Ka BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM, Read & Weep

[milprileb]

http://www.jouster.com/forums/showthread.php?43205-Hard-lesson-on-shooting-lead-in-polygonal-rifled-barrel

[ukrifleman]

No chance of that happening this side of the pond. That was one lucky fella!
ukrifleman

[FLYCUTTER]

Buy plastic junk guns and expect to get hurt down the road. My feelings on the matter is if you can't afford a quality gun don't buy anything until you can get something you can pass down to another generation. They will appreciate your Kimber as much as you do now. They never fail and you can stake your life on it.

[Love Life]

So much fail. So much....

[bhn22]

90135

[Tucker]

I may be wrong but I don't think that damage to that gun is due to shooting led bullets, seems to me there is an error some place else that nobody wants to admit. I would think (well it don't matter what I think ) just glad nobody got hurt. I mean if it blew the case apart where it was unsupported maybe a case failure, really hot round I don't know. But if you shoot long enough things like this may happen just like driving in a car you never know when you are going to get in a crash.

[prs]

Notice that one responder claims to have seen this hundreds of thousands of times! He also says he never exaggerates. Oi-Vay

H377, any pistol can be made to lead with high pressure hard cast ill fitting boolits with crappy lube; does not have to be a Glock. And the reciprocal is that Glocks with poly barrels don't have to be lead prone.

prs

[HATCH]

I would lean towards a powder charge gone wrong....

[prs]

I would lean towards a powder charge gone wrong....

Or a a split case mouth that let the boolit slip way back in the case upon feeding.

prs

[Love Life]

If you are mentally retarded, then YES!! You can cause a Glock to kaboom.

If you can read, have solid comprehension skills, have critical thinking skills, and use the scientific method then you will be merrily shooting cast in your Glocks with nary an issue. Reloading, and even shooting, just isn't for everybody.

◦Ask a Question
◦Do Background Research
◦Construct a Hypothesis
◦Test Your Hypothesis by Doing an Experiment
◦Analyze Your Data and Draw a Conclusion
◦Communicate Your Results

[seaboltm]

any gun can kaboom. don't fool yourself into believing otherwise.

[milprileb]

any gun can kaboom. don't fool yourself into believing otherwise.

I would submit this is true with human errors in reloading but I would also submit, the Glock is a helluva great pistol but.... and this is my bias... if I had a pistol Ka Boom, a steel one is less likely to hurt me than a plastic one. Just saying...nothing against polymere framed pistols , they have good track records.

If nothing else, the threads of lead bullets in Glocks or H&K stimulate thinking.

[Doc_Stihl]

Ignorance yelled loudly and confidently is often construed as law by the general IGNORANT masses.
You can't shoot lead in a rifle, It'll make the moon crash into the sun.

[dkf]

Buy plastic junk guns and expect to get hurt down the road. My feelings on the matter is if you can't afford a quality gun don't buy anything until you can get something you can pass down to another generation. They will appreciate your Kimber as much as you do now. They never fail and you can stake your life on it.

^^^This post has as much fail as the guys whom gun kaboomed. Glock "Junk", Kimber "quality". LOL


I would bet money cast boolits had nothing to do with the kaboom. Probably the guy that loaded the rounds.

[vintagesportsman]

Dittos here...
Or a a split case mouth that let the boolit slip way back in the case upon feeding.

prs

[vintagesportsman]

Well said again...
As one who has had a "Kabooommmm..." in his past - it most likely "AINT" the gun or bullets: powder or casing.

^^^This post has as much fail as the guys whom gun kaboomed. Glock "Junk", Kimber "quality". LOL


I would bet money cast boolits had nothing to do with the kaboom. Probably the guy that loaded the rounds.

[1Shirt]

To each his own, but I believe in mfg disclaimers! Never had a hankering for a glock!
1Shirt!

[Dryball]

As much as I dislike plastic guns there's gotta be something else is amiss. Sounds like an improperly fit boolit and poor cleaning practices. If it's the rifling how is it that Shillen, Kreiger, et. al can make the 5r/ratchet rifling and have success shooting...just sayin

[smokesahoy]

did he say the powder used? generally it is a new person using economical powders that is starting to speed up the process and accidentally double charges. i shoot lead out of the glock factory barrel in .40 all the time. i select powders that fill the case to my oal.

generally it pans out to being something like tightgroup or similar fast burn that had a overcharge that still didn't even come close to filling the case.

800x may meter poorly, but if you overcharge it the case will be overflowing.

glocks get more kabooms because there are a **** ton of them out there compared to steel frames and polymers in general appeal more to people just getting started as they have been historically so much more affordable.

correlation =/= causation.

[Doc_Stihl]

A case head failure due to an unsupported case head is as likely as anything.

[seaboltm]

To each his own, but I believe in mfg disclaimers! Never had a hankering for a glock!
1Shirt!

If you believe in mfg disclaimers you should stop reloading NOW. No mfg I am aware of will tell you reloads are ok.

[smokesahoy]

these threads are nothing more than thinly veiled attempts to flame people that don't have the same likes as you. most reload safely and never have this issue regardless of the platform leading me to wonder what is the purpose of this incendiary topic if not just to start a childish internet flame war? it's not like you are delivering some new information that will uncover a fundamental flaw leading to a safety issue that we should all be aware of right?

[1950Hudson]

If you follow the OP's link to the Kaboom thread and read down a bit to the post mortem,

"there was so much lead in the barrel it looked like a smoothbore...hadn't been cleaned for 2000 rounds..."

[dkf]

If you follow the OP's link to the Kaboom thread and read down a bit to the post mortem,

"there was so much lead in the barrel it looked like a smoothbore...hadn't been cleaned for 2000 rounds..."

I missed that. Funny thing is polygonal barrels look an awful lot like a smooth bore to start off.

Anyway. The guy was negligent with his lead reloads. Kept shooting a load with leading issues and ignored any cleaning. Not a fault of the cast boolit, not Glocks fault. All the blame lies on the young man. Hopefully he will pay more attention to what he is doing in the future.

People like the young man are exactly why Glock's (and other gun companies) lawyers have them put in all kinds of warnings. If they did not have the warnings they just leave themselves open to frivolous lawsuits.

[xacex]

looks like the work of an "expert" in reloading:killingpc

Do you want to compare the bore between that glock, and mine which has shot many,many rounds of lead boolits? We can play "guess how many rounds down the pipe since it has been cleaned." Pick a number between 1-599.

[MBTcustom]

Oh yeah.... That was undoubtedly caused by cast lead boolits.
And monkeys fly out of a frogs ***.

There are poor people out there who want so desperately to be cool and make bang sounds. It's just so much for them to get their mind around all at once, and who has time to actually read these days?

So they charge ahead without realizing that one of the things you pay for with factory ammo is a certain level of QC.
Then when things blow up, there's a whole troop of equally uninformed shooters who make fun of them and post their mistakes online.

All I'm going to say is "Fit is King" even in a Glock.

If any of you are members over there, please inform the OP that his friend can send the pistol to Glock and they will repair it for about $350.
Buddy of mine did the same thing to his Glock, but he didn't have the convenience of having cast boolits to use as a scapegoat. His problem was a double charge of Bullseye.
Hmmmm, I wonder what powder this guy was using? wanna bet?

One other thing, Somebody tell me how a Glock can fire out of battery.
There's so much misinformation in that thread it was hard to read.

[possom813]

any gun can kaboom. don't fool yourself into believing otherwise.

No kidding, I've had this picture in my phone for a while and finally figured out how to get it onto the computer.

This was a brand new Kahr, as in just taken out of the display case, 4473 ran, and walked out the door and onto the range for his CHL qualification(literally brand new)

I believe it was the 3rd or the 7th out that this happened with, factory ammo that was off the shelf behind the display case.

[wistlepig1]

If you follow the OP's link to the Kaboom thread and read down a bit to the post mortem,

"there was so much lead in the barrel it looked like a smoothbore...hadn't been cleaned for 2000 rounds..."

This comes up way to often to bad mouth Glocks and cast bullits. I have shot thousands of cast in my Gen 1 21 Glock and I have a cleaning Kit and USE IT! Select a powder that will overfill the case if double charge, use a powder check die, know what the h#$# your doing. You can only help those that will read, learn, do it right.
Ok i feel better now, flame away!

[milprileb]

"Negotiating with Obama is like playing chess with a pigeon. The pigeon knocks over all the pieces, s**** on the board and then struts around like it won the game." Mr. Putin

Is that a for real quote ?

[seaboltm]

"Negotiating with Obama is like playing chess with a pigeon. The pigeon knocks over all the pieces, s**** on the board and then struts around like it won the game." Mr. Putin

Is that a for real quote ?

This site says it is fiction:
http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/p/Putin-on-Obama-100513.htm#.UqeIDvRDvTo

[Tucker]

looks like the work of an "expert" in reloading:killingpc

Do you want to compare the bore between that glock, and mine which has shot many,many rounds of lead boolits? We can play "guess how many rounds down the pipe since it has been cleaned." Pick a number between 1-599.

xacex
If I quess it right do I win anything..:kidding:

[dkf]

No kidding, I've had this picture in my phone for a while and finally figured out how to get it onto the computer.

