Having a good experience with my metro arms contender, I was planning on getting a metro arms amigo, I was fortunate enough to try one at the factory, the recoil was comparable to the fullsize 1911, and was small enough to fit in my front pocket. A colt is one of the guns which I also plan to purchase, but to be honest I see no difference in terms of quality, accuracy, reliability, finish between a colt government model compared to my metro arms contender, maybe I am not that experienced enough. I was able to examine a colt defender and metro arms amigo when I went to the Philippine gun show yesterday, I was surprised by the big difference in finish, the metro arms was a lot better. The price difference is very big, the colt defender cost 2,100 dollars compared to the metro arms amigo which cost 695 dollars. Having a stable medical practice I can afford to buy the colt defender, but since it is hard earned money I want to make sure that it is worth it. Do you guys think the quality of the colt defender is worth paying 2,100 dollars?

We still haven't seen any Amigo's here in the U.S. I wish they carried another name, but they didn't ask me my opinion!!

Buck Nekkid

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Buck Nekkid
That's the way I was born...That's the way I'll die!

I would vote the Defender here, but it may be over there you could better service on something made there.

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NRA Life Member

dakota1911, i have no experience with the defender, seems like a nice gun, but since you seem to have experience with it, is it worth paying 2,100 dollars?
Parts might be a problem since colt does not have a distributor in my country, parts for full size 1911 abound, but parts for a 1911 officers might not be readily available.

I have a couple RIAs and they are fine guns. I paid a little over $300 US for the first (bottom) one new and a couple years later a littler over $400 US for the top one. They are all steel guns and worth what I paid for them.



I have a couple Defenders and even over here they are not cheap. The one on the top is a 9mm built in 2010 and it was almost $1K. The older one is a .45 ACP I bought back in 2002. Would have to look up what it cost. I did change the grips on both Defenders.



I order parts through Brownells, Midway, and Colt itself (coltsmfg.com). No problem here, but not sure what it is like over there.

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NRA Life Member

Most critical parts are the same between the Officers/Defender frame and the Government frame.

Same:

Trigger
Sear
Disconnector
Hammer
Sear Spring
Slide stop
Magazine Catch
Grip Safety
Thumb Safety
Extractor
Ejector
Barrel Link
All pins

Different:

Grips
Magazine
Mainspring
Mainspring housing & internal parts

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Hawkmoon
On a good day, can hit the broad side of a barn ... from the inside