I got this one on a trade after looking for quite awhile for a Clackamas this clean. Anyone who follows these early Kimbers knows they are getting harder and harder to find. There are only 7000 of them with the Clackamas roll mark but you don’t see them for sale very often. The deal was especially sweat because it is much nicer than the pics I was sent before it was a done deal.
Also I’d never handled one of the late 90’s Kimbers before and this thing just reeks of quality. If Kimber would have kept up this level of fit and finish, and been able to hold the price, they would have no competition today to speak of. The only thing I’m sad about is it has an idiot mark that I’m trying to figure out what I should do about. If any of you have some ideas I would like to hear them.
A 1911 “Idiot Mark” is where someone, when reinstalling the slide stop, accidentally went too far with it and managed to completely FUBAR the pretty finish on the slide. It looks like someone took a protractor & an exacto knife and cut a perfectly round GASH into the slide.
All I can say is, whatever you do, do NOT try to dremel polish an idiot mark out of a blued slide.
(Yes, I was dropped on my head when I was young and did many awful things to guns with a dremel tool. Lets not talk about the work I did on that one AK to make that 8X POSP scope to fit…sigh)
no, no, no… they’re called Genius Marks and they’re caused by the sharpness of the user’s mind… scratches everything around you. and they’re on all of my guns.
There are 7000 total Clackamas marked Kimbers but very few of the Custom Royals. That plus it was in much better shape than I thought it was going to be makes pretty special to me.