This was a brand new Kahr, as in just taken out of the display case, 4473 ran, and walked out the door and onto the range for his CHL qualification(literally brand new)

I believe it was the 3rd or the 7th out that this happened with, factory ammo that was off the shelf behind the display case.

Similar thing happened with a brand new G38 on another forum. He decided to put a couple mags of Winchester White Box through it on the way home from picking it up at the gun shop. Didn't even get a full mag through it before it Kaboomed. Winchester foot the repair/replace bill.

[armexman]

Miss Huevos,
Glocks go KABOOM because of reloader error. Not WW lead with a touch of tin an antimony.

[jmort]

Nothing gets the Glock fan-boys overwrought like a Kaboom. Glocks go kaboom enough that there is a term for it, "Glock Kaboom." Cast boolits are but one cause. Stupidity is the #1 cause. Bottom line, there is no reason not to own a Glock, other than preference for another gun.

[wistlepig1]

I don't know if it is true on not but you do have to see the truth in the sentiment!

"Negotiating with Obama is like playing chess with a pigeon. The pigeon knocks over all the pieces, ****s on the board and then struts around like it won the game." Mr. Putin

Is that a for real quote ?

[KYCaster]

Miss Huevos,
Glocks go KABOOM because of reloader error. Not WW lead with a touch of tin an antimony.


I have to disagree......Glocks go kaboom because of Glock's unsupported chambers and sloppy tolerances.

Friends of mine who have been involved in training at Louisville PD, Jefferson County PD, Jefferson County Sheriff's Dept. and more recently Louisville Metro PD have documented numerous Glock KB's.....all with issue ammo. They don't cut corners on training ammo; they train with what they carry and have changed from Remington to Winchester to Federal trying to cure the problem, but the brand doesn't matter.....Glocks blow up.

The problem appears to be that the gun will fire out of battery. Depending on tolerance stacking, some by a substantial amount. Combine that with a generous feed ramp and you have a KB waiting to happen.

There have been many more Glock KB's with jacketed ammo than with lead boolits, simply because there are many more jacketed bullets shot from Glocks. Lead boolits come with their own issues including leaded barrels (for whatever reason, including poorly finished barrels) and lube or lead deposits in the chamber. Any of these issues can interfere with chambering, which can cause the out of battery condition.

Check the fine print in the owner's manual that came with your new gun....no matter who made it and chances are the warranty is void if you shoot reloads (lead or jacketed).

Jerry

[mikeym1a]

Okay. I don't like Glocks. They are ugly. A gun friend owns and carries one, and loves it. He gave it to me to heft, one day. It didn't 'feel' right. My 1911A1 'feels' right. That aside, what is is about a glock that causes so much controversy? What does a polygonal barrel have to do with anything? To me, that seems like Marlin's microgroove barrels. Why not lead in a polygonal barrel? And I have seen a few things on this site with cautions about how to load glocks that seen out of the ordinary. Are they that different? As I said, I am ignorant of glocks, but this thread has left me curious. Oh, I am talking about serious discussion, but bring the smack on, as well. :smile:

[seaboltm]

I have to disagree......Glocks go kaboom because of Glock's unsupported chambers and sloppy tolerances.

Friends of mine who have been involved in training at Louisville PD, Jefferson County PD, Jefferson County Sheriff's Dept. and more recently Louisville Metro PD have documented numerous Glock KB's.....all with issue ammo. They don't cut corners on training ammo; they train with what they carry and have changed from Remington to Winchester to Federal trying to cure the problem, but the brand doesn't matter.....Glocks blow up.

The problem appears to be that the gun will fire out of battery. Depending on tolerance stacking, some by a substantial amount. Combine that with a generous feed ramp and you have a KB waiting to happen.

There have been many more Glock KB's with jacketed ammo than with lead boolits, simply because there are many more jacketed bullets shot from Glocks. Lead boolits come with their own issues including leaded barrels (for whatever reason, including poorly finished barrels) and lube or lead deposits in the chamber. Any of these issues can interfere with chambering, which can cause the out of battery condition.

Check the fine print in the owner's manual that came with your new gun....no matter who made it and chances are the warranty is void if you shoot reloads (lead or jacketed).

Jerry

1911's are the king of unsupported chambers and sloppy tolerances, at least in USGI configuration. I don't hear of 1911's going kaboom, although I am pretty sure it has happened more than once in the long 1911 history. Regardless, anecdotal data is not data at all, it is mostly disconnected observations connected by conjecture and opinion.

[dkf]

I have to disagree......Glocks go kaboom because of Glock's unsupported chambers and sloppy tolerances.

I guess if bad info is repeated enough times it becomes true.[smilie=1:

[seaboltm]

Again, any gun can kaboom. A quick google search shows 1911's, XD's, and all sorts of other guns detonating. Perhaps part of the reason Glocks get so much attention is they were legendary for durability. I suppose some people thought they were indestructible. Some people think Ruger BH and RH revolvers are indestructible, but they have been destroyed too. What is surprising is how tough guns really are:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZaK7D4XVo8

[Ghost101]

I may be a newbe here, but I bought a Glock 20 in 10mm close to 30 yrs ago. From the get go I have fire 1000's of store bought cast boolits down range without any problems. I also Clean my bore after every shooting. I use a Lewis Lead remover! Have for many yrs. The reason for that purchase will remain my little secret. This yr I was able to pickup A Hawkeye bore scope. I am now able to tell if whatever gun is clean or not. I haven't changed my method of cleaning in all these years, so I suppose I was doing a good job. I still use lead in my Glocks with out a single issue. When you get anything dirty, Clean, clean an clean a little bit more.

Ghost101

[DeanWinchester]

Plastic haters tickle me. Ya'll are just too funny.
Obviously it's the PLASTIC that makes it weak. Never mind that there is no pressure held by any plastic parts, ever.
…And it could NEVER happen to an antiquated boat anchor design made of good ole solid steel and worshipped like a golden calf. LOL!!!

Piss poor reloading practices and equally poor maintenance can and will destroy anything.

90169

90171

90173

[MBTcustom]

I've got no problem with a Glock. If I had to pick a random gun to defend my life with it would have a G on the side of it. That said, I have tuned my 1911 to my liking, and I carry it cocked and locked. I have tuned in the safeties myself, and proven to myself that it functions flawlessly. Besides that, My dad carried one, my grandpa carried one, and if I was a bettin man, I would think that great granddad carried one.
I don't own a Glock, but if the 1911 didn't exist, it would be my first choice.
BTW, you see how the side panels blew out? That's a safety feature that has saved many a mans fingers from getting blown off. The side panels peel back from the trigger guard, effectively shielding the shooters fingers from the blast.
Here's one from a local feller that did the exact same thing:
90183

[Mumblypeg]

Here is my observation..... I was a firearms instructor for two law enforcement departments for a number of years. I would risk to say that I knew more about firearms than anyone in both departments, not that that is saying much. In those years I never saw a Glock blow up like the ones in the pictures. We all shot jacketed ammo in the dept. What I have seen is what I believe was a Firing out of battery twice. Once while I shot another officers gun. The ammo in that case was a Winchester Black Tallon if I remember correctly. The case head separated and the extractor was blown from the gun but was down in the mag well. The other time was similar but the extractor was lost. The rear of the case was bulged which leads me to believe that it fired out of battery as the cases never look like that under normal operation and I see no way it could happen otherwise. Both times there was no other damage to the gun. I believe as others, that this is a case of a bad handload. Say what you want about a Glock but I own a lot of hand guns and a Glock is what I carry all the time. They work and you just can't beat them for what they do. And yes I have fired cast out of mine with no problems. Will they fire out of battery? I say yes but so rare that I still believe in them. My 6 cents worth...inflation, you know....

[oldgeezershooter]

Anyone remember .38 Super face?
Some of the competitive shooters used to blow up the .38 Super guns.

[MtGun44]

Double charge.

Bill

[Hanzy4200]

I'm sorry, but that guy got what he had coming to him. To fire 2,000 casts bullets in a Glock barrel and not even monitor it? Don't get me wrong, I think the Glock vs. lead bullet deal is somewhat bunk. I run a G-17 and G-30s both with stock barrels and shoot lead exclusively. My Glock barrels actually lead LESS than the Lone Wolf aftermarket barrel I purchased to avoid leading. You must monitor your bore however. This is prudent with ANY handgun, not just Glocks. This guy is probably a new reloader, and obviously a complete idiot.

[Hanzy4200]

So true sir. A steel frame gun malfunctions, it's the ammo or general wear. A "plastic" gun has issues, and of course it's the Tupperware frame. Ridiculous.

[mdi]

I may be wrong but I don't think that damage to that gun is due to shooting led bullets, seems to me there is an error some place else that nobody wants to admit. I would think (well it don't matter what I think ) just glad nobody got hurt. I mean if it blew the case apart where it was unsupported maybe a case failure, really hot round I don't know. But if you shoot long enough things like this may happen just like driving in a car you never know when you are going to get in a crash.
I agree. I don't see how leading, a progressive problem, would cause this. Mebbe a fat cartridge that fired out of battery. For me the verdict is still out for firing lead in a poly barrel, as I've seen/read the ongoing "discussion" for quite a while, and have not been convinced either way (mebbe poly barrels lead more, mebbe not, but a kaboom?).

