question on firing glocks

Midget

Midget

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Jun 1, 2002
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i fired a glock 26 today at the range (not my first time using a glock). i experienced a few problems and i was looking for some insight.

first, the g26 does not act quite like the "traditional" automatic handgun that i'm familiar with (i primarily only shoot my 1911). i was likely doing something wrong in chambering the weapon-- it seemed as if the first round i fired *always* misfired. that is, i would charge the weapon and fire, but it would just click. i pulled the bullet out to see a small indent where the firing pin had engaged the primer, but obviously not enough to cause an explosion. what was i doing wrong?

second, is it just me, or are glock magazines very difficult to load?

just curious. i am impressed with the handling of the weapon and the overall reputation of their reliability--i'm deciding between a glock 19 or glock 30, depending on whether i want both 9mm and 45acp laying around, or all 45acp...
 
you had one of two things going on.

1) possible defective primer on the round

2) worn out firing pin on the Glock

Range rentals at some ranges aren't maintained as well as they should be.

at a nice indoor range/gun shop just South of Tacoma I shot a Glock 19 that had the recoil spring replaced at 2000 rounds.

it is possible that after thousands of rounds down range that the firing pin was worn and needed replaced. It is also possible with ammo to have been bad primers.

Other than that I don't know why you would be experiencing failure to detonate the primers. But I am not a Glock certified armoror nor a Glock owner. I am certified by the US Army as an armorer for the Berretta M-9 (9mm pistol), M-16 (A1 and A2), M-60, and 12 guage shotgun (Winchester 1200 complete with bayonette mount and heat shield)

Dave
 
secondly, the 26/27 mags can be difficult to top off. I perfer to put a few rounds into mag and insert into gun with slide locked back/open and chamber a round by letting the slide fly forward. Then pull mag and fill to one less than max as in 9 in 9mm and 8 in 40 (just what I perfer to do). releives some pressure in the mag and you still have 10 rounds in the 9mm. It can be difficult to chamber a round with a full mag inserted in a closed slide. As to the first issue; miss-fire (light strike) on first shot there seems to be a problem other than you I would think... UNLESS the slide is not fully locking up due to resistance from a full mag slowing slide speed on chambering by hand... which is way I always load from the slide locked open. Fully break it in if it's new...or send it back for factory work. Great guns IMHO. good luck
 
yup, sounds like a light strike, range guns likley have a hundred thousand rounds through them or more.

and glock mags, especially when new, are very hard to load, more so toward capacity.
 
so....

i'm not doing anything wrong?

the thing that makes me wonder about it being a "light strike" is that it only happened on the 1st round. and consistantly. i could eject the round by hand and let the slide load the second round, which worked every time.
 
1) Ammo type? I have fired thousands of rounds through my Glocks, and every malfunction I have ever had was because of the ammo, not the gun. Generally, failure to fire was due to dead primer, failure to chamber was due to bad crimp, and failure to extract was due to the wrong powder for the cartridge (hey, it looked good in the loading manual :o )

2) Method for chambering first round? If you insert the magazine with the slide locked back and thumb down the slide release to chamber a round, it may not go completely into battery. The slide then moves forward the last couple of thousandths when the striker moves forward, cushioning the strike. Try pulling the slide all the way back to release the lock, then release the slide and let it run into battery on its own.

3) Most high capacity magazines are difficult to load until you develope "Glock thumb". Then it becomes easy (and you don't need a nutcracker to eat walnuts, either :D )
 
lizardman_u said:
you had one of two things going on.

1) possible defective primer on the round

2) worn out firing pin on the Glock

Range rentals at some ranges aren't maintained as well as they should be.

at a nice indoor range/gun shop just South of Tacoma I shot a Glock 19 that had the recoil spring replaced at 2000 rounds.

it is possible that after thousands of rounds down range that the firing pin was worn and needed replaced. It is also possible with ammo to have been bad primers.

