was, so the next round popped it. It was clearly an ammo issue, but RIA fixed it anyway for no charge. I know they replaced the barrel and frame; I assume they replaced the slide too.

[GL49]

My RIA never has a problem with the Lee 228 gr RN, cast with COWW's and sized at .452, every once in a while it'll fail to feed the 230 Lee TC, I don't know what causes that. I'm thinking I need to seat them just a teensy bit deeper, but haven't fooled with it because my Springfield really likes that boolit. Both are taper crimped to .472. Never have tried tumble lube myself, but I know a lot of guys that swear by it. Too nasty looking for me.

[Hard_Cast]

Enjoy your RIA and welcome to the 1911 club!! Before you curse the thing and throw it over feeding issues, definitely try multiple mags and quality ones if you can get them. Lookup original GI design (tapered) as compared to the wadcutter (parallel) mags and the cross-hybrids. You best luck with the RIA is a tapered original-style mag and ball. I do not and have not owned one, but a friend has one- as does his brother- and their feeding issues were always with SWC and HP bullets. I think deeper SWC seating and different HP styles could fix it, but I did not get a chance to play with reloading options there. Enjoy the gun, they feed well wen well fed :)

[jmsj]

rich,
In the last couple of years I have worked on a few and built a few complete guns from Rock Island frame slide and barrel kits. I have found them to be very tolerant of various bullet designs.
In the one I built for myself (Rock Island frame barrel and slide), I have tried H&G 68 type, H&G 130, Rem. jacketed ball, RCBS 45-201-SWC, NOE 45-230HP, Lee 452-255-RNFP , Lee 452-200-RNFP and Lyman 452460 200 gr SWC and they all feed pretty well. Once in awhile the longer bullets like the NOE 230 gr HP or Lee 255 RNFP wil fail to feed if the gun is a little dirty.
For alloy- most the bullets I use for 45acp are 50%WW-50%Pb the Lee 452-255 RNFP are water quenched WW's and the NOE's are 25% WW's 75% SOWW's. All styles are lubed with FWFL.
I have found the Metal Form 7 round mags with the round follower works real well in this and my other 1911's
Good luck and enjoy

[45fan]

I own an officers model RIA 1911 and a gov model Taurus 1911 they both get fed a diet of pure lead or range scrap what ever I have on hand. As long as you size your boolits correctly you wont need any special alloy for 45 acp to prevent leading. If you do go with a TL design mold you MAY need a little tin to get good fill out. I cast with a Lee 200 gr RFN boolit (not a TL design mold) and I tumble lube with Recluse 45/45/10 recipe. Loaded on top of 5.0 to 5.5 gr HP38 for good practice round with a slightly less recoiling feel of my store bought daily carry defensive rounds.

[Moonie]

I own an officers model RIA 1911 and a gov model Taurus 1911 they both get fed a diet of pure lead or range scrap what ever I have on hand. As long as you size your boolits correctly you wont need any special alloy for 45 acp to prevent leading. If you do go with a TL design mold you MAY need a little tin to get good fill out. I cast with a Lee 200 gr RFN boolit (not a TL design mold) and I tumble lube with Recluse 45/45/10 recipe. Loaded on top of 5.0 to 5.5 gr HP38 for good practice round with a slightly less recoiling feel of my store bought daily carry defensive rounds.

Interestingly enough I also own an officers RIA and PT-1911. The ones I use most in them are the Lee 200gr SWC, Lee 230gr TC and MIHA 200gr HP. The Taurus feeds anything and everything. The officers RIA has been more picky but that was due to a magazine issue. I've replaced the magazine and it has been flawless since but I've only used it with the 230gr TC. The other full size RIA's in the family feed any of the above boolits, tumble lubed with 45/45/10 although I did PC my first batch yesterday and I look forward to trying them out soon.

[DaveInFloweryBranchGA]

Rich,

At one time I owned 5 of the Rock Island 1911's. I currently own a 5" custom model, a Widebody/high cap, a Commander style model. I sold off my stock 1911 model and my wife traded her officer's model for a simpler revolver that she doesn't like as well, but feels she can clean and load if I pass away. Some commentary in the quote below:


Looks like my brother is sending a Rock Island 1911 with a half dozen mags my direction for some work I did on a vehicle. Nice guy. If the magazines are stock Rock Island magazines, remove the follower and polish the edges of the stampings to eliminate sharp edges and smooth things out, then clean and lube. The stock RIA mags are good mags with good springs, but the followers generally have rough edges. Once polished, the mags run as good as any mags I've bought for 1911's.

This will be my first 45 so I'm wondering if anybody has any boolit experience with these? I loaded Lee molds and a group buy copy of the H&G #68.

I've been doing some reading on molds for this thing and will pick up a Lee of some sort I owned the tumble lube and standard versions. If I had it to do over, based on various issues, I'd not buy the tumble lube version again. The standard versions work ok.

before I put some real money into a NOE or HM2 mold. My suggestion is to go ahead and buy an H&G #68 NOE mold right from the start and save yourself some money long term. That particular boolit shoots extremely accurate and feeds well in all my 1911 pistols. Note: I do have the ramps polished on all my 1911's. Which you should do or have done if you're going to be using anything but USGI ball ammo, as the stock pistol was designed to feed ball ammo best.

The big questions I have at this point are:

Lube - Is tumble lube good enough at 45 velocities, or do I need to use my Lyman 450? It will work fine, but my advice is to go Lyman 450 from the start. You'll get tired of tumbling lubing much sooner than the pistols will get tired of shooting up the tumble lubed boolits.

Alloy - I've always ran straight wheel weights through my 9's, mainly because I didn't have enough pure to cut it, but now I do. WW, pure, or mix? I shot a lot of WW, but that's because I had a lot to shoot. If you have access to both, shoot a more pure lead and extend the amount of hardened lead you have. I don't think I'd shoot pure, depending on velocity, but I wouldn't shoot straight WW now either. Since I've got enough reloaded 45 to last me into next year, I probably won't be casting any mixed yet.:)

TC vs RN - In a Lee mold with this gun...any difference? In a Lee mold, I would go RN, but if you've polished the ramp, it should feed either. The RN is easier to get the cartridge setup right to me, but that may just be me. Again, after all that, I'd just go ahead and buy a copy of the H&G 68 and spend my energies there first. You're more likely to be rewarded with the best accuracy there.

Hope this helps,

[SeabeeMan]

Absolutely! I think an h&g 68 is in order shortly after I slug my barrel.

[DaveInFloweryBranchGA]

Absolutely! I think an h&g 68 is in order shortly after I slug my barrel.

Rich,

Based on the 5 pistols I had, I wouldn't even bother slugging the pistol. I size at .452" and find it works with 99.9% of the 1911's out there. Don't know about the European manufactured ones though. But as far as the RIA's go, it's been spot on.

[scattershot]

I wouldn't worry much about slugging the barrel, either. Just size to .452 and go shooting.

[ACrowe25]

Lee 200 hg68 swc copy works for me...