BTW, did you read the follow up posts? Not being a site dedicated to casting boolits, some of the answers are the stock "Glock says don't do it, it's dangerous" type...

[Springfield]

20 years ago when I knew WAY less about reloading then I do now I fired thousands of rounds through my poly barrelled Tanfoglio pistols. I was using hard cast store bought bullets and reloaded using some specs for the makers book. Don't even remember what I was using. I sold many many boxes of my nines to other guys on our range at the Armored truck company I worked for, and many of them ran Glocks. We were apparently prime candidates for Ka-booms, but we never had any. Why? I dunno, maybe because when we were done we all cleaned our guns. Don't remember anybody having any leading problems. What is that joke about cars and women, if they turn the key and it starts everything is OK? Looks like it holds true for many new shooters, if the cartridges fit in the magazine the gun is good to go. Lack of proper training or just not listening to good advice seems to account for many of these ka-booms, and sloppy reloading my account for the rest. I haven't shot them for a while but as I recall my poly barrels were much easier to clean than standard, no where for the lead to hide.

[Springfield]

20 years ago when I knew WAY less about reloading then I do now I fired thousands of rounds through my poly barrelled Tanfoglio pistols. I was using hard cast store bought bullets and reloaded using some specs from the makers book. Don't even remember what I was using. I sold many many boxes of my nines to other guys on our range at the Armored truck company I worked for, and many of them ran Glocks. We were apparently prime candidates for Ka-booms, but we never had any. Why? I dunno, maybe because when we were done we all cleaned our guns. Don't remember anybody having any leading problems. What is that joke about cars and women, if they turn the key and it starts everything is OK? Looks like it holds true for many new shooters, if the cartridges fit in the magazine the gun is good to go. Lack of proper training or just not listening to good advice seems to account for many of these ka-booms, and sloppy reloading my account for the rest. I haven't shot them for a while but as I recall my poly barrels were much easier to clean than standard, nowhere for the lead to hide.

[Harter66]

I don't feel like I tediously clean my guns,but 500 rd is a lot of shooting to me . They probably get field striped and bore brushed every 200 or annualy whether they need it or not. I did have a FEG HP-9 give me some trouble . It accumulated lead in the bbl extention slot in the slide . That's not a place you'd expect to find lead fouling . I've never knowingly seen it fire out of battery. The 1911 and BHP were designed in an era of crawling in the mud trench warfare they were designed sloppy but safe and shot to distruction over and over. Glocks are designed as combat weapons also but for a different kind of combat. (if that doesn't make sense read it again and get a history book). Engineering demands that a good design will have minor/cheap/simple/repairable failures before an operator injury failure and then that failure will be contained as to minimumise that injury. It seems to me the designs do that.

The why in this case I think ultimately is cleaning. I just read an artical where a fellow tried at 1st to Jo Hamfist out of battery discharges,then more scientifically. All 3 (IIRC) pistol brands had a tiny bit of movement where they could fire out of battery. I don't recall particulars it was a link to a link to a link. Dirt/crud/debris causes more problems than loader compatency. If it were a 2x charge it would have damaged a Contender as easy as the Glock. It may well have even been stacking cleaning issues rather than most of the parts being at or near maximum service tolerence. Fact is you and I don't know unless it gets published w/the actual diminsions from the gun in 4 columes that represent that gun, std assembly, minimum and maximum service diminsions.

[DRNurse1]

^^^This post has as much fail as the guys whom gun kaboomed. Glock "Junk", Kimber "quality". LOL


I would bet money cast boolits had nothing to do with the kaboom. Probably the guy that loaded the rounds.

(satire/rant on:) What! It was not the gun based on the evidence provided....the anti's will be apoplectic! You had better revise the research to better reflect their view or you will never get another government grant.....(end satire/rant)

[smokesahoy]

That's actually one of the nice things about a glock, you can have the barrel out for a good scrubbing in about 10 seconds flat. No reason not to clean it after shooting.

[xacex]

That's actually one of the nice things about a glock, you can have the barrel out for a good scrubbing in about 10 seconds flat. No reason not to clean it after shooting.

10 seconds! You must be slooooowww......:shock:

[35remington]

Mumbly, mdi, Harter......

We've gone into some length on this board why, exactly, a Glock cannot fire out of battery if the trigger is pulled. If the trigger was pulled and then the gun burst, you can absolutely, positively bet that the gun did not fire out of battery.

This is frequently speculated upon as the cause of blowups of this nature, and it's really never the case. For one, when the gun is enough out of battery that the case head lacks support, the striker cannot physically be tripped by the sear as it's completely out of reach.

Believe it. Out of battery fire cannot ever happen if the gun is set off by a pull of the trigger. If the gun fired, it most assuredly was not out of battery. This does not depend upon the presence or absence of any active or passive safety features, either. Everything can literally fail and the gun still will not fire out of battery with a pull of the trigger.

[W.R.Buchanan]

DON'T GET ME STARTED ON THIS SUBJECT!

The morons on that site no understanding of the Glock pistol whatsoever and poor understanding of reloading in general, and cast boolits specifically. It was hard to read.

I love the part that comes up everytime about the polygonal barrel encouraging leading, and the MFG not allowing reloads. AS if? We all seem to forget that polygonal rifling was originally designed to combat leading. (even though it looked a little different than the Glock rifling does) Why anyone would think this type of rifling encourages leading more so than any other is beyond me. I guess they read on the Glock Kaboom site?

Too much has been written on this topic. We all do it, and we know better than to shoot thru a leaded barrel. If that barrel actually had 2000 rounds thru it without cleaning the lead out then I'd say he was one of the stupidest shooters I have ever heard of.

But one other thing comes to mind, and this is the really important one.

Why didn't the guy who warned him actually intervene and stop the idiot form shooting the gun?

If you see someone doing something you know to be dangerous at a range, I feel it is your duty to stop them even if they are insistent and intent on going ahead. By not doing so YOU are endangering every other person on that range by allowing that person to endanger others with their unsafe actions. You must intervene!

I had one instance at my local club where there was a guest who was shooting a Glock Pistol and repeatedly was covering most everyone on the firing line by turning around and not keeping the muzzle down range. Nobody else would deal with the problem so I went over and talked to the guy. He told me to mind my own business, and then turned around a walked a way.

Unfortunately he neglected to take his gun with him and I immediately "Field Stripped" it for him and turned in the slide over to the caretaker of the range. He was miffed but chose not to push the issue further as there were several armed people behind me. I also had my Glock in my back . He finally got his gun parts back as he was being escorted from the facility

He hasn't been seen since and would be told to leave if he showed up.

Sometimes you just gotta speak up and take responsibility for what is going on if it isn't right. The guy in the situation from the other website should have been shut down before he ever started.

Why wasn't he?

Probably so they could bitch about Glocks and unsupported chambers and reloads and polygonal rifling like they even know what it is, and all talk about how great the 1911 is.

Don't get me started!

Randy

[W.R.Buchanan]

DON'T GET ME STARTED ON THIS SUBJECT!

The morons on that site no understanding of the Glock pistol whatsoever and poor understanding of reloading in general, and cast boolits specifically. It was hard to read.

I love the part that comes up everytime about the polygonal barrel encouraging leading, and the MFG not allowing reloads. AS if? We all seem to forget that polygonal rifling was originally designed to combat leading. (even though it looked a little different than the Glock rifling does) Why anyone would think this type of rifling encourages leading more so than any other is beyond me. I guess they read on the Glock Kaboom site?

Too much has been written on this topic. We all do it, and we know better than to shoot thru a leaded barrel. If that barrel actually had 2000 rounds thru it without cleaning the lead out then I'd say he was one of the stupidest shooters I have ever heard of.

But one other thing comes to mind, and this is the really important one.

Why didn't the guy who warned him actually intervene and stop the idiot form shooting the gun?

If you see someone doing something you know to be dangerous at a range, I feel it is your duty to stop them even if they are insistent and intent on going ahead. By not doing so YOU are endangering every other person on that range by allowing that person to endanger others with their unsafe actions. You must intervene!

I had one instance at my local club where there was a guest who was shooting a Glock Pistol and repeatedly was covering most everyone on the firing line by turning around and not keeping the muzzle down range. Nobody else would deal with the problem so I went over and talked to the guy. He told me to mind my own business, and then turned around a walked a way.

Unfortunately he neglected to take his gun with him and I immediately "Field Stripped" it for him and turned in the slide over to the caretaker of the range. He was miffed but chose not to push the issue further as there were several armed people behind me. I also had my Glock in my back . He finally got his gun parts back as he was being escorted from the facility

He hasn't been seen since and would be told to leave if he showed up.

Sometimes you just gotta speak up and take responsibility for what is going on if it isn't right. The guy in the situation from the other website should have been shut down before he ever started.

Why wasn't he?

Probably so they could bitch about Glocks and unsupported chambers and reloads and polygonal rifling like they even know what it is, and all talk about how great the 1911 is.

Don't get me started!

