From the web site: "Our 1911's are assembled in the Philippines by Shooters Arms Manufacturing, but they are made to our spec and our design, using our parts. All models have a forged slide that is CNC machined, and a cast frame that is CNC machined. All models have MIM parts, and the slide and frame are hand fitted for a nice, tight fit..."no wiggle", great accuracy".
The "Hawk" is their Commander sized 1911 and comes in 9mm and 45 ACP. It is an all steel gun, including the MSH. It has a matte blued finish; Novak® style low profile fixed rear sight & dovetail front sight; Beveled magwell; Lowered & flared ejection port; Thin, angled serrations in front and rear of slide; Barrel is black and then polished in port section; 3 hole skeleton smooth trigger & finger relief cut in frame near trigger; Skeleton hammer & beavertail grip safety with memory cut; Flat, serrated steel backstrap; Iver Johnson exotic walnut large diamond grips w/ fine line checkering & owl head logo. They also make a polished version but I prefer a consistent finish on my guns. Either all polish or all matte.
View attachment 83728
View attachment 83729
View attachment 83730
Ok, that said, I bought the gun to be used as a carry gun and all around shooter.This is my first 1911 though I spent some time shooting my dad's G.I. 1911's some 25 years ago. The gun as presented from the LGS was in the display case and fairly dry though my understanding is they are shipped covered in gun preservative. The roll stamps are not necessarily as straight as one would like. The "Hawk" logo is a bit uneven though it makes for an interesting effect, sort of modern and edgy. Anyway, the gun was tiight as a drum when I picked it up, no rattle, slide worked smoothly, trigger was fairly smooth and broke cleanly after a bit of take up. Trigger pull was heavy. I read a gun rag article that cited 8lb's. I believe the trigger pull was every bit of that. There is no trigger block My understanding is that it is a direct copy of a Colt series 70 commander internally. I took the gun home, field stripped it and lubed the snot out of it with gun lube and Phillips Aviation 10W30 that I had sitting around The gun started to leach some rust so I tried to get lube into every hole and crevice before I shot it.
On day one I shot 50 rounds of Tula through the gun and then 50 rounds of PMG 230gr brass ammo. All FMJ. I had two failures to feed and one double feed that I believe were due to rounds that were not completely seated in the mag. Once I started tapping the mag on my boot I had no failures. The gun comes with one factory mag that seems to work fine with FMJ ammo. The gun fed a clip of Remington Golden Saber 230gr JHP's just fine through a Chip Mcormick mag. I didn't test JHP's with the factory mag. The gun exhibited reasonable accurracy for a service gun at first but seemed to deteriorate over time. By the end of the session accurracy was not acceptable. I think the barrell had become overly fouled as I later found quite a bit of metal built up around the rifling of the barrell.
On day two, after cleaning the barrell but without any other cleaning, I shot another 100 rounds. Accurracy seemed to be improved though it's tough to tell because I didnt bench test the gun on this day either. Given the 8lb trigger this gun is not easy to shoot accurately. After the second range trip I discovered that the grip safety had become mushy and would not reset rendering it ineffective. I returned to my LGS to have the local 'smith bend the
third arm back as I was fairly certain that a lack of spring tension was causing the grip safety's lack of reset. They wanted to send it back to Iver where upon it would take weeks to return to me. I protested and they finally sent me to their 'smith at another location. It took him 15 minutes to adjust the grip safety arm of the sear spring. I also talked him into adjusting the center arm to lighten up the trigger pull. After the adjustment he measured the trigger pull at 6lb's 2oz's which isn't bad for a service gun so I was happy.
On day 3 I shot another 50 rounds of Tulammo 230gr FMJ that I had laying around off of a bench to get some idea of how accurrate the gun really was. The gun fires 1 1/2" high at 10 yrds and about 2 1/2 inches high at 15 yrds using standard ball ammo. It also seemed to shoot a bit high with the Golden Saber as well. Windage appears to be accurate.
View attachment 83732
View attachment 83731
The aim point target was shot off of a rest. The smaller targets were shot at 15 yards and the larger center target was shot at 10 yards.
