I have a 20 year old "parts" gun built with a Mark IV NM barrel that has NEVER, EVER had a single malfunction, & that slide was VERY TIGHTLY fitted to the frame.
MM
I've had two pretty "high end" 1911's that were VERY tight. One a Mark Morris gun, has never given me a lick of trouble since the first round I fired through it. The second, a custom from a very well-known small-volume builder I won't name, came to me from the guy who bought it from said builder. My friend told me the builder had told him it was "very tight", and that he should expect it to bauble a lot of rounds, but that he should put at least 500 rounds through it before sending it back to the builder for final fine-tuning. I read that as the builder requiring the customer to do a significant part of the final fitting for him. I put 500 rounds through it all right, but it was 2 rounds here and 3 rounds there with Type 1 and Type 2 malfunctions all over the place. That gun went back to the builder for final fitting, I paid my friend an agreed-upon price significantly less than he'd paid, and I carried it off and on for a couple years before selling it to someone who was infatuated with the famous builder's name.
I currently run a Springfield Operator and Kimber TLE II as my "working" 1911's. Both came to me fresh from the factory and although a bit "tight", they worked just fine after initial cleaning. I lubed them liberally through the first few hundred rounds, but now they'll run just as well dirty as they will spanking new clean.