Randy

[grampa243]

well for the record Glock's mfg disclaimer says No reloaded ammo...

i would be willing to bet your favorite brand of gun.. says the same thing.


To each his own, but I believe in mfg disclaimers! Never had a hankering for a glock!
1Shirt!

[303Guy]

There was a thread on resizing the case bulge from unsupported cases from a Glock. A photo of the bulge was posted and it was impressive! The unsupported area was over the feed ramp which cut into the chamber and extended well passed the web. I can see how an overload would blow that portion of the case out if that is a common feature in the Glock.

[jonk]

A case head failure due to an unsupported case head is as likely as anything.

This. Or as said, improper powder charge or bullet pushed all the way back in the case. I would think that if it was leading, pressure would slowly have been building, leading to sticky extraction, primer leaks, etc.; SOME indication of coming issues before the resultant boom.

Lee selling their 'bulge buster' kit just worries me... I wouldn't want to reload any bulged case in a Glock or otherwise.

[jonp]

Plastic haters tickle me. Ya'll are just too funny.
Obviously it's the PLASTIC that makes it weak. Never mind that there is no pressure held by any plastic parts, ever.
…And it could NEVER happen to an antiquated boat anchor design made of good ole solid steel and worshipped like a golden calf. LOL!!!

Piss poor reloading practices and equally poor maintenance can and will destroy anything.

90169

90171

90173

Just out of curiosity how did the second gun have 1/3 of the slide shear off like that without any other apparent damage?

[longshot1154]

Not to highjack this thread, jonp are you still in Vermont or do you live somewhere else now? I keep seeing the Vermont Battle Flag on your posts and now the quote from Ethan Allen.

On with the post, I have thousands of rounds through my Glocks with cast boolits and never had a problem. Like most everyone else, I feel it was user error.

[jonp]

No, living in the south now due to no work up there. I was born and raised there and my family has roots there going back before it was a Republic and fought at The Battle of Bennington with Gen. Stark

[longshot1154]

No, living in the south now due to no work up there. I was born and raised there and my family has roots there going back before it was a Republic and fought at The Battle of Bennington with Gen. Stark

Thanks for the reply. It is very hard making a living up here, especially outside Chittenden County. I live in Addison County and work in Chittenden, but taxes and property values keep going up from everyone wanting to live away from Chittenden County.

[jonp]

Thanks for the reply. It is very hard making a living up here, especially outside Chittenden County. I live in Addison County and work in Chittenden, but taxes and property values keep going up from everyone wanting to live away from Chittenden County.

Try Essex County. No work and skyrocketing taxes and land values.

[longshot1154]

Try Essex County. No work and skyrocketing taxes and land values.

Yeah not much up there except paper company land and moose hunting.

[Doc_Stihl]

Don't forget the maple syrup.

Back on the glock. When the gun was disassembled, why was there no mention of the case? I sure would have liked to seen what the brass had to say about the incident.

[jonp]

Don't forget the maple syrup.

Back on the glock. When the gun was disassembled, why was there no mention of the case? I sure would have liked to seen what the brass had to say about the incident.
I would very much like to hear more about the brass and the reloads. We keep hearing these stories but I am not convinced it was a lead issue more than an operator issue.
My Kahr K9's have polygonal rifling and I have noticed no excessive leading with them.

[DeanWinchester]

Just out of curiosity how did the second gun have 1/3 of the slide shear off like that without any other apparent damage?


No idea. That's just CRAZY ain't it?!?!? Wouldn't have ever believed that.

[felix]

If you see someone doing something you know to be dangerous at a range, I feel it is your duty to stop them even if they are insistent and intent on going ahead. By not doing so YOU are endangering every other person on that range by allowing that person to endanger others with their unsafe actions. You must intervene!

Randy, I agree totally, but any education imparted must be non-confrontational and pertinent at the same time. Hard to do with finesse. Using the proper words can be excessively hard to muster up, and, if so, then it is probably best to barely mention "what I would do" or "what I found out" and then back off promptly. The pertinent subject matter usually involves heavy emotions where intellectual prowess is limited, and therein lies the problem in carving out a fruitful conversation. God, Gold, Guns, Guts are the typical subjects that draw this kind of attention. ... felix

[mdi]

Mumbly, mdi, Harter......

We've gone into some length on this board why, exactly, a Glock cannot fire out of battery if the trigger is pulled. If the trigger was pulled and then the gun burst, you can absolutely, positively bet that the gun did not fire out of battery.

This is frequently speculated upon as the cause of blowups of this nature, and it's really never the case. For one, when the gun is enough out of battery that the case head lacks support, the striker cannot physically be tripped by the sear as it's completely out of reach.

Believe it. Out of battery fire cannot ever happen if the gun is set off by a pull of the trigger. If the gun fired, it most assuredly was not out of battery. This does not depend upon the presence or absence of any active or passive safety features, either. Everything can literally fail and the gun still will not fire out of battery with a pull of the trigger.
I learned a long time ago not to use the terms "absolutely" "positively", never", or "always" when talking about man made machinery. When you do, expect it to someday turn around a bite you in the adz.

I don't own a Glock, and prolly won't own one either. I really don't have an opinion about them, just don't care. I have a 1911, a P90, and a striker fired 9mm "plastic" handgun, a small 25 ACP, a Tokerev, and 8 revolvers, so I have no want or need for a Glock and couldn't care less if a Glock "absolutely, positively, never ever possibly fire out of battery"...

[Love Life]

Take another man's gun apart on the firing line? Sorry, but if somebody started taking apart one of my guns at the range there would be some issues.

[Mumblypeg]

Mumbly, mdi, Harter......

We've gone into some length on this board why, exactly, a Glock cannot fire out of battery if the trigger is pulled. If the trigger was pulled and then the gun burst, you can absolutely, positively bet that the gun did not fire out of battery.

This is frequently speculated upon as the cause of blowups of this nature, and it's really never the case. For one, when the gun is enough out of battery that the case head lacks support, the striker cannot physically be tripped by the sear as it's completely out of reach.

Believe it. Out of battery fire cannot ever happen if the gun is set off by a pull of the trigger. If the gun fired, it most assuredly was not out of battery. This does not depend upon the presence or absence of any active or passive safety features, either. Everything can literally fail and the gun still will not fire out of battery with a pull of the trigger.

35 Rem, My thing and observation is.... On the two incidents I saw, why was the fired case swollen at the rear of the case ahead of the case head which was separated? The gun fired. If it was not slightly out of battery, how could the rear of the case swell if it was inside of the chamber? None of the other cases are this way after firing. The barrel was not damaged nor any other part of the gun. The barrel does not expand and then come back into shape. I say it is physically impossible to happen if it was not out of battery. Otherwise the cartridge would be fully inside the chamber upon firing and the case would not be abnormally swollen. What say you? I hope I have explained what I have observed well enough.

[dkf]

A Glock can fire out of battery if the situation is right. There is going to be a certain amount of "wiggle room" between the slide in full battery and the trigger bar fully depressing the firing pin safety doojigger enough to allow the firing pin to hit. There have been failures related to stuck FP safety plungers do to being all crudded up with dirt thus rendering it useless. If the gun in the OP was neglected and not cleaned properly the FP safety could have been all gunked up, an out of spec round could have hung up in the chamber and caused an out of battery fire. Or the RSA was worn. Or it was an overcharged load, or, or or... We can really only assume.

Sometimes strange **** can happen and the stars align and the "never can happen" happens. Usually it comes down to human error at some point.

FYI Glock increased the support on 9/.40/.357 barrels quite a bit about a dozen years ago. All the 2004 later barrels I have measured were right smack dab in the middle of the SAAMI specified chamber size.

[gandydancer]

well!! all I can say is I shot a glock once. and it was a tough little sucker. it took three rounds from my 1911 45 before it stopped moving.:twisted:

[fatelk]

It's interesting to me how some people will hear something that sounds right to them, take it as gospel truth, and defend it with religious fervor if challenged. I've seen it multiple times when it comes to the "never shoot lead in a Glock" thing.

Some people get borderline violent about it. In a casual discussion about pistols I once told a guy that if you do it right (diameter, hardness, lube, cleaning, etc) it was perfectly safe to shoot lead in Glock barrels. The key of course is know what you're doing and do it right.

You would think I had told him that the earth is flat and his mother was a pig! He got downright condescending and insulting as he started lecturing me that "everyone" knows how dangerous that is, the almighty, all-knowing Gaston Glock says don't, and I must be borderline retarded to even think about it. Nowadays I'm a little sensitive on the subject so I try to just bite my tongue when people put their ignorance on display.

A few years ago I was given a bandoleer of old 30-06 AP rounds for my M1. I was talking to an acquaintance about guns and mentioned the ammo. He told me with an air of authority that I should NOT shoot it in any rifle that I wanted to stay accurate.

He had been told sometime in the past that steel-core ammo will strip out your rifling and ruin your rifle within a few shots.

I didn't know the guy very well, and I'm too nice to just tell him that was the biggest bunch of absolute BS I'd heard in my life, so I just smiled and thanked him for the warning. I try to do that about the Glock thing now too.

