Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns Stealth Arms 1911 Platypus

https://www.stealtharms.net/p/platypus

Thoughts on this pistol? 1911 billet double stack frame that takes Glock 17 9mm magazines. Interesting take on the 2011 or 1911 double stack configuration.

Would be fun to shoot one. Would be a good competitor possibly to the springfield prodigy double stack and a couple of the other more budget friendly options.

Hard Pass

Tisas has a double-stack 2011 coming, for about half that price ($799 MSRP). It's already cut for a red dot sight, uses the same magazines as Staccato pistols (the Checkmate 17s), and is very, very similar to the Prodigy and STI pistols. Did I mention that it retails for $799?


https://tisasusa.com/1911-carry-b9r-ds/

That is a good deal in comparison. The Bul double stacks start at basically $1500 for non competition models and the prodigy I have heard mixed reviews especially I think for the first models. Rock Island has a couple models and the 9mm comes in at $1100 msrp. Not sure what the retail price is. It seems like the Tisas are overtaking the Rock Island for the budget guns with better finish work etc. My son has a Rock Island 45 and it has worked very well.

It is nice to see more support for the 2011 models coming from various manufactures in a variety of budgets.

I just saw a Girsan 2011 9mm double-stack this morning, complete with a red dot sight of dubious origins, for $814.95. The sight was already mounted. All NIB. I fondled it a bit, but the bulbous magwell ruined the whole deal for me, it was just too big and impinged on the heel of my hand. I couldn't get a good grip on it. It just wasn't comfortable to handle. I dunno if the other makers are as bad as that Girsan, but if so, I ain't gonna buy one. I DO have a Girsan Hi Power clone that's really comfortable to shoot and use.
I'm gonna wait and see how the Tisas unit feels. If it's as clunky as the Girsan, I'll stick with single-stacks and be happy with that.

If 9mm is so effective, why are 9mm guns that hold 17+ rounds getting so popular? I like Platypus's initiative with this design, and they filled in the notches on each side of the grip safety, that STI failed to do for decades. But seriously, it seems these "tactical" 9's are getting crazy with round counts and red dots and lights and night sights...and picatinny rails. People are going to need a belt and suspenders to carry their rigs with all these gun doodads.

The GF wants to cotton candy variant 😂

They are the 10/22 of the younger shooters

It would pair nicely with a Ruger PCC 9mm for the zombie apocalypse.

They are very, very popular with the IPSC/USPSA crowd for match shooting, as popular today as the 1911s were back in my day. Today's pistol matches feature high round counts, and that means high capacity pistols rule the games now. They usually come already set up for red dot sights, another benefit, for those who like them. All in all, they're "today's 1911s", popular, easy to dink with, and simple to work on. That's how it is.

Silly post...

I picked up one of the Tisas DS pistols last week, more as a matter of curiosity than anything else. I've taken it to the range twice, and it's been 100% reliable for the 250 rounds I've shot thru it so far. The pistol I picked up is identical to the one in the link I provided earlier, a Commander length (4.25" barrel) Carry model. It shoots pretty well with the right ammo, and it's VERY soft-shooting with 115 ball, and like any other 9mm with 124s and 147s. I ran two magazines (34 rounds) of hollow point ammo, with zero issues. It weighs about 3 oz. more than a LW Commander, which holds 10 or 11 cartridges in 9mm, so it's got a sizeable advantage in the IPSC games. It does have a sizeable magwell, but nothing like the Girsan I mentioned in an earlier post, I can actually get hold of the pistol properly.


Overall, it's just a nice shooting, decent-handling pistol. I can't manipulate it as easily as I can a single-stack 1911, but I've got medium-small hands, and that's a "me" issue, nothing I can fault the pistol about. I paid less than $700 for it, too. The trigger needed work, as any budget 1911 usually does, but I got that sorted out quckly enough.

Is it better than a Platypus, with it's Glock magazines? No way to know, just yet, but it only cost half as much, and holds the same number of rounds. It seems to be as reliable, at least at this point. I like it.

I shoot competitively as well. Lights are not used on a competitive guns (unless you're in a duty division) and I know no one personally that carries their CCW gun with a light. Safariland stopped making competitive holsters - wasn't a big enough market (said their rep. at 2023 SHOT). Pitching these guns as competitive guns is a very small niche market - especially the IPSC/USPSA matches you mention - which have been having waning membership for years now. I'll hazard to guess that 90% on the Fire have never shot in a handgun match and 99% have never shot one of the matches you mentioned. I'm all for customization, it's the American way, Jeeps, Harley's, Pickups, AR's, homes, campers, we all do it, but to me, these decked out 9's are on par with the tacticool crap hanging off AR's. They are not a concealed carry gun, and there's not that many LE departments that allow so much customization, seems to me it's more the basement dwellers, and zombie hunters that tinker with these things.

And for the hi-cap shooting games, almost all require a mag change as part of the course of fire so whether it holds 30 or 10, you're changing a mag.

I strongly favor the single stack 1911s (all 14 of 'em) but I did buy a double-stack, just to see what all the fuss was about. It will likely never see a light on it, and probably won't see a red dot sight, either, but I do want to see how they handle in my hands, and I still shoot our local IPSC matches when the mood suits me. As long as I still enjpy it, I'll keep doing it. It's pretty popular here in Kentucky, still. There are four or five clubs within an hour's drive.