Details
As you first heft the RIA 5.0, you notice immediately this is unlike your typical combat pistol. For starters, the barrel is square … on the outside. The inside is round and rifled, just like you might expect. The external contour, however, is essentially a box. This square shape interfaces seamlessly with a corresponding square cutout on the inside of the slide. That’s kind of weird, but it’s a good kind of weird. The slide rides on these glassy-smooth flats for an inimitably seamless cycling experience. This is tough to put into words, but you feel it right off when you cycle the slide by hand. Imagine warm snot across glass.
The barrel doesn’t tilt. Unlike conventional Browning-style autoloaders, the barrel on the RIA 5.0 remains stationary as the slide cycles. Everything remains directly in the line of recoil. More on that later.
The frame wraps around the slide in the manner of the Czech CZ75. This minimizes the slide gripping surface, but it drops the bore axis as low as physics will allow. It’s not really possible to drop the bore axis of a handgun any lower. This nifty bit of unconventional architecture also contributes to minimizing recoil and excising muzzle flip.
The gun is unnaturally nose-heavy. The forward portion of the pistol is a massive aluminum frame cut into a Picatinny rail. The front-heavy architecture combines with the rest of this radically innovative stuff to do some of the most delightful things to the gun’s recoil characteristics.
In keeping with the thoroughly unconventional nature of this beast, the frame itself is a composite of sorts. The structure is aluminum, while the grip is formed from a rugged polymer insert. The polymer bit is nicely stippled, easy on the mitts, and impervious to sweat and corrosion. The demarcation between steel and polymer is essentially seamless.
The hybrid nature of this design is just cool. The components that manage pressures and reciprocating components are all metal. The bits that interface with your soft sensitive flesh are polymer. It’s the best of both worlds.
There are but two controls. The magazine release is left-side-only and in the expected spot. The slide stop is likewise on the left side of the frame. Aside from a simply extraordinary trigger, there’s just nothing else to wiggle.
My particular test gun didn’t have any iron sights. In their place was a top-flight C-More red dot. As I said, this is a different sort of handgun. Rock Island is launching this pistol with a limited run of such optics-only configurations to be followed by conventional iron-sighted models, as shown in the pictures here.
The finish is a deep, rugged black that looks like that inky spot between the stars on a clear summer night. Fit and finish are both superb, as we might expect. Additionally, stamped discreetly on the right side of the frame, it reads “MADE IN USA-Cedar City, UT.”
Armscor, the international umbrella that owns the American company Rock Island Armory, is the largest manufacturer of small arms in SE Asia. They are the largest producer of 1911 pistols on the planet. Armscor is based in the Philippines and has been churning out quality firearms since right after World War II. It seems they are now going to try their hand at building guns on this side of the pond. I’m just giddy at the prospects.
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