[fatelk]

For the record- I'm not a "Glock guy". I've always been partial to S&W revolvers and 1911s.

I have a Glock that I bought cheap many years ago, and never really cared for it. I thought it was ugly and had the ergonomics of a brick. Then just a few years ago I started shooting it more and really came to appreciate it for what it is: solid, practical, and reliable. I still think it's ugly though. :)

[Valley Forge]

Gandy dancer, you just gave me a good laugh!

[fatelk]

well!! all I can say is I shot a glock once. and it was a tough little sucker. it took three rounds from my 1911 45 before it stopped moving.

Careful there; I have relatives with the surname Glock. They might be offended. :)

I doubt they're related to the Great Gaston, though.

[Mumblypeg]

For the record- I'm not a "Glock guy". I've always been partial to S&W revolvers and 1911s.

I have a Glock that I bought cheap many years ago, and never really cared for it. I thought it was ugly and had the ergonomics of a brick. Then just a few years ago I started shooting it more and really came to appreciate it for what it is: solid, practical, and reliable. I still think it's ugly though. :)

Bingo! And I never said they were pretty either and I shoot wheel guns much better....

[gandydancer]

What ever is said about glocks they do work. and very well. as for people? Remember at one time microwave ovens came with a warning that read"please do not dry your cat in microwave" :violin:

[Tonto]

Clearly caused by ammo loaded on RED equipment.....if BLUE had been used, no thread required.
;)

[35remington]

Well, no, a Glock can't fire out of battery with a pull of the trigger. I invite you to manipulate yours and determine this for yourself.

First, as long as the barrel's chamber front is in line with the slide and even partially engaging it, the gun will stay in battery as soon as the trigger is pulled, assuming the gun can even fire in the first place.....the critical point is the sear has to be able to engage the striker and release it. If the slide is even slightly rearward, to the point of not being even partially in battery (it either is or isn't) the sear cannot release the striker because they are physically separated.

Keep in mind these parts are toleranced specifically to prevent the circumstance of out of battery firing.

Pull the Glock slide enough out of battery that the engaging front of the chamber shelf drops free of the slide such that it cannot engage.....that is, the engaging surfaces are below the top of the slide.

Now pull the trigger. What happens?

Nothing.

Try and retry, if you wish. Observe that the only time the trigger will release the firing pin is when the locking surfaces actually can lock up.

It is often asserted the Glock can fire out of battery with a pull of the trigger by those who really don't have a clear grasp of how the pistol works. Can't happen.

As for the blown out brass, I presume it is not available to you any longer. If it is, place it back in the chamber of the gun that had the kB and observe the blowout is always in the area of unsupported brass in the feed ramp area of the barrel. Never, ever have I seen a picture of Glock brass that was blown out in such a way to indicate the case was so far out of the chamber that the area forward of this point was blown out. Always, always the blown out area corresponded to that of brass that was fully in battery when the case blew.

Which is more likely an overload.

If possible, please retrieve this brass if you can, reinsert it in the barrel, and show us a picture. You'll find the brass blew in the unsupported area of the case over the feed ramp, and not well up the case wall where a blowout is expected with an out of battery event due to a trigger pull.

If you don't have visual proof, the presumption of "out of battery firing" is impossible to prove. Lacking that, and it is always lacking, you're going to have to accept my assertion that the manufacture specifically dimensions the pistol to prevent out of battery firing with a pull of the trigger.

This is so undesirable that you also have to accept that manufacturers take specific and foolproof steps to ensure it absolutely, positively cannot happen with a pull of the trigger. Manufacturers would have to be fools to dimension parts to make that occur, and it won't occur with "tolerance stacking" either, as tolerances are such that even extreme stacking would not produce an out of battery event with a pull of the trigger.

Now, let's put the shoe on the other foot.

Tell me, exactly, how out of battery firing can occur with a pull of the trigger. "It just happens" won't be accepted as an explanation. While you're pondering that, observe how far the striker must move relative to the sear to disengage from any possible reach from the sear while looking at the slide and frame of the Glock. Relate that movement to the movement rearward that pulls the slide out of battery. The movement to pull the sear out of reach of the striker is always less than the movement necessary to pull the barrel out of battery with the slide.

Again, keep in mind if the gun had a nonstandard sear it wouldn't work properly. If it had a nonstandard striker it wouldn't work properly.....and again the distance moved to pull the two out of engagement is always less than the distance moved to pull the barrel out of battery with the slide.

And your response? Please do this after looking that the relevant surfaces of the Glock first after disassembly of the slide to frame.

[Elkins45]

The 9mm guns generally don't have the case support problems that 40's are notorious for, nor do the 357's. That's one argument for buying a 357 Sig G32 instead of a .40 G23.

I blew up my Glock 20 with a weak case holding a near max charge of Blue Dot. No chance of a double charge--it wouldn't have fit. The heck of it is that it wasn't the stock barrel. It was with a fully supported aftermarket barrel. As a (stupid) test I blew up another of the bad cases in my Smith 1006. The major difference was that the Smith didn't have to have the frame replaced.

Sometimes the stars just align against you no matter how hard you try. But letting the bore fill with lead only encourages them.

[35remington]

dkf, the safety plunger can fail and the Glock still won't fire out of battery because of the sear/striker failing to interact......they will be physically separated and the striker will not be disengaged by the sear. The plunger is a backup to the main safety mechanism, which is the sear/striker interaction.

Separate the two and nothing happens, no matter what the plunger does, and whether it is stuck or not.

[303Guy]

The gun fired. If it was not slightly out of battery, how could the rear of the case swell if it was inside of the chamber?Referring back to my earlier post, it was demonstrated that in that instances the case was not supported up to the web i.e. the case wall was not fully supported by the chamber when in battery, particularly over the feed ramp. In that instance normal factory ammo bulged dramatically on firing making resizing a mission.

[303Guy]

I had a look on Google and there are reams of "Glock Case Bulge" search results.


Whereas the resizing die may repair the bulge, the case is absolutely NOT recommended to reload. The bulged area where the metal is distorted is a weakness in the brass, reloading could cause the case to tear causing damage or injury

I was looking for that one specific thread which I didn't find.

[35remington]

This is pretty much analogous to how a 1911 works. Yes, it has a disconnector to prevent it from going off if the slide is pushed back a little, but when the 1911 is out of battery the hammer strikes the bottom of the firing pin stop instead of the firing pin, so it can't fire out of battery for that reason either.

Sound familiar? The Glock works like that too.

The plunger was added to the Series 80 1911 primarily to make it drop safe (arguable whether it was truly needed) but the plunger in this case interposes a physical block between firing pin and the tunnel for the pin, preventing firing. This is desireable not because the gun is out of battery, but because the gun was dropped from a great height.

The disconnector and the hammer striking the firing pin stop instead of the firing pin prevent out of battery firing in a 1911. A Glock simply copied the 1911 interaction in the case of putting the striker out of reach of the firing sear when the slide is moved rearward sufficiently to take the barrel out of battery. If that sounds familiar as a way to prevent out of battery firing, it should.

Other automatic pistols do the very same thing in only a very slightly different way.

A 1911 can't fire out of battery with a pull of the trigger either, no way, no how. If JMB could get it right in 1911, Glock definitely was extremely unlikely to screw up a very well proven and foolproof way of preventing out of battery firing about 70+ years later.

The prevention of out of battery firing has been perfected for a long, long time.

[35remington]

303, very pertinent. The Glock has a large unsupported area already, but out of battery firing is not why the cases bulge......it's because in some of the early pistols a large area was unsupported.

This has absolutely nothing to do with out of battery firing.

[Harter66]

35,
I don't recall the brands or models of the tests.
I don't pretend to know the mechanics of any Glock.
I don't have any Glocks a couple of Rugers BHP clone and a plastic XD.
Grunge will effect tolerance .
Any mechanical device can and will fail, grunge will agrevate this.
If you are a Glock guy or an accredited Glock smith then I have to take your word for it.
I've made loading errors I bet you have too , stuff happens.
The gun had a failure,weapon or ammo,and it handled it as designed.
Enough Glocks have had like issues for it to be note worthy.

The only thing left that makes any difference at all is to know beyond doubt is did the weapon fail (mechanically or dirt) or did the ammo fail (overload,bad case,etc).

[35remington]

Harter, every mechanical device on the gun can fail and it still won't fire out of battery because the prevention of out of battery firing does not rely on the proper functioning of a mechanical device. The gun can function improperly and it still won't fire out of battery.

Grunge can't affect tolerance because the tolerances have the allowances for grunge included as well. Such tolerances are way past that needed to prevent out of battery firing no matter what is introduced for grime into the pistol. It simply won't do it. Glock copied this system because it has an absolutely flawless record.

Prevention of out of battery has been perfected for a long long time. It's foolish to think Glock couldn't get this right when everyone else has as well.

If an out of battery firing after a pull of the trigger occurred its presence would be absolutely unmistakeable in any examination of the brass. No instance of such has been found yet, and never will.

Grunge has been allowed for, amply, many times over. Still won't happen. Think about how sear and striker interact.....grunge is not an excuse for failure.

If the case fits in the chamber with the blown out area in the unsupported part of the chamber cut out, and it always does, then overload or telescoped bullet is the only probable cause, if barrel obstruction is ruled out.

