Lead in a Glock

Couldn't answer that, but shooting lead in them is something the company says is the only limitation on their guns. I asked a friend who works for Glock and he said absolutely don't do it. I just trust that they know more about the product than I do.

Here is just one of the many reads on here:

http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=172607

I shot dozens of thousands of cast bullets in my Glock 17, never had a problem. The bore eventually got leaded, but I filled it with mercury and let it sit overnight, clean bore! You have to be very careful with mercury though.

Same for me, thousands without a problem in 19 and 26. I just brush the lead out or shoot it out with jacketed bullets. Some people say you shouldn't do that either, but again, no problems. The lead seems to brush out much easier than a conventional barrel because it doesn't have all those sharp angles to hide in.

Glocks use polygonal rifling that dislikes lead. If one doesn't want to risk mercury poisoning, acquire a button rifled aftermarket barrel.

gilgsn said:

I shot dozens of thousands of cast bullets in my Glock 17, never had a problem. The bore eventually got leaded, but I filled it with mercury and let it sit overnight, clean bore! You have to be very careful with mercury though.

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Good gosh man! Why?

Yes, I know it works, but you could also wrap a bit of Chore Boy around a jag and scrub it out in 30 seconds. You don't HAVE to use a potent accumulative biotoxin to delead a barrel. That's like washing the dishes with plutonium soap; I'm sure it works fine, but why?

Yes, I know about mercury, I've handled it and mitigated spills, and I have enough to delead a barrel if I wanted to to. . . but why would you?

That would be a good option. Note that the occasional mercury treatment can be replaced by a bit of scrubbing after shooting, and not much at that. The glock will otherwise swallow all kinds of bullets, cast or jacketed without problems. I have used everything from 88gr to 147gr, cast, jacketed and swagged, no problems.. Leading was not a big problem with lead bullets and I had to use the mercury trick only once. A good brush works wonders.

Gil

You don't want to be around mercury. Very nasty stuff. Either get a Lewis lead removal tool or use the chore boy on a brush. If you keep the bore clean you won't have any problems. Get in the habit of looking down the bore with a good light every time you tear it down.

I know Glock manuals state NOT to shoot lead. I also know many shooters who do without any issues.

I also know that nearly all of my firearms state NOT to use reloads in them but I do it all of the time

Look down the barrel after each trip to the range. If it isn't leading, you won't have a problem. If it is, clean it.

I am not suggesting anyone uses mercury. I took the necessary precautions and it was easy, as simple as that. It's a toxic metal, not nitroglycerin! It's not like you'd drop dead by opening the bottle.. just respect it for what it is and the harm it can do if mishandled..

Gil.

The result of shooting lead in .40 cal Glock.

https://youtu.be/TP7CYxvwy4k

There are lots of aftermarket barrels (Lone Wolf, Storm Lake) that have conventional rifling and are better choices for lead bullets.

Don't confuse methyl mercury and elemental mercury. Elemental Mercury can be handled safely with a little precaution and the correct PPE . Disposing of it becomes a little tricky though unless your local dump has a no questions asked hazmat dump day like mine does.

That video doesn't show if he was shooting lead or a double charge, you can barely tell it's a Glock let alone caliber.
Not seen an owner's manual or factory recommendation yet that approves of lead or any reload for that matter. Clean the gun once in a while.

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I'm going to jump on the yes you can side. Proper maintenance is key here that's all. I clean my guns after range trips. I'm not worried about some silly notification from the manufacturer that was placed there to protect them from a liability concern. I shoot a lot of lead in my Glocks and have little lead build up at the end of a range trip. My 44 Mag leads easier than the 40 S&W Glock but I still shoot lead in the 44.

