Very cool thread on the 1911 forum of a Wilson Supergrade. Supergrades start at about $5k and go up from there, but looking at these pics, you can start to understand why. Remarkable craftsmanship and beauty in each piece.

http://forums.1911forum.com/showthread.php?t=417494

They certainly are extensively detailed. And from what I have read from owner surveys, their functional reliability rate is the best of any 1911 manufacturer, slightly edging out Baer.

But for a working gun I think I'd go with a Baer. And if I was looking for a piece of tactical jewelry, I'd look at a Nighthawk. Both of which are a couple grand less than Wilson.

http://www.gunbroker.com/Auction/ViewItem.aspx?Item=450353573

If I were going with a high-end 1911, Wilson would be my choice. I wouldn't go with that particular Wilson, but is certainly a nice piece.

Seeing as how I've been there and done that I'll comment.

First, the Colt Gold Cup. About 20 years ago I bought the Gold Cup. Good gun but it was never very reliable. Over the last 20 years I've had Wilson up grade the gun to where it now works like a Swiss watch. I have about $2700 in the gun.

Second, the Wilson Combat Classic. I've been wanting one for quite a while and the wife said stop complaining and get one. Well I'm not getting any healthier or better looking so I pony up $3500 bought Classic in standard grade. The only problem I can see with what I bought is the flat wire recoil spring set up. The spring doesn't seem to soak up recoil as well as a 17-1/2 pound round recoil wire spring. With the flat wire I have to change the fiber washer about every 300 rounds. As I have two recoil springs and enough fiber washers for about ten years it's probably a moot point with me.

As to the OP's original post I not sure the Supergrade is worth the money. My standard grade is so tight I have to use a gunsmith's nylon mallet to knock the slide stop out of the pistol. I also have to use grease on the slide stop and firing pin stop along with the nylon mallet to knock the slide stop and firing pin stop back into place. How much more tight does the gun have to be?

Another thing you hear a lot with the guys that paid an arm and leg for their super fancy looking Wilsons is the normal wear and tear one gets with using any firearm. Suddenly these super fancy looking Wilsons don't look quite so pretty any more with normal wear and tear. When I ordered my Classic I went with the plain Jane look as my Wilson is a shooter and not a safe queen.

And one more thing I also didn't put any bells and whistles on my Wilson. I kept my Wilson as close to the original Browning design as possible. The only thing I ordered special was the flat wire recoil spring, ambidextrous safety, and the adjustable battlefield sight. Even Wilson says you might not get back all your money with all the bells and whistles in a re-sale.

My .02 worth.

I also have a Wilson CQB Elite. I love it. It's the first 1911 I've owned (out of about 5) that I trust.

Wilson and Nighthawk are very similarly prices - not even close to a couple grand difference - unless you're comparing a supergrade to a bare bones nighthawk. Nighthawk is generally a couple hundred less. Baer runs quite a bit less.

lower right of this pile is a shooting machine...

Personally I just can't see the money...especially for a Plain Jane stainless gun. Jody Joseph at JoJo's Gunsmithing in Ct. can turn out an equally accurate work of art for a lot less money.

For half the price I would rather have one of these...

http://www.gunbroker.com/Auction/ViewItem.aspx?Item=444987144



When Wilson used to make the Thunder Ranch Special before Bare started building them a friend bought one. He asked me to shoot it... Now I grew up on 6-12 oz match triggers on small bore rifles... Most of my 1911s have 3.2-4.5# triggers that break like a thin glass rod. This trigger was uncontrollable. You just touched it and it went off...totally inappropriate for a 1911 let alone one that is touted as being the ultimate defensive pistol. My first round went off way before I wanted it to... Within 100 rounds the gun was doubling or tripling.

Gun was sent back to Wilson with a request for a 3.5-4.0 pound pull... Came back with about a 3# pull that quickly started doubling again...my friend requested his money back and bought a SIG 229 and lived happily ever after...

Two female instructors at the club I taught at bought Combat Commander size guns. One was a $2400 Wilson and the other a $1200 Kimber Eclipse. Both had excellent trigger pulls and exactly the same sights. I shot both the guns and the groups with the Kimber were smaller than the Wilson...

With 1911s at some point you are paying a lot for advertising and name recognition...

Bob

I personally wouldn't pay the cost a Wilson brings because you are buying the name and nothing else. When i was a FFL Dealer i ordered one for my hunting buddy and the problem was my Springfield would out group it and the Wilson from day one would lock the slide back every other shot . I had to send it back for him they fixed the problem but i decided you are just paying a extra couple grad just for the name.

There was a Les Baer on a local classified board for $1,500 this week.........good deals abound when you have no play money! LOL

RJM, you summed up my limited experience with Wilsons.

I will stick to my Kimber USA Team Match II and buy a used ATV with the rest of the money.

Gee, I paid $750.00 for this early 1960s Colt Government Model that's been functionally flawless with a great trigger, and I cannot imagine I'd be six or seven times as happy if I spent $5,000.00 on one of those. But YMMV.

half the cost of a SG Wilson:



And it works very well.

I can't image paying more than double the cost of a premier grade Freedom Arms for a WC super grade.

I'd take door number two, an FA 83, a Kimber and $2k for powder, primers and lead.

well, I like the Wilson and soon to have another, I am a confessed 1911 slut and over the years bought,sold,traded and built a few hundred. I see them as no different than a nice truck,good watch or an out of state hunt.
It's what it's worth to me.....