Other than that I don't know why you would be experiencing failure to detonate the primers. But I am not a Glock certified armoror nor a Glock owner. I am certified by the US Army as an armorer for the Berretta M-9 (9mm pistol), M-16 (A1 and A2), M-60, and 12 guage shotgun (Winchester 1200 complete with bayonette mount and heat shield)

Dave
Click to expand...

I was about to say just about the same thing. Glocks usually just work, but like all things mechanical, can wear or have weakened springs or have been modded or less likely, bad primers on the ammo.
 
yablanowitz said:
Most high capacity magazines are difficult to load until you develope "Glock thumb". Then it becomes easy (and you don't need a nutcracker to eat walnuts, either :D )
Click to expand...

Just after buying a glock 17L I managed to slice my thumb open requiring a emergency room visit, since the wife and I couldn't get it to stop bleeding.

A few days later I visited the gun range with an ex(?) marine buddy who was showing me the ropes on the 17L. Lord that was painful. He had a number of choise words till I showed him my thumb.
 
2) Method for chambering first round? If you insert the magazine with the slide locked back and thumb down the slide release to chamber a round, it may not go completely into battery. The slide then moves forward the last couple of thousandths when the striker moves forward, cushioning the strike. Try pulling the slide all the way back to release the lock, then release the slide and let it run into battery on its own.

This is what I meant to articulate. I pull back the locked open slide and let it fly home. Was recently instructing a new "recruit" and she could not get her head around the technique... kept riding the slide causing a fail to chamber.
 
I never could get the glock loader, I am way faster without it. I do notice that my friends struggle to load magazines, while I just breeze right through it.

Maybe I have strong thumbs.

As to the misfires, I would chalk it up to a worn or poorly maintained pistol. Who knows how many rounds it has seen.
 
I'm glad you mentioned the failure to fire on the first round. My Glock 20 only has a few hundred rounds through it, so there's no problem with worn springs. However, when shooting jacketed practice rounds, on several magazines I had the first round fail to fire. Upon checking, the primer was indented, and would fire after I re-inserted it into the gun. I'm a little concerned that if I ever need my gun in a deadly encounter it won't fire -- NOT a comforting thought.

As far as being hard to load -- that's just loading a Glock, it seems. I do it by hand, and I've sort of gotten used to it, but it's still hard.

All in all, though, I love my Glock, and am very glad to have it by my side.
 
mountainmain, sounds like what was happening to you was exactly what was going on w/ me.

i was shooting "fiocchi" ammo. i think. maybe spelling incorrect. FMJ, w/ red primers.
 
Fiocchi put out high quality ammo back when I was shooting a lot, so it probably wasn't that.

Was the gun yours, a friend's or a rental? If there is a carbon buildup in the chamber, it can cause that sort of problem. So can weak springs, strong springs on fully loaded magazines, and loose hold on the grip while letting the slide run into battery.

Did you try firing the same round a second time, and did it fire on the second try?

Sorry to be so nosy, but I have several Glocks, and have shot many others, and I have never encountered a consistent problem with any of them.
 
this isn't a wear issue. Generally this kind of malfunction occurs because the striker channel has never been cleaned.
 
..but only on first round in a fresh mag? every time? might be a combination of several things conspiring to that effect...
 
IIRC Fiocchi has harder primers than some other brands. I found this out when I was tuning a pistol for competition. If I went with the lightest hammer spring possible, I had a great trigger pull but fairly frequent failures to fire.

My bet is on a combo: ammo with slightly harder primers than other brands, Victory's point in the striker channel, and a worn recoil spring failing to get the pistol all the way into battery when you load the first round.
 
who knows?

and it doesn't really matter--my problem is likely due to the fact i was using a rental-- one with thousands of rounds through it w/ no maintenance.

what i was concerned with is that maybe i was doing something wrong, since i'm not very familiar w/ glocks as i've only been shooting my trusty 1911. but i like glocks, i think i'll go for a g19.

i got my commission too, on 21dec2006. i'm an officer now. ;) :D

thanks for the the advice everyone.
 
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