The tactical target was shot at 10 yards using a combat grip/stance and was shot utilizing quick reactionary drills; squeeze the trigger as soon as the front sight is on the target. Two quick shot COM then one aimed shot at the head. Not great, but again, servicable.
The "Hawk" is their Commander sized 1911 and comes in 9mm and 45 ACP. It is an all steel gun, including the MSH. It has a matte blued finish; Novak® style low profile fixed rear sight & dovetail front sight; Beveled magwell; Lowered & flared ejection port; Thin, angled serrations in front and rear of slide; Barrel is black and then polished in port section; 3 hole skeleton smooth trigger & finger relief cut in frame near trigger; Skeleton hammer & beavertail grip safety with memory cut; Flat, serrated steel backstrap; Iver Johnson exotic walnut large diamond grips w/ fine line checkering & owl head logo. They also make a polished version but I prefer a consistent finish on my guns. Either all polish or all matte.
View attachment 83728
View attachment 83729
View attachment 83730
Ok, that said, I bought the gun to be used as a carry gun and all around shooter.This is my first 1911 though I spent some time shooting my dad's G.I. 1911's some 25 years ago. The gun as presented from the LGS was in the display case and fairly dry though my understanding is they are shipped covered in gun preservative. The roll stamps are not necessarily as straight as one would like. The "Hawk" logo is a bit uneven though it makes for an interesting effect, sort of modern and edgy. Anyway, the gun was tiight as a drum when I picked it up, no rattle, slide worked smoothly, trigger was fairly smooth and broke cleanly after a bit of take up. Trigger pull was heavy. I read a gun rag article that cited 8lb's. I believe the trigger pull was every bit of that. There is no trigger block My understanding is that it is a direct copy of a Colt series 70 commander internally. I took the gun home, field stripped it and lubed the snot out of it with gun lube and Phillips Aviation 10W30 that I had sitting around The gun started to leach some rust so I tried to get lube into every hole and crevice before I shot it.
On day one I shot 50 rounds of Tula through the gun and then 50 rounds of PMG 230gr brass ammo. All FMJ. I had two failures to feed and one double feed that I believe were due to rounds that were not completely seated in the mag. Once I started tapping the mag on my boot I had no failures. The gun comes with one factory mag that seems to work fine with FMJ ammo. The gun fed a clip of Remington Golden Saber 230gr JHP's just fine through a Chip Mcormick mag. I didn't test JHP's with the factory mag. The gun exhibited reasonable accurracy for a service gun at first but seemed to deteriorate over time. By the end of the session accurracy was not acceptable. I think the barrell had become overly fouled as I later found quite a bit of metal built up around the rifling of the barrell.
On day two, after cleaning the barrell but without any other cleaning, I shot another 100 rounds. Accurracy seemed to be improved though it's tough to tell because I didnt bench test the gun on this day either. Given the 8lb trigger this gun is not easy to shoot accurately. After the second range trip I discovered that the grip safety had become mushy and would not reset rendering it ineffective. I returned to my LGS to have the local 'smith bend the
third arm back as I was fairly certain that a lack of spring tension was causing the grip safety's lack of reset. They wanted to send it back to Iver where upon it would take weeks to return to me. I protested and they finally sent me to their 'smith at another location. It took him 15 minutes to adjust the grip safety arm of the sear spring. I also talked him into adjusting the center arm to lighten up the trigger pull. After the adjustment he measured the trigger pull at 6lb's 2oz's which isn't bad for a service gun so I was happy.
On day 3 I shot another 50 rounds of Tulammo 230gr FMJ that I had laying around off of a bench to get some idea of how accurrate the gun really was. The gun fires 1 1/2" high at 10 yrds and about 2 1/2 inches high at 15 yrds using standard ball ammo. It also seemed to shoot a bit high with the Golden Saber as well. Windage appears to be accurate.
View attachment 83732
View attachment 83731
The aim point target was shot off of a rest. The smaller targets were shot at 15 yards and the larger center target was shot at 10 yards.
The tactical target was shot at 10 yards using a combat grip/stance and was shot utilizing quick reactionary drills; squeeze the trigger as soon as the front sight is on the target. Two quick shot COM then one aimed shot at the head. Not great, but again, servicable.