Originally Posted by
JTQ
As soon as "controlled round feed" got mentioned in your OP, I was sure you had read that article.
While I appreciate all the hard work that went into writing that article, both part one and part two, most readers come away with erroneous take aways, primarily that Wilson Combat mags bypass "controlled round feed". The author makes that claim, but never proves it, even in part two where he slow motion, without a recoil spring, runs the slide cycle and shows the rounds feeding from different mags. If it were true, that Wilson mags by-passed controlled round feed, it would be because of the feed lips and nothing else, which as you mention in the OP, the vast majority of 1911 mags use wadcutter feed lips.
Edit to add: I'm not smart enough to know if Wilson mags do or don't by-pass controlled round feed, just that in spite of the claim, the author doesn't prove it, and nearly every other mag would also by-pass controlled round feed since almost all of them have the same wadcutter feed lips.
What most commonly happened when folks read those articles was they tell a forum they dropped their Wilson mags because of this information and switched to Chip McCormick (CMC) or Tripp mags to fix that problem, because of course there weren't CMC or Tripp mags in either article. The error of course is that CMC and Tripp also have wadcutter feed lips, and if loss of controlled round feed was a problem with Wilson mags, it would also be a problem with CMC, Tripp, ACT-Mag, and just about every other mag out there. It just doesn't seem to be the case.
I bought into the "hybrid feed lip" mania about 15 years ago, when I first joined M1911.org and subsequently read those "how-I-did-it" articles. I'm sure the late John Travis (1911Tuner) typically forgot more about 1911's while sleeping overnight, than I'll ever know, but what I found was, #1 my hybrid lipped CheckMate mags all caused inertia feed (1911Tuner told me to replace the springs with Wolff extra power springs since those early CheckMates came with a weak spring. It didn't fix the problem), #2 my 1980's era Colt (I'm the original owner) came with Metalform hybrid lipped (the hybrid lips are a Colt design) mags that have worked perfectly, #3 if you look at just about everybody that shoots a 1911 either professionally or trains folks professionally to shoot the 1911, or custom 1911 makers, almost all of them use mags with wadcutter feed lips, whether they prefer Wilson, or McCormick, or Tripp, or any other brand of mag.
The dimple/pimple on the follower also seems to gain a lot of traction. Sure it was there when Browning designed the gun and mags, but Browning's mags all had GI feed lips that hold the rounds less securely than wadcutter feed lips, and it really is only an advantage for the last round in the mag. If you have wadcutter feed lips, you probably don't need the dimple/pimple on the follower, but probably do with GI feed lipped mags.
I have versions of all feed lip styles. Sure, the GI and hybrids probably feed a little smoother, but the wadcutter feed lipped models will feed ball ammo just fine, but with a little "ker-chunk" feel, though that's kind of how I think a 1911 should probably feed. The top makers typically use wadcutter feed lips, and I get the feeling one reason is they are just easier and simpler to make, and because of this they are probably made correctly more consistently. Another thing to think about, of all your non-1911 mags, do any of them have any thing other than parallel (wadcutter) feed lips?