Wow! I wish they were so accommodating when I requested my money back. I ordered them to build me a CQB Compact back in the 1990s. They told me that due to back order it would be nearly a year. Within a couple of months they informed me they were sending it. I asked them what happened to the year estimate. No explanation. When it arrived, it had the older style setup, i.e., the sights were the kind advertized as standard years earlier. The newer models were supposed to have the Novak style sights. Also, it had considerable holster wear.

Mind you, I had ordered a brand new gun, that was supposed to be built specifically to order. What they clearly sent me was an old sample, try-it-out, gun that had been in the shop for years. They denied it, and acted like the idea was ludicrous.

I demanded either a refund or to allow me to send it back and to put me back on the waiting list for a new gun. They denied both demands, but offered to switch out the sights to the current specs. I had no choice but to accept.

I was completely turned off to that company ever since.

...that is beyond words........

Bob

I picked up a LNIB supergrade for around $2k a while back, I shot it a bunch but ended up getting rid of it.

It was too nice to EDC, and I much preferred my Sig P210 legend for the range. So it ended up sitting in the safe for years untouched and eventually went down the road.

Most definitely you either love a Wilson or you don't. Wilson is probably a cult gun for most.

For 5K you get a gun with gaudy juvenile logos.

Doesn't even rate laughter. More like a snicker.

Pass.

If you weren't a reputable & reliable source, that would be hard to believe.......what time frame was that from as that is just unbelievable from any manufacturer, much less Wilson; I'd love to hear their response today. That gun obviously had sear & hammer engagement issues.

As to a Wilson Supergrade & any other cosmetically fancied up gun, 1911 or not, they are just absolutely never worth the money paid and are usually just an ego stroker.

As to Wilson's in general, I've had the opportunity to handle & shoot 10 or so different versions w/o any issues......they have all been very, very smooth & well done......but those are/were fairly recent vintages.

Of the dozen or so 1911's that I currently own, one is a Wilson X-Tac, a fairly plain Jane, low end gun as Wilson's go.

It is extremely smooth, very accurate & has performed perfectly over around 2,000 rounds, mostly 200 gr SWC handloads; the trigger is clean & crisp at 3.5 lb........it's as good a gun as anyone could ask for; I have not done a single thing to it other than to shoot it. My wife, who is not the biggest fan nor the best with a 1911, even shoots it very well.

MM

That's what I bought a plain jane Classic. It seems to shoot just honky dory. I have well over a thousand rounds through it and that is since June.

I don't care if people have BBQ guns but I wanted a shooter. To be honest if I won the billion dollar lottery I would not want anything different than what I have.

I will say that the Willsons that I have been around functioned flawlessly, but I was less than impressed with their accuracy especialy for the price. I had much less money in mine and mine were more accurately and functioned just as flawlessly.

Geez, if you can't build a .45 1911 that functions flawlessly you shouldn't be building guns. As a builder of custom 1911's myself, I'd really like to tear down a Wilson sometime to see just what they do with them as far as fitting.

As I said earlier Wilson's is a cult thing but I think all custom makers is a cult thing for the people who own a particular maker's gun.

As to fit I think that the guns are very tightly fitted' maybe too tightly fitted sometimes' but probably not any better fitted than any other custom maker's gun.

What Wilson's does have is that they no longer use MIM or cast parts for what they call their bullet proof parts. These parts are machined from bar stock. Also Wilson's bullet proof ambi safety is as good or better than Colt's old ambi safety. No sloppiness at all. And their battle sight is super for tired old eyes with cataracts.

I don't believe Les Baer has ever made use of MIM parts.

That maybe true I don't know. Wilson builds most if not all their parts in house now. Wilson just move to new buildings the other because they out grew everything else.

I've heard some things that lead me to believe some of the Wilsons are perhaps too tightly fitted in some areas for optimum performance. Some of this is undoubtedly due to consumer demand for tight,tight,tight when they really don't know that super tight ain't neccesarily "right" or indicative of proper fitting in some areas.

Based on what I've seen, I'd not say that is not true, but I've only seen a limited number.

Snug, yes, but not overly tight & no barrel wrench needed for the bushing. Barrel lockup on all has been well fitted in all the right places.

The slides on all the ones I've handled (as well as Nighthawks) have all felt like they were on ball bearings.........much better feel than any Baer I ever handled.

As for accuracy, all I've seen were plenty good in spite of not offering a 50 yard guarantee; their guarantee is 1" at 25 yards.

MM

I was talking with Joe Chambers (http://chamberscustom.com) about a year ago about custom 1911's and mentioned that I just couldn't bring myself to like cast parts on serious guns (actually it was during an anti-Ruger rant ). He mentioned that over his career, he's seen a lot of cracked Colt 1911 frames, but NEVER has he seen a cracked cast 1911 frame of any manufacturers. I hate it when people point out how subjectively ignorant I am.

I forget, were you 'for' or 'against'?

Yup...really happened...even worse the owner of the gun, who was a member of the combat shooting group I ran, was named...Wilson...Frank Wilson.

Time wise it was a while ago... Maybe early 2000s. Wilson didn't make the 1911s for TR very long as I recall so if you can find out when that was that would be the time period. As I recall it was between $2300-2500.00. You would think that when someone sent back a gun that the trigger pull was too light and was going burst fire they would have put a trigger scale on the remake before it was returned...

Bob

Best one is the upper right

On a gun that doubles, the problem really isn't the trigger, per se'; it's the sear and/or hammer hooks..........the sear can be cut too low or the hammer hooks too short or a combination of both. The trigger pull is just a manifestation of the other problems.

MM

John, you always get a smile out of me with your humor............given the ones I've been exposed to, I'm pretty strongly "for".

MM

I know,it's a keeper,now looking for another for the SIL...