have owned four. Each one of them was reliable enough for range duty, but 1 out of 10 times on the last round of a magazine they would jam the head of the empty case into the feed lips of the magazine effectively locking the gun up. This made them useless for USPSA or carry. One had to go back three times because it was going full auto and twice because it was breaking barrel link pins and once because it wouldn't extract (and they never fixed the extraction issues).
I have personally witnessed two out of time firing pin safeties go click instead of bang and one of mine does it too. I know one other person who had the full auto issue and he got it fixed in one trip because I explained to S&W how to resolve it.
The extractor is .125 high while a regular internal extractor is .175 high. Draw your own conclusions. Also be aware that as the hook wears it can drastically effect performance and reliability because the bottom corner of the hook is the critical surface when it comes to preventing this jam and there really isn't much material left after the hook has been dressed to aid feeding at the factory. This is not a problem that will always show up immediately as there are a number of other tolerances that affect its appearance.
If you don't believe me then see what Hilton Yam has to say:
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I am awaiting updates from S&W re: the proposed changes to their external extractor. Some samples of the extractor system work well, others not so well. The placement of the extractor is a bit high and the round slides off the hook during barrel linkdown. As the round slides off the hook, the extractor loses purchase. Some guns will continue to work ok, but you will occasionally see a casing eject to the front or up over your head. This is less than ideal and indicates marginal purchase of the extractor on the casing.
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http://www.10-8forums.com/ubbthreads...true#Post51066
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Just wanted to add my experience with the S&W 1911s to Ned's excellent analysis.
The fit of the beavertail to the frame tangs - specifically the side to side play at the junction of the frame radius/thumb safety hole and the grip safety - can also affect the timing issues. If the fit is loose, the safety can actually be depressed along more than one line, allowing more than one variation in the timing. When I was up at S&W, they recognized this issue and were working to tighten the tolerances in this area.
In experimenting with the firing pin and safety plunger, I tried a number of mods to increase the clearance between the two parts in order to favor the timing lag. All the mods were ultimately unsuccessful, and the parts ended up peening each other.
The S&W extractors need to be closely monitored as they age and wear, as they all seem to work pretty well when very new. As the part wears, the performance starts to vary dramatically. Most users do not notice problems with their guns, as the bulk of the guns out on the commercial market do not get very high round counts on them.
For a few years, Smith has been planning the introduction of a new extractor and the deletion of the firing pin safety on their 1911s. These changes do not happen fast, but if/when they do, I feel that their 1911s will be an extremely solid offering for a duty 1911.
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Buy a Colt or a Springfield so you don't have to deal with non-standard "improvements" to the design.
If you are unfortunate enough to have one of these problem guns I know of several partial solutions that may get it running well enough for gaming.
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Sig 226ST 9MM
The gun is reliable and good (maybe the best) for a DA auto but it is still a DA auto. The DA trigger reach is too long and the SA trigger reach is too short. Trigger reset is also long. I regret getting the stainless frame because it does not transition well and makes the gun heavy for carry. The grip is quite thick and does not conceal well. The factory grips squeaked and had play in them so I replaced them with hogue rubbers which are thick and tend to grab clothing. There was some light barrel springing which worked itself out on its own.
The factory sights are terrible. They are regulated so the POI is behind the white dot on the front sight and the front sight is too thick allowing too little light for feedback and it also obscures the target. There is no shortage of aftermarket options, but it would be nice if they came standard with a half decent set. Bar-dot is dead, let it go, it was never that good to begin with.
The manual of arms is %100 incompatible with the 1911 because the slidelock lever is in the same location as the thumb safety. This makes it difficult to get a comfortable grip high enough to be worth mentioning. This is already exacerbated by the large grip and long DA trigger reach.
The SA trigger is 4.5 pounds and crisp with a large quanitity of overtravel. The DA trigger broke in to 10 pounds or so after I replaced the mainspring with a 19 pound Wolff spring. Older carbon steel slide Sigs will have a worse DA trigger even with a lighter spring because they have a different (longer) mainspring.
I would only recommend this gun for people who are not going to be shooting competitively and are going to train extensively enough to master it. For the same level of effort you would get much better performance from a pseudo-DAO or SA gun. This is not to say that the 226 cannot perform as well, just that it is more difficult. It also stood up well to >1k rounds/month in USPSA.