A fellow at work has a U.S. Property marked pre-A1 1911. It has been nickel plated, so I'm thinking the collector value is gone. He inherited the gun and knows nothing about guns (I only know enough about 1911s to know its a pre-A1.) The barrel has some rust in it. Can a new barrel be simply swapped out, or is there some fitting involved? Where can one get a correct size barrel for this gun? Thanks

Hi CM, from Britain. First it isn't too difficult to REMOVE nickel by a electro chemical method...so you don't need to use grinding wheels, sand paper and the rest. I'd speak with either a specialist gunsmith that does plating and/or a specialist plating company that just does general nickel plating.

Many years ago I owned and early 1911 that had the half-moon shape rear sight...not the later flat top rear sight.

The barrel looked like the inside of a drain pipe. Dark, rifling barely visible, rough surface but no pitting mind, like a drain pipe.

With cast lead Hensley and Gibbs type #68 (200 grain SWC) it shot off-hand two inch groups at twenty yards. All day, every day, and didn't lead up either.

So as bad as those barrels look some pistols still shoot well. I have a Tokarev pistol that also has a bad looking barrel and that shoots off-hand four inch groups at twenty yards with sixty year old Czech military factor ammunition.

So I'd try it first as long as the barrel, even though rough and ready, is in safe condition. Give a good soak in what in USA you call kerosene for a few days. Also liquid molasses aka Evaporust is good.

As to swapping another barrel from a 1911A1 it shouldn't need any fitting or gunsmith work. But it is so long ago that I wouldn't know if that was the same for any MkIV/Series 70 collet bush barrel.

Hope it helps. Bit the nickel isn't with the RIGHT treatment the need for a destructive removal.

For in World War One a lot of Brit officers in India had factory nickel Webley revolvers that were sent back to Webley with the instruction "de-nickel and black" for when they went to fight in France in the trenches.

I've seen many such guns (they tend to be older WG Webleys) and if you didn't know from Webley's records that this had been done you couldn't tell that it had.

Cheaper to just get a new barrel; and they usually drop in. Not always. It is the link/lug fit that might need fitting. But for a worn 1911, a real mil spec barrel will drop in. A new after market one, who knows.
Lots of sources for barrels. $50 from SARCO and Brownells has a plethora of them. Hundreds of them on that auction site. But a NOS one will cost more than the pistol is worth.

Thanks for the advice!