[dkf]

dkf, the safety plunger can fail and the Glock still won't fire out of battery because of the sear/striker failing to interact......they will be physically separated and the striker will not be disengaged by the sear. The plunger is a backup to the main safety mechanism, which is the sear/striker interaction.

Separate the two and nothing happens, no matter what the plunger does, and whether it is stuck or not.

Theory and practice are often not the same.

This is a quick example I could find there are other cases as well that have shown a Glock can fire without being completely into battery. Then add the chances of out of spec parts, aftermarket parts, human stupidity, ammo and etc and the possibility goes up. Sometimes you get the perfect storm. Sometimes weird **** happens and "something that can never happen" happens regardless if the "experts" say it can't happen. Then on the older Glocks their is that 6 part upgrade to prevent discharges with the real reasons being somewhat speculative.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iaWh5zJbtC8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOzq863p964

Yeah it is not much out of battery in the vids but things are happening so fast that little amount can end up meaning something under the right situations. I own 3 Glocks and like Glocks but nothing is perfect and without issue at one point or another. Thinking something is perfect does nobody any good.

[35remington]

The barrel was in battery when it dropped the firing pin. Absolutely no question whatsoever. I viewed it several times. It proves my contention, and proves the video in error.

Neither the guy making the video and possibly you as well understand what "out of battery" means. It means NO engagement of the chamber front with the slide. It means the slide can open when the bullet is in the barrel.....because the slide absolutely CAN'T open with the bullet in the barrel if the barrel is even partially engaged with the slide, because the shear forces holding the barrel in battery with the slide are far greater than the ability of the barrel to be pulled out of battery.

His gun was functioning perfectly, and the gun was in battery when the firing pin dropped.

Remember......out of battery means just that. No engagement whatsoever. If there is even partial engagement, a case blowout is impossible. If you don't know why, I can go into detail about that, too. The slide/barrel engagement when his firing pin dropped was vastly ample to hold the barrel in battery when fired.

It doesn't have to be perfect, and I didn't say it was. It simply has to be made to prevent out of battery firing with old school technology like the 1911 uses. That's exactly what Glock does. To think they would overlook such a simple and foolproof method to prevent out of battery firing is simply giving them way too little credit, and is not credible in any event.

[35remington]

For whatever it's worth, my Glock and Smith M&P (Glock clone) function exactly like the Glock in the video. They function exactly as they are supposed to, and none of them will drop the firing pin when the gun is out of battery.

If the barrel is very slightly dropped, but still obviously in battery (there is no such thing as partially in terms of blowup prevention.....it is either in battery and engages or it is not in battery and it does not engage) the pin will drop, but this is hardly unsafe.

Further, keep in mind the striker's impulse drives the gun toward battery. If the gun is in battery "partially" (not really a relevant term for the sake of this discussion), the impulse of the striker/hammer contributes to increasing the amount of engagement of the barrel and slide, not decreasing it.

[dkf]

Out-of-battery refers to the status of a weapon before the action has returned to the normal firing position



ut-of-battery refers to the status of a weapon before the action has returned to the normal firing position. The term originates from artillery, referring to a gun that fires before it has been pulled back into its firing position in a gun battery.

In artillery guns, "out of battery" usually refers to a situation where the recoiling mass (breech and barrel) has not returned to its proper position after firing because of a failure in the recoil mechanism. Most gun carriage designs should prevent this, however, if a gun is fired out of battery, then damage to the carriage can occur as the effectiveness of the recoil mechanism will have been compromised.

In firearms and artillery where there is an automatic loading mechanism, a condition can occur in which a live round is at least partially in the firing chamber and capable of being fired, but is not properly secured by the usual mechanism of that particular weapon. The gas pressure produced at the moment of firing can rupture the not fully supported cartridge case and can result in flame and high pressure gas being vented at the breech of the weapon, potentially creating flying shrapnel possibly injuring the operator.

There are many reports of modern pistols being damage or destroyed by out of battery discharges that has led to the use of the term kB - meaning "kaboom".

Absolutely no definition I find says "NO" engagement. Saying the weapon is in complete battery when the barrel is not fully locked and slide is not all the way forward is flawed IMO. I just have a hard time with saying something can never happen because often times that is proved wrong.
I do know what you are referring to with the hood of the barrel being partially engaged when firing in the video. Just not completely engaged.

[35remington]

I am finding it interesting that you are using sources that also incorrectly attribute blowups to out of battery firing by expanding the definition to "modern pistols." This simply means your quoted source does not understand how automatic pistols work, and is hardly a reason to quote said source......quite to the contrary........the source doesn't know enough to be worthy of a quote. For this, we need to go to Automatic Pistol Function 101, and the understanding of how locked breech pistols work.

True locking does not occur until the gun is fired. The bullet drags forward on the barrel while the slide pulls the barrel rearward. The effect is analogous to hooking your fingers of both hands together and pulling in opposite directions. The shear forces are driven by the impulse given to the bullet in one direction, and the slide in the other. The forces holding the barrel in engagement are quite large, and do not get released until the bullet leaves the barrel and stops pulling it forward......and the pressure is released that stops driving the cartridge and slide rearward.

Both disappear once the bullet leaves the barrel. Even if the barrel's camming surface could tug the barrel down in the time the bullet was speeding down the barrel, it could not get it accomplished, because the slide and barrel are actively resisting disengagement with very high forces preventing them from being separated.

For the purposes of blowing up the gun, due to the shear forces involved, "out of battery" when referring to pistols like the Glock is just that.....NO ENGAGEMENT of barrel and slide. To posit otherwise and suggest that partial engagement could lead to barrel and slide being separated while the bullet is in the barrel is simply showing ignorance of the relative forces involved. Even if the barrel was partially engaged and the gun was somehow capable of being fired in this state (which is still in battery) the forces involved prevent separation of barrel and slide while the bullet is in the barrel.

Slide and barrel cannot be separated until bullet is gone and the system is depressurized. If the gun unlocks only when the bullet is gone (and this is the only way it can function) no blowup can occur due to early unlocking.

[35remington]

And I never said it was in "complete battery."

I simply said, for the purposes of a "blowup" discussion, that the gun is either in battery or it is not. The forces involved see to it that the idea of being "partially" in battery is just as valid as being "fully" in battery. Please also understand that long before the barrel gets fully out of battery, the gun simply won't fire, so any fireable condition where the firing pin drops due to a deliberate pull of the trigger also sees to it that the barrel is sufficiently in battery that the gun can be fired safely, without any chance of a blowup.

A little background in how pistols function is the reason it is not possible to believe in "out of battery" firing with a deliberate pull of the trigger.

[dkf]

Well I am glad I found an internet expert to set me straight then.

[dkf]

Double

[35remington]

You do know more now than you did before, do you not? All these things are relevant to the discussion, and if they are not known, different viewpoints are plausible. Once they are known, certain hypothesis are clearly impossible.

How is it hard to believe that more information does not give you a better grasp of the probability of a given action happening, especially when due consideration is given to the forces involved? A barrel does not come out of battery if it is in battery to begin with until the bullet leaves and the pressure to cause a blowup is gone. A better understanding of what "in battery" means in terms of the forces involved was needed.

I gotta go to bed.

Let me offer a challenge: Next time you see/hear/read of an event like this happening, take a really close look at the case. Or ask the interested parties to do so, reinserting the case into the chamber if it is possible to do so.

Dollars to doughnuts you'll find the case goes all the way in, and the blowout is over the unsupported part of the chamber.

Whistle me up when you see anything different when the gun was claimed to be fired with a pull of the trigger. I won't hold my breath until that happens because it won't.

[303Guy]

I'm with 35remington. I don't have and never have had a Glock (I did hold one once and didn't really like the 'feel' and definitely didn't like the look - it's not exactly beautiful). In fact, I don't have any handguns at all, but I did have some once. So I'm no expert but I do have more than a basic understanding of the mechanics of things. Now a broken part might make a pistol fire out of battery (I don't really see how though). I know of at least one 1911 that AD'ed when the 'worked' safety was disengaged after pulling the trigger (some dumb *** turned the safety into a virtual trigger 'for speed of operation' in a fast draw. :violin: Safeties must draw the hammer back off the seer).

The way I see it. There may be one or two very rare 'firing out of battery' events all told but Glock blow-ups seem to be way too common to attribute the blow-ups to firing out of battery.

[mdi]

It's interesting to me how some people will hear something that sounds right to them, take it as gospel truth, and defend it with religious fervor if challenged. I've seen it multiple times when it comes to the "never shoot lead in a Glock" thing.

Some people get borderline violent about it. In a casual discussion about pistols I once told a guy that if you do it right (diameter, hardness, lube, cleaning, etc) it was perfectly safe to shoot lead in Glock barrels. The key of course is know what you're doing and do it right.

You would think I had told him that the earth is flat and his mother was a pig! He got downright condescending and insulting as he started lecturing me that "everyone" knows how dangerous that is, the almighty, all-knowing Gaston Glock says don't, and I must be borderline retarded to even think about it. Nowadays I'm a little sensitive on the subject so I try to just bite my tongue when people put their ignorance on display.

