Kimber 1911's with the External Extractor
 

I bought an Ultra CDP II Kimber 1911 a couple of years ago for my carry weapon. I was happy with the fit and finish, but the external extractor always cause me problems (FTE).

I went to Wilson Combat mags, and it made it a little bit more reliable, but still not enough that I was totally comfortable with it.

Since I had read on some of the 1911 forums that Kimbers customer service was pretty good, I decided to give them a call.

Since I hadn't been in the market for a new gun for a while I wasn't aware that they had gone back to using the internal extractors (why they ever changed I will never know).

Long story short, they replaced the slide with a completely new one. I have been very pleased with their customer Service.

So if you have a Kimber with the external extractor, there is a fix.

Bill

Thanks...I like happy customer stories...

Another case of "fixing something that ain't broke". The internal extractor is pretty darn foolproof. Kimber, and others, thought they could "improve" it. Nice to hear they are good about "un-improving" it.

Yep, they fixed something that ain't broken. The internal extractor was good enough for the military torture tests back in the early 1900s.

It's fine for a 1911 today, also!

+1.
That is why I purposely sought out a nice used Series-1 Kimber when I bought mine. Kind of like the Series 70 to Series 80 (de)evolution IMO... Just because something is simple, doesn't mean it needs "improving".

The only thing I can think of is that they changed it to add a round loaded indicator.

Bill