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About Cylinder & Slide
How
Bill Laughridge became a pistolsmith & more
By
Mac Scott
In
the early seventies, as a young man in Fremont,
Nebraska, Bill Laughridge
hung out in the local gunshop just about every
Saturday. It was there that he watched the shop
owner's son make a futile and brutal attempt at
taking apart a Colt Woodsman to "fix
it." Just before the guy totally lost his
cool and heaved the hapless .22 against the shop
wall, Bill asked if he could have a go at it, and
he did so successfully. This was the first step on
the road towards today's Cylinder and Slide, Inc.
Like
so many in the gunsmithing business, Bill's career
began when he realized he had a natural aptitude
for understanding the mechanics of firearms and
saw a demand for such services. Although many
people can be and are taught about how firearms
fit and function, the really good 'smiths seem to
have a natural ability towards that end.
Laughridge is one of those.
Bill
worked for several years as a gunsmith in a
couple of different shops in Nebraska. It didn't
take too long for the local IPSC crowd to start
flocking to his door for modifications on their
191 is. Soon Bill was accompanying some of these
fellows to the Second Chance World Speed Shooting
Championships in Michigan, toting a box of tools
and parts with him, to repair any of his buddies'
guns that might decide to fail in the middle of a
world-class shoot. It wasn't long before word got
out and people started flocking to Laughridge for
on-the-spot help during the match.
Never
one to ignore opportunity, Bill Laughridge checked
out a tent from his Army Reserve unit, lugged it
out to the next Second Chance and set up his
"Armory," offering quick repairs for the
broken and soliciting custom pistol work from the
willing. Business blossomed, particularly after
Evan Marshall sidled up to Laughridge the second
year he had his tent setup and asked him to build
a revolver for him. That gun soon wound up the
basis of an article in a major handgun magazine
and Laughridge was officially "on the
map."
Bill
opened Cylinder and Slide in November
of 1978 and began advertising nationally. He also
had a specially equipped trailer built to his
specifications and annually traveled to most of
the major IPSC matches (he found this trailer to
be far superior to the hand-receipted Army tent).
From this trailer he could do everything from
minor repairs through almost building a complete
race gun from scratch. After dragging this trailer
around for close to twenty years, Laughridge
finally discontinued the shooting circuit about
four years ago.
"I'm
getting too darn old to haul that trailer from
coast to coast and border to border," says
Bill, who claims he averaged about 50 MPH towing
that trailer; a little quick math will disclose
how long it takes to travel from Nebraska to
California, New York and Florida at that speed.
One can hardly blame him for giving up that end of
the business. Nonetheless, Bill is typically blunt
and open about the experience.
"I've
met some really great people and made some
lifelong friends," says he,
"while traveling to those matches. I wouldn't
trade it for anything. Hell, I think that I've
fixed a race gun during a match for just about
everyone of the big name shooters. I don't know
one of them that isn't
a nice guy and willing to help an up-and-coming
shooter. Says something about our sport, doesn't
it?"
Today,
Cylinder & Slide is one of the more respected
pistolsmithing firms extant. A quick glance at
their website (www.cylinder-slide.com) gives an
insight into the work they do on pistols by Colt,
Ruger, Browning, Kahr, ParaOrdnance, SIGARMS,
GLOCK, S&W, Walther and H&K, just to name
a few. From basic reliability work through
serious, full-house custom handguns, C&S seems
to have a package for almost everyone's tastes and
budget. They also normally have fully customized
handguns in stock for immediate delivery to a
customer's FFL dealer, for those who simply cannot
wait.
Cylinder
& Slide also manufactures many high-quality
parts for the 1911, Browning Hi-Power and numerous
other firearms. We've been using their hammers,
triggers, sears and other custom parts for the
Hi-Power for years now and have never had a single
problem with them. Quality is first rate; trigger
pulls achieved with these parts, when properly
installed and fitted, are match-grade. C&S
also makes extended thumb safeties for the BHR
These are some of the best safeties we've seen for
this gun. They work well, fit perfectly and look
as good as they function.
C&S
is one of the few firms that makes custom parts
for the little Colt .380 series of pistols,
primarily extended thumb safeties for the Mustang
and Government .380. Since Scott, McDougall has
been known to do a bit of work on, and make
specific parts for these particular guns, we long
ago reached a sort of accord with Cylinder &
Slide: They don't manufacture Colt .380 guiderods
and triggers and we don't manufacture safeties.
It's been a symbiotic relationship, with each
company buying their needed parts directly from
the other. I wish all our business relationships
were as seamless and rewarding.
Of
late, Bill Laughridge has been touting his new
sear/hammer sets for the 1911. These sets come in
various trigger-pull settings and consist of five
separate parts each: hammer, sear, disconnector,
hammer mainspring and sear spring. There are
several models of these "trigger pull
sets" available, with trigger pull weights
set at 4.5, 4, 3.5 and even 3 pounds. C&S does
a 100%
inspection on each part and includes a Rockwell
hardness certificate with them.
  
 
Each
kit is installed in a test frame and set for the
pull-weight advertised. This is the trigger pull
the customer can expect
in his gun, although certain allowances must be
made for individual tolerance differences. Details
such as pin-hole regulation will obviously have an
effect on the trigger pull of any 1911. As it is
often said, "your results may vary;"
nevertheless, our experience with a couple of
these kits has been that the trigger pulls they
provide are so close to those advertised that only
a slight amount of sear spring tweaking puts them
right on the money.
C&S
offers a limited lifetime warranty with these
trigger pull sets. If the parts have not been
modified in any way and they break or wear out,
Cylinder & Slide will replace them at no
charge-period! Prices range from $116.50 for the
4.5 pound set to $183.75
for the 3-pounder. (Prices have changed, since
the publication of this article, visit our online
store HERE
for the latest prices.) They are also available as a
three-piece set (sans springs) and with beveled
hammers. The accompanying pictures will give you
an idea of what these parts look like; a trip to
C&S's website will give you full price and
delivery info if this sounds like what you're
looking for. (C&S parts are also available
through Brownells.) Not pictured but soon
available is a spur-hammered set identical to the
one (identified as the "Mcorps Set")
C&S is manufacturing for the U.S. Marine Corps
Marksmanship Unit.
Oh, and about that C&S "handlebar
mustache" logo. A friend designed that for
Bill as he entered the business years ago, basing
it on Laughridge's trademark facial hair.
According to Bill, the logo "kinda caught
on" and became symbolic of his business and
doomed him to sport a handlebar mustache for
probably the rest of his business life.
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