A few years ago I was given a bandoleer of old 30-06 AP rounds for my M1. I was talking to an acquaintance about guns and mentioned the ammo. He told me with an air of authority that I should NOT shoot it in any rifle that I wanted to stay accurate.

He had been told sometime in the past that steel-core ammo will strip out your rifling and ruin your rifle within a few shots.

I didn't know the guy very well, and I'm too nice to just tell him that was the biggest bunch of absolute BS I'd heard in my life, so I just smiled and thanked him for the warning. I try to do that about the Glock thing now too.
There are some people out there that, for some psychological reason, must be an "expert". They may know a little on the subject, but something in their little pea brains tells them they are absolutely, positively correct, and everyone else is an idiot. "Manly/Macho" things are where this situation is most often seen (sports, guns, hunting, cars, etc.). Sometimes I can get caught up in the "discussion" and try to tell the "expert" he's full of beans, but it's like wrestling with a pig, you get all muddy and the pig loves it. I know I don't know everything, and I am always willing to learn, but I much prefer reliable sources...

BTW, I shot a box of ammo through a Glock a few years ago (45 ACP). Wasn't impressed either way...

[W.R.Buchanan]

OK I will insert my .02 here again. First,,,35 Rem's description of what is happening with a Glocks firing cycle is exactly right.

Another point to add to his blurb is that once the barrel hood goes below the slide the firing pin safety is no longer engaged. The little ramp on the trigger bar does this and it only reaches the safety plunger when the slide is closed, or nearly so,,, as the slide opens the ramp releases the plunger. As soon as the point of the ramp is off the plungers top surface the plunger blocks the firing pin and the gun can't fire.

If you want to see a Glock not go into complete battery or more properly sticky battery just wash all of the lubricant out of the gun and try it. Usually the slide will only go all the way home when pulled all the way back and released, and even then it is iffy. I have experienced this first hand and the simple cure for the day was a shot of WD40 on the slide ways . Now the gun is dosed with Frog Lube and these problems don't arise.

Another point here referring to the OP's original topic is that these types of failures usually occur on the first shot when the slide is racked and not allowed to function normally. IE the shooter doesn't release the slide from the rearmost position. Like in watching the gun strip a round while chambering to chamber check. I do this and it is a bad habit I need to break. There is a loaded chamber indicator on the extractor that will tell you if anything is in the hole.

When I had MY ND this is what caused it. I released the slide from about half way closed and then pushed on the back of the slide with my thumb while my finger slipped into the trigger guard and fired the gun into the ground. This was entirely my fault and the gun was in fact in battery when it occurred, the extra action of pushing the slide down is what caused the ND. Changes have been made to prevent this from happening again.

The pictures of the cartridge that was blown out that I posted earlier in this thread were NOT caused by and out of battery condition. It was caused by a poorly designed case with insufficient web height to reinforce the unsupported area of the case during firing.

Now all .40 S&W cases have a much higher web and that has pretty much cured that problem. However idiots loading cases that have been fired many times, not debulged or just plain bad, with hot loads still can experience KABOOM.

Somebody earlier mentioned "Stacking Tolerances." With out sounding too harsh, there is not too much Stacking of Tolerances that can take place in gun building.

Stacking of Tolerances refers to the thing that happens on a machined part when dimensions with different datum's are allowed to proliferate.

Simply put one hole is located from the end of the part and the subsequent holes in a line are all located based on the previous holes locations. if the tolerance is say +/-.010 and the moves are all on the plus side of the tolerance, then by the time you've gotten to the fifth or sixth hole you can be as much as .05-.06 off in your hole position. However per the drawing you are still good to go. This is usually caused by an incompetent engineer incorrectly dimensioning the drawing.


However If you have ever actually seen a drawing for a gun part (I actually have the drawings for the M14 receiver which are 7 pages long) EVERY SINGLE DIMENSION has it's own tolerance and it's own datum, SPECIFICALLY so that tolerance stacking cannot occur.

When I dimension a drawing typically I call out all dimensions from one edge of the part for both axis'. That way the farthest any given feature can vary is the actual "drawing tolerance" which in my case is generally +/- .005. This way stacked tolerances cannot occur. Every feature stands by itself and is not contingent on any other feature.

All competent engineers and machinists do this normally. I'm sure Glock does too.

Randy

[KYCaster]

OK, I obviously didn't understand the meanings of the terms "out of battery" and "tolerance stacking". Now that I've been educated in the semantics of the discussion, I'll rephrase my statement so it may make sense to everyone.

Because of the generous tolerances Glock uses in the manufacture of their guns, a situation can occur where the unsupported area of the chamber falls forward of the point where the cartridge brass is capable of containing the pressure.

The result is the "classic Glock kaboom", resulting in pressure vented into the mag well, usually causing damage to the frame, extracter, trigger mechanism and magazine, but normally not causing any serious injury to the shooter; not to be confused with a catastrophic failure of the chamber/barrel/slide caused by excessive pressure.

Does that make more sense?

Jerry

[35remington]

Yep, KY.

I understand, however, that the way Glock make chambers now is different (to what extent I do not know for sure as I have not made chamber casts of dozens of early and late model Glocks) and some levels of kB's are.......supposedly.........caused by overworked and overflexed brass that has been reloaded and reused when it should not be. The unsupported chamber warning was/is very common in the handloading literature. I do not know to what extent it was the actual problem and to what extent it was overactive imagination.

My presumption is the great hulabaloo over lack of case support was to ensure that the usual amount of "hot rodding" did not take place wherein guys figure the loading recommendations are conservative and "bump the load up" to give everything a little more pep. The warnings seemed to be intended to get the idea across that the more accustomed to levels of safety redundancy were not present with such chambers/barrels.

Throw in pickup range brass with uncertain heritage and you've supposedly got problems. Supposedly. I cannot resolve that issue here in any way.....I'm just addressing the chance the pistol will fire out of battery with a pull of the trigger, which is zero. I know expressing it that way will irritate some people, but it's relatively easy to engineer a part to ensure that something will never happen, especially when the possibility of parts failure is irrelevant in ensuring that said event never happens. As mentioned, every part on the gun can fail and it still won't fire out of battery.

[Shiloh]

Also he said the gun had not been cleaned for about 2000 rds.


Who shoots 2000 rounds of cast lead boolits without cleaning??

At what point between round #1 and round #2000 did the accuracy completely fall off from the leading??

My guns develop functioning problems with a LOT fewer rounds than that. They are filthy from the lube or ALOX residue combined with powder residue. Never had issues with lead boolits in a 9mm Glock. The .40 was a different story. KaBoomed two before I went with an afermarket barrel.

Shiloh

[MBTcustom]

Shiloh STOP.

You are making way too much sense.

[dubber123]

Also he said the gun had not been cleaned for about 2000 rds.


Who shoots 2000 rounds of cast lead boolits without cleaning??

At what point between round #1 and round #2000 did the accuracy completely fall off from the leading??

My guns develop functioning problems with a LOT fewer rounds than that. They are filthy from the lube or ALOX residue combined with powder residue. Never had issues with lead boolits in a 9mm Glock. The .40 was a different story. KaBoomed two before I went with an afermarket barrel.

Shiloh


I tried it once. I read an article where Ross Seyfried claimed to only clean his 1911's every 10,000 rounds, just adding enough oil to "keep the gunk fluid" I believe was how he put it. My Springfield made it to 7,000+ rounds without a failure, LEE 228 RN with my lube, and either Bullseye or Green Dot powder to produce 850 fps. When it failed, it was a failure to chamber due to lead buildup in the chamber. I scraped it out quickly and it went almost another 4,000 rounds before it did it again. It was more of a stunt than anything, but it proved a lot to the shooters at the club about lead boolits and leading. I have since fully cleaned it, with the exception of the bore, which is still clean and shiny. The best way to cure leading is don't let it start in the first place.

[10x]

I may be wrong but I don't think that damage to that gun is due to shooting led bullets, seems to me there is an error some place else that nobody wants to admit. I would think (well it don't matter what I think ) just glad nobody got hurt. I mean if it blew the case apart where it was unsupported maybe a case failure, really hot round I don't know. But if you shoot long enough things like this may happen just like driving in a car you never know when you are going to get in a crash.

This is a pressure event causing a parts failure.
It is possibly a design fault of the gun maybe?
The gun looks as if it were fired with a very high pressure round before the cartridge was completely seated in the chamber.
I suspect operator error in reloading rather than a problem with cast bullets...

