Picked up a mid-90s vintage steel-frame Colt Commander on GB Saturday, from a guy who lives about 3 hours east of here. Got family over there, so we drove over to visit and I met the guy to get the gun. Very nice shape, some finish scuffs but almost no wear to the internals. Wilson night sights and Ajax medallion Ivorex grips.

Got to get out and shoot it tomorrow.

Best Commander I ever had was a mid-90's Ugly Rollmark 1991A1 with a CJ serial prefix.

That's exactly what I've got. Shot a bout 30 rounds this morning for function check. One FTE and one failure to go into battery. I'm going to dig out my good .45 magazines and see how it works with them. Not sure about the ones that came with it.

there are a bunch of innernet how-to's on that. Chip McCormick 8 round Power Mags have been universally good for me, BTW.

field strip it and remove the barrel from the slide. Push an empty case into the slide from below so that the rim goes under the extractor. There should be enough tension to hold the empty case in place but not too much. If the slide comes back and leaves the case laying in the port then I think that is not enough tension. You can buy a new extractor or you can bend yours slightly.

The 'correct' way to measure extractor tension is by using a trigger pull gauge, or even weights, attached to a loop of fishing line.

Using a piece of brass that isn't all beat up from multiple loadings and firings (or from simply chambering it too many times), place the empty cartridge in the slide as noted above by bj2.

Slip the loop of fishing line around the brass, and pulling straight downward (or upward if using weights), measure the amount of force required to release the brass from the extractor's grip on it.

How much force should it take?

Frankly, I don't remember, but I'm sure that can be found pretty easily via Google or your favorite search engine.

HTH

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