The 1911 Centennial Project

It has been 100 years, so this year I decided to build a 1911 into what John Moses Browning would have made if he had access to modern materials and engineering. ย I had the egg-heads at Gun Nuts Skunkworks design a software program that perfectly reproduces John Moses Browning’s thought processes and design philosophy (in other news, we created sentient AI on accident) but gives the program access to the aforementioned modern materials, engineering processes and design breakthroughs of the last 100 years. ย With access to this information, the Gun Nuts’ JMB-AI went about the task of designing the pistol JMB would have built if he lived today. ย Hit the jump for the result!

HK45c

34 Comments

  1. I think you are 100% correct. Browning never stopped inventing and I would love to see what he could come up with if he had today’s technology at his fingertips.

  2. Seeing that pic after the jump made me throw up in my mouth a little. Blasphemy!

  3. brilliant… ๐Ÿ™‚

    HK’s and 1911’s are my two loves in the firearms world. It is hard to argue that the HK45c isn’t the culmination of what the 1911 style firarm has progress and evolved into.

    sure it has a different trigger mechanism, different grip/frame material, different lockup, etc.. but the lockup is pulled from the HiPower, the grip/frame is basically the latest and greatest of what modern materials have provided. the grip angle, general size, controls and accuracy are on par and true to the 1911 ergonimics.

    the quality and durability/reliability cannot be topped by any other modern system.

    the HK45c is with me as I write this. sure, i carry 1911 commanders from time to time as well, but the HK45c is a fantastic addition, and worthy of note.

  4. Glib, but actually the Glock is probably a lot closer.

    If you look at JMB’s successive designs, as he refines them over time, they tend to get simpler and simpler through each iteration, with one part serving multiple functions.

    The HK45 is a fantastically durable and reliable and accurate pistol, and I’d not hesitate to own or tote one, but its RubeGoldberMaschine internals are pretty far from Browning’s design ethos.

    1. I vacillated on whether I should put the Glock or the HK in, what tore it for me is that I don’t believe that JMB would have put plastic sights on a gun. ๐Ÿ˜‰

        1. In all seriousness though, I really do believe that if JMB lived today, he would have designed something that looked a lot like an M&P 9mm; the man was very practical after all.

          1. Major
            Mega
            Ditto’s

            (M&P-45 would be my first guess, but, I know JMB fell in love with the 9×19 during his work on the hipower)

  5. JMB (PBUH) created the 1911 and the Browning Hi-Power, both full-size service pistols. If your computer program worked correctly, it would have spit out the HK45, not the HK45C. Obviously, your program is fatally flawed and your results must be tossed out.

  6. You forgot to factor in the modern liability laws at which point Mr. Browning would have said ,screw this I’ll design umbrellas .

  7. Browning never did design a double action, although the mechanism was well known. While he might have used polymers, he clearly had a preference for single actions. And there really haven’t been too many new single actions since his time. It’s a good thing his designs still work, ’cause I don’t think we’ll ever get another that’s truly in his style.

    1. If I was trying to do something other than tweak 1911 fanboys, I would have posted an M&P, because I believe that actually is what JMB would have designed if he still walked the earth today.

  8. Where the HK falls down in terms of it’s JMB-ism is in the trigger mechanism. No way JMB would have followed the 1911 with a DA/SA. Even in his time I sure he was fully aware of how much it is the antithesis of a fire control system that’s easy to shoot well.

    I’d rather have had JMB design the MnP. At least it would have had a decent trigger in it.

  9. I just got back from Apex tactical and they just came out with a New trigger for the mp. it mimics the 1911 trigger. and in a MPc it would be like having a double stack compact 1911. now JMB would like that!!

  10. So, John Moses Browning is now a malfunctioning AI inhabiting a cyborg body, 13 computer-controlled milling machines and most of a highly-automated former Mitsubishi manufacturing plant in Bickerstaff, Alabama.

    Because you suck . . . . and JOHN MOSES BROWNING HATES YOU . . . . . from beyond the grave.

    1. I was going to say, I have a hard imagining John Moses Browning (pbuh) saying “You suck and we hate you!:

  11. Also unknowable, but an interesting exercise: If JMB had designed a revolver, what would it have looked like?

  12. “If JMB had designed a revolver, what would it have looked like?”

    Alot like the Webley-Fosbery Self-Cocking Automatic Revolver, but a bit more refined.

  13. Caleb,

    I think your computer has a virus. It may have actually crashed during that computation.

    Please, for your sake and your readers, don’t trust any further information from it.

    ๐Ÿ˜‰ RAM

Comments are closed.