Any decent Colt, original Delta Elite is an excellent investment. Longtime lurker.
That said, I do not care for the 10mm cartridge and it's a direct result of the very early Colt 1911 platform. I had endless problems with a very early Delta Elite as pictured above, rubber stocks, etc. It was very early.
Some history of why!
I could not get cases; the only ammunition I could get was Norma, for which the Colt platform was inadequate; 200 grain bullets at who-knows-what-velocity, and I retrieved maybe 1 of 5 of the brass, seeing as how it kicked 30 feet away. There were routinely hard brass marks on the slide because the gun was badly timed and the case came out so fast it hit the mouth on the slide. Colt prevaricated. Next up was Hornady, not so bad but not great either, 180 grains; but all this came in boxes of 20 at outrageous cost. I recall Norma was 65 cents a round in maybe 1989? that was a lot of money when .38 Special could be had for $6/50.
Magazines were also a huge problem: my DE came with a magazine with a solid floorplate, but other Colt brand magazines came with that nipple thing, and on the first round dumped all the cartridges out of the bottom of the gun from the recoil, which was barely controllable as the slide hit so hard. 'WHAP'!
All this was complicated by buying Lyman dies that weren't bored concentrically and damaged every case I managed to retrieve. Because nobody made dies. Powders were also an issue at the time: nobody knew how to reload it and I recall AA #9 was my go-to, IF I could get it, and maybe AA #7? WW231 would barely get you past .45ACP performance which wasn't even worth it.
I got on the phone with Hornady and they basically told me to load it down to .45 ACP levels. What was the point of that?
The Norma brass was also incredibly hard, I've not sure why; may have been the dies, may have been the brass, but it was hard. I had to use lube with Lyman carbide dies I spent a lot of money for, and they trashed the cases anyway.
Properly sized jacketed bullets were also a major problem.
Oddest experience was walking by a gun store in Budapest Hungary in 1993 and seeing a Colt Delta Elite 10mm in the window! I walked in and talked to the owner, he said he'd had it for 3 years.
I'm sure it's a great cartridge, NOW, after the bugs have been worked out, but man, those early days were a nightmare. I finally sold mine to a guy I worked with who just liked it, with 50 rounds of factory ammo, 4 magazines, for USD$400. I was sick of it. I bought the gun brand new for USD$450. At that point I was delighted to off it.
I forgot to mention all the metal was so sharp I was badly cut within the first 3 rounds by the front and back straps, and the trigger guard.
My opinion is, early Colt DE 10mms belong in collections. They were not ready for prime time. I would not even consider owning one ever again except as a collectible. Yes, I had Bad Luck and shouldn't blame the combination but I made my choice, and I won't do it again. I won't own another 10mm.
I got sprayed by a skunk.
I anticipate a bunch of hate about this, and I'm not trying to start a fight, really, but I believed Colonel Cooper and got one, very early, thinking Yeah, it's the greatest thing since sliced bread, but found at least the Colt variant and ammunition available at the time, was dog meet dog.
I think it's an excellent investment! Much better than say a Colt 2000, which I handled at the time and went, Eh.
Now, with the 10mm being codified and dimensions standardized and such, it's a different story and it's matured; but I'm like...
Pass.
Good investment though; the early ones went through hands like mine, where I grew to hate both the platform and the cartridge. I boxed my Delta Elite 10mm and returned to carrying a S&W M19. They were that bad.