[303Guy]

Have a look here.

http://www.google.co.nz/search?q=Images+for+glock+barrel+chamber+support&newwindow=1&rlz=1C1FDUM_enNZ551NZ551&espv=210&es_sm=122&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=VxKtUuWVJuaViAfHoIHgDQ&ved=0CCgQsAQ&biw=1680&bih=891

Plenty blown Glocks and unsupported cases!

http://img403.imageshack.us/img403/5007/40swchambers.jpg

http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/GlockUnsupportedChamber_zps065553b9.jpg (http://s388.photobucket.com/user/303Guy/media/GlockUnsupportedChamber_zps065553b9.jpg.html)
http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/GlockBlownChamber_zps68946e93.jpg (http://s388.photobucket.com/user/303Guy/media/GlockBlownChamber_zps68946e93.jpg.html)
http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/GlockChambers_zpse5fecb64.jpg (http://s388.photobucket.com/user/303Guy/media/GlockChambers_zpse5fecb64.jpg.html)
http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/GlockBulge_zps98870839.jpg (http://s388.photobucket.com/user/303Guy/media/GlockBulge_zps98870839.jpg.html)

[303Guy]

I read that the reason for the unsupported case design is reliability. Well, I had a Star DKL in 380 ACP which would feed empty cases from the mag with either slow cycling of the slide of dropping it forward. It never once hung on me (not that I fired it that much). But it had a fully supporting chamber.

[W.R.Buchanan]

303guy: your pics are excellent and tell the story very well. The only change I would make to the drawing of the cartridge is that the web of the cases is actually has a radius in the corners instead of being square. and that web radius is what is preventing the cartridge case from failing.

The picture of the early G23 barrel versus the later ones is a good example of the changes Glock has made over the years to minimize the unsupported area of the case..

I find that the Cases are usually at fault before gun problems. That .45 acp case appeared to be an overload. However it was a factory load (notice the red primer seal) Maybe a +p loading, Notice the flat primer which doesn't occur in normally loaded .45's as there isn't enough pressure to do it. Another give away is that the vast majority of KB's are with .40 S&W's versions and not .45's. first one of those I have seen pics of. But after looking closer the web between the chamber and the unlocking lug below the barrel is awfully thin. My gun's chamber is a lot heavier there.

One thing that must be emphasized here is that this problem of unsupported chambers is not only with Glocks. First Glock chambers are not any bigger and in some case smaller than other guns. I had a Para 16-40 LDA .40 S&W, the gun was a 1911 style gun and the chamber was about .004 bigger(.438) in dia. than my Glocks chamber and unsupported area was about 20% larger. I also have a Storm Lake barrel for my G35 and the only difference between it and the stock one is the type of rifling and the chamber is about .428 in dia. versus .434 for the stock barrel. The unsupported area is about the same size. I might add that this barrel isn't even remotely reliable, thus it doesn't get used.

As a point of dimensions; an unfired .40 S&W case measures about .421-422 in dia. before it is fired. If fired in a chamber that is .434 it will expand to .434 and then shrink down to around .433-2. This amounts to about .005-.007 expansion per side on the case. That is not very much but it is visible as a bulge . By not removing the bulge the case is already to it's limit and there is no cushioning effect, so the likelyhood of failure is higher especially if the case happens to index into the same position in the chamber as it had previously been fired in. Then a combination of the already weakened area and no expansion to cushion the pressure spike can result in a blow out. Obviously the weaker the case head the more likely the event is to happen.

The FC and FC-10 cases I mentioned earlier were responsible for many blow ups including the gun that fired the one I found at the range. I didn't fire that round luckily but I found about 10 more of those cases in the batch I picked up at the range that day. I don't believe that case was fired in a Glock Pistol either since it has a round striker make on the primer and Glocks have a rectangle one. Also the Santa Barbara CA Police Dept. is not allowed to carry Glocks, they carry Sig's.

About the only way you are going to get a completely supported chamber in a .40 S&W gun is to buy a S&W 610 which is a Revolver.

Was the nickel case a reload? cuz it was very close to blowing and that bulge was not caused by a bad barrel.

On another note: I just played with my G21 and the gun will not fire until the barrel is going up into battery and is at least half way up into the cutout in the slide. IN other terms if the slide has moved to the rear .100 or 2.5 mm the gun will not fire and you can feel when the trigger disconnects from the striker. If it is further closed then it will fire however the gun is still in battery meaning the locking block is at least half way up into the locking cutout in the slide. The barrel only drops .075-.080 between fully closed(in battery) and completely out of battery. Once the barrel has dropped .040 (about half way) the slide has moved .100+ and the trigger is no longer in contact with the striker. Also the firing pin safety is no longer depressed meaning the striker can not travel past the slide face.

It appears that this gun could not fire unless the slide is at least half way closed during the last half of phase of the cycle where the barrel is going into battery in the slide and the slide is within .100 of it's final position fore and aft. IN any event, the bolt face or slide face is still in its proper position for firing in relation to the chamber. IE closing the back of the chamber. Also in this case the firing pin safety is no longer depressed either as the trigger bar is in front of it.

This gun will only fire if the slide is nearly all the way home and I'm talking less than .020 back will stop it from going off. this action is prevented by either the trigger disconnecting or the firing pin safety.

I'd need three to four hands to take pics of all these different positions so you will have to read and reread the post to understand all the content. It's all there.:mrgreen:

Randy

[Harter66]

The XD seems pretty well supported in 40.
90632

[W.R.Buchanan]

Harter: The unsupported area where the feed ramp intersects the chamber is about the same size as the G23 pics above.

Here's another little tidbit guys. Most all of these guns have this same relationship and there are very few exceptions simply because it has to be like this in order to function reliably.

It ain't that big a deal. REALLY!

What really drives me nuts about this whole conversation is that even though Glock Pistols are used by more Agencies in the world than all other pistol types combined, they still suffer from this "stigma," which was perpetrated by some gun writer early on and as been amplified to ridiculous proportions.

If you look at the percentage% of failures with these guns you will probably see a lower percentage rate of failure than virtually every other auto pistol out there. The reason they are so maligned is because there are so many of them. Just like VW bugs were maligned in the past. Some people loved them and some hated them. However we didn't have the internet back then to spread the BS about how unsafe they really were, we relied on the evening news instead. The News hasn't changed in that regard, but it has been amplified greatly by the internet, and the speed which news travels now is much faster, so BS can travel just as fast.

Randy

[boatworks]

I had a S&W model 99, .40 cal kabooom on me......handloaded range brass with a bulge, the round didn't actually chamber but the firing pin hit it anyway. Blew the frame apart, S&W replaced it anyway. Great company.

[dnotarianni]

Every time I read about a Glock grenade I remember the article where Glock mentioned it only cost them $75 to build a gun. Everything else was markup and profit.

[jmort]

Love seeing the Glock fan-boys get wound-up.

[MtGun44]

KUDOS TO 303 Guy!!!!

Great pix. Well done. Folks don't believe there is an "unsupported area" until you prove it.

I have them put a case in the dismounted barrel and spray a short shot of paint at the case/feed ramp
area then pull the case. They are surprised at where the steel isn't.

Like I said - Over pressure, some ammo issue, VERY high probability of double charge.

People just want to believe in the "gun malfunction fairy" rather than they made bad ammo.

That said - I have seen a letter sent by the head of the Federal Police (yes they exist in the USA) to Glock
asking why so many Glock 40s were blowing up WITH FACTORY AMMO! Never saw an answer, but
apparently Glock has changed the guns.

NEVER EVER heard of even ONE case of a 9mm or .40 or .45 cal 1911 blown up with FACTORY AMMO.
Handloads - yes. Factory - nope. 35 years of competition with pistols and never even heard a third hand
story. I have seen and even done it myself with handloads. Never heard of a single case of a Glock 9mm
blown up. . . . . . LOTS of .40s, tho.

Bill

[mpmarty]

Had a Glock 21 in or about 1983 and used it in IPSC. Many thousands of rounds all cast no problems. Sold it and got a 23 in 40 Short & Weak and hated that pistol with a passion. Sold it and No more GLOCKS for me. I much prefer 1911s and Tanfoglio Witnesses in all steel.

[onehousecat]

I'm not really a Glock fanboy. My ratio of 1911s to Glocks is about 4/1. My ratio of other autos to Glocks is also about 2/1. (I have a G17, G20, and a G21.) The only real complaint I have about Glocks is the atrocious trigger pull. I have pretty much gotten over that with practice. Glocks are really reliable. If the ammo is in spec, and the right caliber, the Glock will handle it. In a life or death situation, I sure as hell would not worry about the pistol blowing up. I would be much more concerned about the competency or the luck of the opponent trumping mine.

One thing about the kabooms is that the ones I have heard of (apocryphal or not) is that most of them involved 40s. A number of people have told me that a 40 will do anything a 10mm will. When politely requested to accompany me to the range with my chronograph to prove this assertion, guess how many accepted? None.

[jmort]

"A number of people have told me that a 40 will do anything a 10mm will."

They are as crazy as the people who compare a 10mm to a .41 mag.

[MtGun44]

EARLY 10mm Norma ammo was very close to .41 mag ammo, but that is LONG gone
and current factory 10mm is way down.

Bill

[whisler]

We had a newspaper article about a local police force that had a Glock Kaboom on their range...in 45ACP. This was with factory ammo the article stated. The chief said he had never heard of any problem with Glocks until then (obviously not a gun guy) and that, after research, they had decided to trade all the Glocks for Sigs

[travelr]

I don't think quality had anything to do with the Glock coming apart! However, I thought it was common knowledge that polygonal
rifling isn't kind to lead bullets. Not to mention that match quality Glock barrels with standard rifling are around $100/plus frt and
may need to spend some money at your friendly gunsmith's shop for fitting.