Keep your range mags and your primaries separate
Gun magazines have various levels of quality. Some gun magazines are meant as throw aways i.e. 1911 magazines made in Tawain. I have several 1911 GI magazines that were pretty good range mags, but when they jammed up on me, and I could blame it on the gun springs, it was time to toss them. Buying Wolff gun springs that cost about $8 for an $8 magazine isn’t really worth my time, plus I’ve found that many of these have worn out followers and it’s really not worth the headach to tweak them, plus I’d consider them to not be worth using for self defense. Wilson Combat and Chip McCormick make very good gun magazines and both of them should help get your 1911 to be more tolerant of various types of ammunition.
The one thing I have learned over the years is that no matter how much money I spent on a firearm, I’m still going to have something break. When you put thousands of rounds through a firearm the you will eventually have to learn some level of gunsmithing. After taking some of my guns to gunsmiths and having to wait for months to get simple things done, it’s good to pick up an AGI video and do the changes yourself. The same goes for gun magazines. Parts on a gun magazine can wear out and depending on how much you spent on the magazine, you may want to just toss it in the trash. For some magazines, you will only have to replace the springs to get it back to reliable functionality.
Although I understand that polymer guns are here to stay and they are far more technologically advanced than their early metal counterparts, I still enjoy shooting my 1911 handguns. The 1911s that are being made today are really several generations beyond where the guns that crossed the European continent and fought on the beaches of the Pacific. The best improvements I have seen in the 1911 design compared to the GI guns are #1 the pistol sights, and #2 the gun magazines. The GI 1911 magazines weakness seemed to be the followers. The slide stops were so heavy that many of the times the tabs on the magazine would bend and the slide would close on an empty chamber.
Back when the 1994 assault weapons ban was into effect there were more headaches in the gun world due to the fact that factory handgun magazines were so expensive. People cut corners with other brands and had issues. When it comes to owning a handgun, especially an auto, I highly recommend having atleast 3 magazines. Not only can guns malfunction, but magazines do wear out and break at some points and its always good to have some extra comfort if one goes down. Most of the time it’s the floor plates that come loose and a loaded mag will just dump rounds on the ground. I’ve seen it happen with rifles and handguns. If you ever run a Carbine course, you’re defanitely going to want to have atleast 3 mags for your pistol, too.