Detonics Combat Master .45acp

[DJTC45]

Just picked this up last Friday at Goodlettsville Gun Shop, they handled the Transfer for me. I purchased this one off of another site I belong to. Came with orginal bag, owners manual, and one Mag. I found another orginal Mag. and bought it, man the original Mags. are expensive if you can find them. As soon as I feel well enough I'm going to take it out and run some rnds. through it. I've always wanted one of these for some reason.

[hipower]

Congrats!! That brings back memories of reading Jerry Ahern's The Survivalist Books.

Always loved that that Double Alessi Rig with the Twin Detonics Combat Masters!

[Garufa]

That’s from back in the day!  Good looking pistol.

[hipower]

My late brother-in-law(it's only been 6 months, so I keep referring to him this way), had a Detonics for a range trip one time. I vaguely remember shooting it and it must have been good, I tried to buy it from him. No idea what ever happened to it.

[leroy]

A genuine " Blast from the Past "..! Aint seen one of these in forever... Im glad ya rescued this guy...

On a related note; i seem ta remember that Colt tried a slightly warmed over copy of these pistolas, but they couldn't do anything with the popularity of the Detonics and finally quit tryin.

Admirin leroy...

[DJTC45]

Thanks guys, I can't wait to try it out. I've heard they were great running guns to have a 3",Bbl. it's not easy to find some of the parts for. I do have a source for recoil springs but orginal Mags. are hard to find and cost as much as my Staccato P 4.14 double stacks or more. I'll post some pics when I get time to go shoot.

[seez52]

I worked for a wholesaler back in the 80s and we were Detonics distributors. I remember admiring them at the time. They were always on the pricey side. The last batch I recall us having included some that did not have sights. They were meant to be that way. 

[MP5_Rizzo]

Nice pistola!

I remember these from back in the day but never got bitten by the "I gotta have one bug".  looking at the photo I noticed the shortened sight radius so I had to find out why.

"Perhaps the most obvious of these concerned the absence of a grip safety and the sloping contour along the rear of its slide, which lessened the slide’s mass and sped up its shortened travel. The rear-sight assembly was moved forward, closer to the ejection port. Although this decreased the pistol’s already short sight radius, the Combat Master still proved accurate at close range."

 

CLASSICS: DETONICS COMBAT MASTER

 

Edited December 29, 2020 by MP5_Rizzo
Added exceprt

[DaveTN]

Wow… some of those have sold on GB for $1000-$1300. Some have listed them as high as $3K, of course they had no bids.

I had one back in the early 80’s. Nice compact gun, but they didn’t cost much back then.

[gregintenn]

Looks new!

[DJTC45]

It hasn't been shot much from what I can tell, can't wait to try it out.

Edited December 30, 2020 by DJTC45

[Moped]

On 12/25/2020 at 5:40 PM, hipower said:

Congrats!! That brings back memories of reading Jerry Ahern's The Survivalist Books.

Always loved that that Double Alessi Rig with the Twin Detonics Combat Masters!

Soon as I saw the title, I was thinking the same thing!  Those were pretty good books and I always wanted one of these after reading the series! 

Can it run Colt Officer mags too?

[hipower]

I'm not sure, but I don't think it's possible. Proprietary mags, I think.

EDIT Well seems that it is possible. lol See following posts.

 

As far as the books, I just found some. On ebay of course. And ordered a few. My wife will not be happy.

Edited December 31, 2020 by hipower

[DJTC45]

I've been told by other owners that the officer mags will work they just don't fit flush. I've got two original Detonics Mags. and they are hard to find and expensive when you find an orginal. I was also told by another guy that has a few of these and he said the Wilson Sentinel  magazine's will work but I don't know, I may try and find one to try out, and probably buy an officer size to try also.

[ken_mays]

The only thing special about the Detonics mags are the custom length, IIRC.   Standard 1911 mags will work but won't fit flush to the frame.  The recoil assembly was the other special thing about these, getting the right springs to replace them can be a challenge.

The reason for the odd cut on the slide is that the designer intended the gun to be carried hammer down, so provisions were made to make thumb cocking quick and easy.   Apparently it's also not uncommon for the piece of metal above the extractor at the rear of the slide to crack off, I've seen photos of two guns that happened to. 

There is currently a really nice example on the shelf at Arms Fair in Memphis for about $850.  Looks to be a later model, or one that had some custom work done.  Black/OD Cerakote and checkering.  I've thought about picking it up but haven't successfully talked myself into it.

Edited December 31, 2020 by ken_mays

[DJTC45]

Wolf still sells the springs, haven't heard of the breakage part. This one was made in Seattle Washington.

[ken_mays]

You can see in the photo below that a corner of metal has broken off above the extractor.  

[DJTC45]

Not sure how that was caused by shooting, but I guess anything is possible. Could have been a flaw in the metal or heat treat process, but I'm not to worried about the one I bought, I'm not going to run 10,000rnds down it anytime soon and I'll definitely won't shoot +P's through it.