I scratched my 9mm 1911 itch and ordered the Tisas "Duty" 5 inch all steel 1911 from Classic Arms for 339.00.
This configuration comes with:
ambi-safety(I'm sinister)
Novak style 3 dot sights
front slide serrations
beveled mag well
undercut trigger guard
a 3 hole medium length trigger
2 x 9 round unmarked mags(Checkmates per sumdood on the internet)
All in a nice plastic box that has a plastic bushing wrench, a nylon bore brush and a plastic slotted patch jig. According to Tisas, every gun that comes in the plastic box has no MIM, only forged parts. Some of the late 2022 guns were all forged also, but the box is the definite cutoff.
It's Ceracoted a smooth matte black, slide to frame fit is tight enough not to rattle but can be moved and barrel to slide fit is very tight. The bushing is finger removable and it has a GI recoil system. The only markings on the slide are a small Tisas eagle and the word "Duty" behind the rear slide serrations.
The only sharp edges are on the ambi-safety (thanks, guys), with undressed sharp edges for the lefty though the right hander side is okay. the safeties are smallish carry types with very positive on/off clicks.
Loading the 9th round in both mags is a thumb peeler/buster.
The trigger has smooth take-up, a wall that requires between 4.5 and 5 pounds to break, and it has no creep or roll. Reset is short, positive and tactile.
I sharpied the rear sight dots, dabbed the front dot orange, made sure the barrel was hollow all the way through,lubed it and hit the range Friday.
The first hundo was Winchester NATO ball. Recoil was soft, with a pronounced muzzle flip. I had 2 failures to eject, both in the last round of the mag. The first had the brass laying loose on the follower and the second ended up backwards between the magazine and the feed ramp.
Brass to face was pronounced(lefty again), with the rest hitting the ground behind me at 1730.
Up next, 100 blazer brass(Eli's duty carry of choice), even softer with less muzzle flip and 100% function.
The sights are apparently regulated for 147 grains, because even at 10 yards I'm hitting low. Windage is dead on, and while I've not benched it yet, the gun groups well at 15 in "front sight press"cadence fire
I took it home, stripped , cleaned and lubed it again. I took out the safety and went to town with a file.
Today I fired 50 each of Norma Training, Maxxtech Steel and Blazer aluminum with 100% function. So, 350 rounds of asssorted ammo with 2 malfs in the first hundred rounds, both with NATO +P.
I've ordered a couple of recoil springs, 11 and 13 pounds, to experiment with and a MecGar 10 rounder. The safety needs more filing.
Handling it next to my RIA .45 FS, the Rock has a trigger that is lighter by about a half pound and much crisper. The slide to frame fitment on the Rock is better. I like the parkerizing better than the Ceracote. I prefer the Rock's safeties, although I had to take a hacksaw to them as well.
All in all, a promising start.