u/BasementLarperActual

Ordered a flat, stainless steel, checkered mag guide with lanyard loop from Smith and Alexander (incredible company by the way, you should definitely check them out). These are single piece main spring housing and mag guides and he also offers main springs and small parts. Then I had my gunsmith (Eskridge firearms in Evansville, IN) cerakote it. The coyote tan he had in stock was damn near a perfect match, he did a great job. Next step is figuring out how I’m going to get the magwell contoured stocks I ordered from VZ installed. Looking at potentially counter boring the screw head recess to match the oversized head on the m45a1 screws.

Yesterday I installed the Red Dirt USA Speed Tune flat-face trigger in my Springfield Armory Prodigy 4.25 (compensated) and took it to my local indoor range today. Overall, I’m extremely pleased with the results.

The pistol is currently configured with the EGW Full Length Guide Rod Kit, EGW Mainspring Housing Kit, EGW Ignition Kit, EGW Slide Stop, and finally the Red Dirt USA Speed Tune Trigger.

I do wish I had gone with trigger shoe length 4 instead of length 3. Length 3 is advertised as being roughly equivalent to the OEM trigger length, but in practice it felt slightly short to me. That may partially be due to my reduced trigger return length, which changes the overall feel and perceived reach of the trigger. I intentionally ordered the trigger with an extra spare parts and hex key set. This enables keeping one hex key set in the trigger return set screw while the other is in the trigger over travel set screw. Getting the hex key to engage on the trigger return set screw can be challenging while this pistol is partially assembled so it saves quite a bit of time to go this route in case you need to go back and forth with your adjustments.

During installation, I found that the Red Dirt trigger bow altered the disconnector geometry enough that the disconnector required refitting in order to articulate smoothly into the disconnector port while articulating it vertically in the port by hand. Prior to fitting, the slide exhibited significant binding during return to battery. To correct this, I slightly reduced disconnector ball head diameter and very lightly shortened overall disconnector length by removing a small amount of material from its top flat surface using a needle file before refining the surface with 1000 grit. Having the gun fully apart gave me the opportunity to stake my hammer strut pin in the hammer which is something I originally neglected to do during my ignition kit install.

Red Dirt recommends fitting the trigger bow to the grip safety by removing material from the top rear portion of the trigger bow where it interfaces with the grip safety block. Personally, I found it much easier to instead remove material from the grip safety blocking arm itself. This avoided repeated full disassembly and reinstallation of the trigger during fitting.

For range testing, I fired 500 rounds of Midwest Ammo 115gr FMJ, 200 rounds of Federal 147gr flat nose FMJ, and 17 rounds of Federal HST, bringing the session total to 717 rounds. Only two stoppages occurred during the entire session, both near the end of the Midwest Ammo batch: one failure to lock the slide back on an empty magazine and one failure to fully return to battery.

These were the first two stoppages I’ve experienced with this pistol in over 4,000 rounds, including a recent concealed carry course hosted by my local gun club. At the moment, I’m inclined to attribute the stoppages primarily to the noticeably underpowered remanufactured Midwest ammunition (being used in a comped gun no less), particularly given that both occurred late in the session around the 450-round mark of that ammunition lot. However, because the pistol had recently undergone trigger and disconnector fitting, it’s something I’ll continue monitoring during future range sessions.

Overall, I’m extremely happy with the results. The trigger feels excellent, the gun shoots noticeably cleaner and smoother due to short trigger reset, and the setup is beginning to feel much more like a properly tuned 2011 than a factory production pistol. Trigger pull weight feels very similar to my alchemy delta, but I don’t have a trigger pull gauge to say for certain. One thing I do want to is reduce lateral slop between the trigger shoe and the grip module. I’m considering different ways I can add small amounts of material to the grip module’s trigger shoe port, and would definitely appreciate some input. This is currently my carry gun and I think I’m going to keep it this way, at least until my ACW hicap carry comes in around December time frame.

Let me ask you something: what is Indiana best known for? Is it motorsports? Basketball? (Although Coach Cigs might be trying to turn that one around.) Maybe it’s astronauts and producing some of our nation’s finest aviation legends — I’ll give Purdue that one.

But I think we need to start adding phenomenal 1911s to that list too.

Today we’re taking a look at the ACW Delta 1911, produced by Alchemy Custom Weaponry in Fort Wayne, Indiana. We took her out to Dave’s Gun Shop in beautiful Holland, Indiana, to run her through her paces.

Now you might be asking: why are we even talking about the Delta? Only around 51 were made, and if you didn’t buy one within a couple hours of the unveiling, you probably aren’t getting one — at least not firsthand.

But correct me if I’m wrong: at its core, the Delta likely shares a lot of DNA with the Prime model. The fit and finish are exactly what you’ve come to expect from ACW — exceptional lockup, immaculate fitting, and a slide that feels like it’s riding on ball bearings.

Honestly, if you told me today that you wanted an Alchemy 1911, I’d seriously consider waiting for one of their restomod drops instead of placing a standard order. It’s one of the quickest ways to get one. Your pistol will probably be sitting at your FFL in less than a week, and if previous drops like the MEUSOCs and the Delta are any indication, chances are you’re going to end up with an absolutely badass pistol.

The Delta arrived in a nice black range bag with ACW’s signature Strong Arm sticker, a patch, two blued magazines, a gun lock, some literature worth reading through, and a commemorative dog tag.

Before heading to the range, I field stripped the gun and applied enough CLP to keep a 240 running. The barrel bushing was fit to the slide tighter than a nun’s… well, you get the idea. The slide release was tight as well, and in the process I managed to put a small idiot scratch on the slide. That one’s on me, not the gun. Oh well — she’s going to get scratches eventually anyway. No safe queens here.

We sighted in the Delta at 25 yards. Each click appeared to move point of impact roughly 3/8” at that distance. Eli and Nick were right: save yourself the trouble and just bump the elevation up about 13 clicks out of the box. That’ll get you on paper.

Over the course of the day we shot 500 rounds of PMC Bronze and another 200 rounds of Winchester White Box — all in the Lord’s chosen specification: 230-grain FMJ moving at approximately 850 fps. Not a single stoppage.

The recoil impulse was incredibly forgiving. I don’t know whether it’s the tight lockup or just good tuning overall, but recoil was noticeably softer than my M45A1. At times, I honestly felt like I was shooting my Prodigy.

The trigger deserves special mention. The short, smooth take-up, crisp break, and positive reset result in a gun that feels almost impossible to shoot inaccurately. Failure-to-stops, box drills, Bill drills, hammer pairs, and 1-6-2 drills were all shot with ease and at a cadence that surprised me.

The gun is far more accurate than I am, but even so, I managed to erase the barcodes off a couple PMC boxes at seven yards with some respectable cloverleaf groups.

All in all, I absolutely love my Alchemy. The Delta should hold me over nicely until my Quantico HiCap Carry arrives in December.

3yd range footage