Title says it all. How many have been effectively bought by the USMC?
Do they get the spare parts with each contract, or are they purchased separately from Colt when the need arises?
The contract specified “drop in” parts, and colt claimed they actually achieved this, perhaps with some special runs of better dimensionally controlled parts?
Now that Colt’s future is uncertain, will the existing spare parts be enough to service the guns in the future at the armorer level, or eventually the USMC will require again theyr own group of gunsmiths to keep them running (something they were trying to avoid with this contract)?
I don’t know that anyone here can answer this question and if they can, they probably won’t (FYI). Colt will end up being just fine so the parts (which are not unique to Colt alone) will be available to Marines.
C4
IF all the parts are drop-in as the Colt rep claimed here and in 1911 forum, then they are unique…
Colt ain’t going anywhere. Although, hopefully everyone will panic buy up all their guns.
Question is how many are still using them and how many have been replaced by Glock 19’s.
Contrary to popular belief, everything on a Colt is pretty much drop-in. I’ve seen a lot of M1991s that had functional thumb safeties with no fitting. Colt extractors will drop in on any properly built 1911 and run fine without all the black majic tuning you read about. Same with barrels.
It is not something I read about 
… but I’m sure some small parts do fit without even minor fitting in some guns. But true drop-in parts means 100% interchangeable parts, including sear, hammer, extractor, thumb safety, barrel, bushing, etc. with NO fitting whatsoever. Perhaps even Colt has improved their dimensional tolerances in later years and this is a more common occurence, but much of the allure of a modern high grade 1911 lies with a good trigger, crisp safety, good accuracy, etc., not simply something that works fairly well most of the time.
In any case, these fabled absolutely in-spec parts only come from (later production) Colts, and if the company goes down they will be more difficult (or imposible) to get. The parts from other vendors, even if they are high quality parts, don’t share exactly the same blueprints/dimensions down to the very small details that are essential for true drop-in parts.
Grant (FYI) is very confident Colt won’t go down, so perhaps I worry in vain.
That comment needs to be repeated often on multiple sites.
Approx. 2300* M45A1s will be purchased over a 5 years period.
I won’t post the actual number based on the Website owner’s post
Acquisitions of small arms is not classified or limited distribution information, in reality the only thing that cannot be released is company provided proprietary information. Which does not really exist for the M45A1 program.
The pistols this thread is about are late model Colts…
And thus this comment is still pertinent (with my doubts about the 100% true drop in parts): “In any case, these fabled absolutely in-spec parts only come from (later production) Colts, and if the company goes down they will be more difficult (or imposible) to get. The parts from other vendors, even if they are high quality parts, don’t share exactly the same blueprints/dimensions down to the very small details that are essential for true drop-in parts.”
For 2300 or so pistols, getting a bunch of spare parts from Colt (even if they are a special batch, or selected with somewhat tighter dimensional tolerances) does not seem all that difficult.
I’m under the impression that they’d mothball the pistols and use their Glock 19s. Which they’re pretty much already doing anyway…
Base SRTs and Force Recon Companies are not getting Glocks; MARSOC uses both depending on mission and the users’ desires.