I was installing a new extended ejector to improve reliability. I had found out how to do it at www.blindhogg.com (nice site by the way) I had to file down the sides of the ejector to get the slide to fit over the top. Going slow, trial fitting as I went, I stopped as soon as I got the slide to move freely on the frame. I noticed the rear of the slide did not seem to wobble as much as it did before I started, but I did not think much of this until I got to the range. I started by shooting some rounds to see how the new ejector was performing. Ejection was very positive. I was three stalls from the right wall of the range but some of my brass was in the far right corner of the range against the back wall. When I was down to my last eight rounds I decided to shoot from the sand bags to see how well I could do. At 50 feet I pulled the first one to the right three inches level with the top of the bull. The next seven felt good and the lighting at my range is a little dim so I could not see the rounds hit the paper, which told me they were going into the black. When I retrieved my target I was rewarded with an amazing sight. Six of the rounds had gone into one ragged hole that cut away the right half of the X ring, and the seventh round was at 9 O'clock in the nine ring just above the number 9. Now I consider myself a fair shot but, this was done with an Auto-Ordnance 1911-A1 that I bought as a cheap gun to tinker with and not have to worry about messing up an expensive gun. I have put more than a thousand rounds through this gun, and the only other mods I have done so far is a set of grips and some three dot sights. My question is, have any of you ever heard of similar results just by changing something like an ejector? Can I expect the same kind of shooting the next time I take this gun to the range? Will it eventually shoot loose again?
Sounds like you've tightened up the frame-slide fit in an interesting way. Eventually it'll wear loose, but we're talking about tens of thousands of slide cycles, probably -- I'll bet something else "shoots loose" first.
I suspect its not the ejector. I shoot with several top shooters (though I am certainly not one of them!;) who all have custom 1911s that must shoot 3" or less - at 50 yards. The ejectors on their 1911?? They are not pinned. Put another way, when they take the slide off their 1911, the ejector falls out. It works in the gun because it is captivated by the slide. I have owned & have also shot a number of 1911s with pinned ejectors that also shot to this level of accuracy. This tells me that the ejector has nothing to do with a 1911's accuracy. It is very important to relaibility and there are a number of tricks to "tuning" a 1911's ejection, but accuracy is not linked to the ejector. If you noticed a change, I'd agree w/ geodkyt that you must have tightened the slide/rail fit somehow.
The only way I could have tighten up the slide/rail fit was with the ejector as this was the only part I worked on. When I originally installed it, the fit was so tight I could not operate the slide. I work it down until the slide would work as it should. I did notice that the side to side play that was present before I started was almost non-exsistent. From behind it looks like the slide is tight against the left rail of the frame, which would make sense as it was the right side of the ejector that I had to work down. I plan to do some more extensive testing on my next trip to the range and I will let you know how it turns out.
First off glad to hear you worked on your pistol yourself and also glad to hear my website helped. As I am sure you know you did not tighten the slide to frame fit in the traditional manner which is peening the frames rails which is normally done with a ballpeen hammer and frame fitting rails. What is sounds like you did was inadvertantly tightened the frame to slide fit by making a tight fit between the ejector and slide. Doing this on most guns will not greatly increase accuracy. Because tightening the frame to slide fit in the rear will not correct a loose barrel to bushing fit nor a overcut lower lugs on your barrel, which is a symptom of most factory churned out 1911's. But it definitely sounds like the moons have aligned and you may have gotten lucky. Hey, stranger things have happened.
Quite possibly the ejector is holding the slide up and locating it horizontally. A quick way to check would be to look at the ejector and see if it shows signs of rubbing on the slide. My 1911 shows no indication that the ejector touches the slide. I'm not saying that touching is bad. Just that mine doesn't and if his does, that could be an explanation for the change in accuracy. This is what I was suggesting -- the ejector is acting as a "prop", forcing the slide higher, so that it's the same efect as if he filled in the bottom of the slide rail. Instead of resting on the bottom part of the frame rail and wiggling up and down, his slide seems to be jammed up until it it enages the top part of the rail with no room for wiggle. Doesn't mean I'm gonna run out get over-tall ejectors for my guns...
Made it to the range today and it is still shooting tighter than it did before I worked on it, but I was not able to shoot as tight a group as I did the first time out. I just never thought something like changing the ejector could have any affect on accuracy. I guess that is one of the reasons I decided to work this pistol over. It started out as a cheap copy of the 1911, and I figured I could learn more about it and work it over without worrying too much about messing up too bad.