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I've been looking for a CCO 1911 for a few months, and finally decided to pick a Compact CDP yesterday. I hesitated to go with a Kimber because of the reliability issues that I've heard about, but ultimately decided to give them a chance. This gun gave me most of the options that I was looking for out of the box, and was less than half of what I would have paid to have one custom made to my specs.

A few upgrades are in its' future, but I want to identify any reliability issues before making any changes to the gun. I got out to the range early this morning with 300 rounds. I was planning to make it through them all, with a break to clean halfway through. Unfortunately, I only made it through 150 before the range that I was using to shoot was needed to set up for a match.

Kimber recommends a 400-500 round break in period, cleaning every 100-150 rounds. I was prepared for more failures than I ended up having, but only had four failures to feed out of the 150 rounds that I fired today. Three of the FTF were with the Kimber mag on the last round, and only one with my Wilson mag. I'll be sure to look into getting more quality mags, as I suspect that the Kimber mag wasn't up to par.

I wasn't as focused on accuracy, as I was on function testing the gun, but was very pleased with the accuracy from 7 yards. I've been very impressed by the gun thus far, so here's to hoping that it continues to improve, and will run flawlessly after the break in period!

150 rounds from 7 yards:

I have two Kimber UCII’s. I followed flintknappers suggestions for break-in ideas which are simple. After over 1000 rounds through both guns I have had no problems. I know that Kimber recommends very light oiling. But I use Lubriplate, I guess because of military training. Good luck with your VERY fine gun.

Commander Cody wrote:I followed flintknappers suggestions for break-in ideas which are simple.

My googlefu is not working well. Do you happen to have a link please?

Edit: Persistance pays off (I think): Found Here

Lapping the rails with red jewlers rouge has always worked for me.

Commander Cody wrote: Lapping the rails with red jewlers rouge has always worked for me.

Thank you sir!

Beatiful gun! Thanks for the report.

Its a beauty.

What do you plan on adding/changing after reliability check?

RECIT wrote:Its a beauty.

What do you plan on adding/changing after reliability check?

Thank you. I'd like to add a mag well and get a grip safety with a bump. Down the line, I'm thinking that I'll get it refinished in BlackT, but that will be after it has developed some character. I like the grips pretty well, but can see some benefits to going with a composite. I'm sure that more ideas will develop with time and use.

The grip safety with the bump you speak of. Is it a little bump at the bottom of the grip safety about half way up the grip? If so I have had two different 1911's with that feature added and I did not care for that at all. I have small hands to begin with and I found it to kinda bite my hand/or apply more than comfortable pressure in that part of my hand while shooting.

RECIT wrote:The grip safety with the bump you speak of. Is it a little bump at the bottom of the grip safety about half way up the grip? If so I have had two different 1911's with that feature added and I did not care for that at all. I have small hands to begin with and I found it to kinda bite my hand/or apply more than comfortable pressure in that part of my hand while shooting.

My concern is making sure that the grip safety disengages, so that I'm able to fire with a less than perfect grip during a stressful situation. I hope that I don't find it to be too uncomfortable while shooting, but I guess that I'll have to try it to find out for sure. I like the smooth look of the grip safety on the gun now, but think that I'll take any advantage that I can get from a carry piece.

Another 150 rounds through the gun today.

The stock Kimber mag gave me two more FTF, giving me a 5% failure rate with that mag. On the other hand, my Wilson mag has only had one FTF out of 200 rounds.

I trust the gun, but I don't think that I'll be using the Kimber mag anywhere but the range.

Interesting.

Gave Mr. Shasta the same gun (bought from DaveT here) for his birthday in November. 2 Kimber magazines. We've put over 300 rounds through it without so much as a hiccough.

Shasta wrote:Interesting.

Gave Mr. Shasta the same gun (bought from DaveT here) for his birthday in November. 2 Kimber magazines. We've put over 300 rounds through it without so much as a hiccough.

I have regretted not buying that gun from DaveT since I saw it was sold!

I'm sure that you and Mr. Shasta will enjoy it!

LOL im laughing because I have two Kimbers (Eclipse Custom and a CDP Pro ) with Two Brand new magazines from Kimber in the safe. One is a 10mm and the other 45 Acp. I use Wilson mags in both have never even tried the Kimbers Magazine. Read alot of reviews about them.

I have a real good deal on Kimber mags one in 45 and one in 10mm lol. Take care thanks for the update.

How are you liking that single action trigger?

Congrats on a very nice pistol. An Ultra CDP has been by most-often carry since June 2007. It definitely has some "carry character" by now.

And I'm with Keith. This was my fourth Kimber; bought the first one circa 1995. Years ago I began using Wilson mags only, then migrated to the newer Wilson Elite mags when they came out.

I was concerned about the reliability of the three-inch gun, but was pleasantly surprised. I did do a tiny bit of fluff-and-buff when I first got the Ultra, and have run it only with Wilson mags. I've never had a failure. I shoot various types of standard ball through it (WWB, S&B, Monarch, Fiocchi, etc.), and Ranger +P 230 gr. rounds.

Enjoy the new CDP! I think you'll like it a lot.