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It looks like I will soon be the owner of a 1911. If all goes well, I will be picking up a Rock Island Armory Tactical 5" from Becky at Sporting Arms next week. I'll post pictures as soon as I can.

My question to all of you 1911 guys and gals is what mags do you use in your 1911 and why? I'm looking at 7- or 8-round mags. I'll think about 10-rounders later (maybe). I know many of the answers will be subjective, and I don't want any "You should avoid brand X" comments. I just want a pool of mags that you folks have had good experiences with to start trying so I can find out what will work best in my pistol.

barres wrote:It looks like I will soon be the owner of a 1911. If all goes well, I will be picking up a Rock Island Armory Tactical 5" from Becky at Sporting Arms next week. I'll post pictures as soon as I can.

My question to all of you 1911 guys and gals is what mags do you use in your 1911 and why? I'm looking at 7- or 8-round mags. I'll think about 10-rounders later (maybe). I know many of the answers will be subjective, and I don't want any "You should avoid brand X" comments. I just want a pool of mags that you folks have had good experiences with to start trying so I can find out what will work best in my pistol.

Your RIA Tactical will come with one Novak 8 rnd mag.Novaks works well with Ria.As for extra/upgrade mags I like to use Wilson 47D mags.They work so well with all 1911 full and midsize.

Congrats on the new Tactical, they are great guns..

I remember there used to be some 1911 mags made by ACT/Novak (at least I think I remember that). I now see ACT mags and Novak mags. Did they split their partnership, are they still together but their products don't clearly indicate that, or am I completely mistaken?

barres wrote:I remember there used to be some 1911 mags made by ACT/Novak (at least I think I remember that). I now see ACT mags and Novak mags. Did they split their partnership, are they still together but their products don't clearly indicate that, or am I completely mistaken?

I believe you are right. It's still act/novak mags.

ACT-Mag of Italy makes 8 round 1911 mags that are used by many manufacturuers. S&W, Sig, Nighthawk, Armscor and RIA. There are probably many others. You may see a mag with any number of names roll marked on it but if you look closely at the edge, they will all say ACT-MAG in very small letters.

1+ the 47d mag's work great with my STI and Colt.

Wilson, Metalform, and CMC mags here, and all been working well. Next on the list for me will be Tripp Research Cobra mags.

http://how-i-did-it.org/magazines/

A series of articles written by a friend of mine, who has done lots of self-testing.

He prefers the newer colt factory "Hybrid" mags has he calls them. His reasoning is outlined in the article, and seems very good to me.

Chip McCormac, Wilson, ACT, MetGar, Metalform they are all good if they work in YOUR gun. I have a 1911 that won't feed from a Wilson mag but, Chip Mc and MetGar run like a top. Go figure!

barres wrote:It looks like I will soon be the owner of a 1911. If all goes well, I will be picking up a Rock Island Armory Tactical 5" from Becky at Sporting Arms next week. I'll post pictures as soon as I can.

My question to all of you 1911 guys and gals is what mags do you use in your 1911 and why? I'm looking at 7- or 8-round mags. I'll think about 10-rounders later (maybe). I know many of the answers will be subjective, and I don't want any "You should avoid brand X" comments. I just want a pool of mags that you folks have had good experiences with to start trying so I can find out what will work best in my pistol.

Welcome to the club! I think you will be happy with it

lawrnk wrote:
Welcome to the club! I think you will be happy with it

Does that mean you found a RIA, yourself? I remember you were looking a short time back.

Reysc wrote:

barres wrote:I remember there used to be some 1911 mags made by ACT/Novak (at least I think I remember that). I now see ACT mags and Novak mags. Did they split their partnership, are they still together but their products don't clearly indicate that, or am I completely mistaken?

I believe you are right. It's still act/novak mags.

After doing some more digging, it looks like they're no longer the same mags. Although the only difference seems to be that the Novak mags have removable floorplate base pads, and the ACT's do not. Just FYI, for those of you who get as curious about such trivialities as I do.

I've tried almost all of them...

but i keep buying the Wilson mags... they're about 30-40$ a pop depending where you order/buy them... but they've lasted several thousand rounds and look and work like new.

my only remaining novak failed to engage the slide release last range trip.. it went into the trash. If i can't trust it to do what i'm used to/need it to do, it's garbage.

I also have several factory colt 7rd mags... they're all from 1976 when the colt was purchased by the original owner... they still function flawlessly... but for me, the wilson mags have won the day and will be my standard to measure all others.

I like anything with the bumper pads on the bottom. My favorite is the Wilson Combat; however, at $30 a pop on a good day, they're a bit much.

Chip McCormick also makes some with the bumper pads. Dad found some for me at the gun show for $15 a pop.

I've always had good luck in my Colt Series 80 Commander with Wilson Combat magazines - both 7 and 8 rounders.