The .40 Glock barrel has an unsupported chamber.. The .40 being a high pressure round, it does sometimes blow a case in that barrel. I would never own a Glock .40. The frame is good for 9mm, but more is asking for trouble IMHO. If I wanted more power in a Glock I would get one of the larger frame models and make sure the case is fully supported by the chamber. I doubt the blow-up in that video has anything to do with shooting lead.
I have seen people load up Glocks 9mm for major class in IPSC, and none ever blew up, even though I saw plenty of flatten primers on cases I picked up after competitions. The Glock 17/19 is an awesome gun. The .40, no thanks.

Gil

Glock also says not to use reloaded ammunition.

gilgsn said:

The .40 Glock barrel has an unsupported chamber.. The .40 being a high pressure round, it does sometimes blow a case in that barrel. I would never own a Glock .40. The frame is good for 9mm, but more is asking for trouble IMHO. If I wanted more power in a Glock I would get one of the larger frame models and make sure the case is fully supported by the chamber. I doubt the blow-up in that video has anything to do with shooting lead.
I have seen people load up Glocks 9mm for major class in IPSC, and none ever blew up, even though I saw plenty of flatten primers on cases I picked up after competitions. The Glock 17/19 is an awesome gun. The .40, no thanks.

Gil

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IMO, this was the issue in the video. Leading isn't brought up as an issue anywhere that I could see.

I'm another one who shoots lead all the time in my Glock, with factory barrel. I don't have any problems. Sometimes a little lead build up depending on load, but that's with everything. There have been days where I've shot hundreds of lead rounds without cleaning and no problems. No excess pressure, no accuracy problems (outside of shooter error)...nothing.

In other guns that have polygonal rifling (which is what supposedly causes the problem), I don't shoot anything but lead bullets. No problems there either.

So yes, while the manual says don't do it (same with reloads), you can do it just fine. But if it is a concern, just get an aftermarket barrel with conventional rifling.

gojuice101 said:

I'm another one who shoots lead all the time in my Glock, with factory barrel. I don't have any problems. Sometimes a little lead build up depending on load, but that's with everything. There have been days where I've shot hundreds of lead rounds without cleaning and no problems. No excess pressure, no accuracy problems (outside of shooter error)...nothing.



In other guns that have polygonal rifling (which is what supposedly causes the problem), I don't shoot anything but lead bullets. No problems there either.



So yes, while the manual says don't do it (same with reloads), you can do it just fine. But if it is a concern, just get an aftermarket barrel with conventional rifling.

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I've shot lead in my Glock since I bought it.

The factory culture, anybody's factory culture, detests handloaders - period.
Add to that their retained lawyer parasites whose bread is buttered by this stuff........ Before you cancel my ticket, consider that all this has been brought to fruition by litigious whining consumer ignorance. A perfect Catch 22.

There is a difference between just plain lead and hard cast bullets. Most of what people call lead bullets these days are actually hard cast. They are not the same thing. People just call them that because they aren't jacketed and look like plain old lead bullets. They are usually much harder than just plain old lead and contain other metals mixed in to create a much harder alloy. You can push these hard cast bullets much fast without the leading problems that you used to see with just plain lead bullets.

atomd said:

There is a difference between just plain lead and hard cast bullets. Most of what people call lead bullets these days are actually hard cast. They are not the same thing. People just call them that because they aren't jacketed and look like plain old lead bullets. They are usually much harder than just plain old lead and contain other metals mixed in to create a much harder alloy. You can push these hard cast bullets much fast without the leading problems that you used to see with just plain lead bullets.

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They are still considered plain lead. Pure lead is generally swaged as opposed to cast for commercial use.

But yes, bullets today are almost universally cast of a harder alloy, though we still call it plain lead, just not pure. In many cases this hard lead can be direct cause of leading when loaded into low pressure cartridges or firearms with poor bullet fit.

That's true...but there is still a very big difference in the overall makeup of the bullet. There are also wildly varying degrees of hardness too. Bullet size, velocity, rifling, types of powder, how often the barrel is cleaned, etc etc are all factors you have to consider (among other things). You can't just simply say that if it doesn't have a jacket it's automatically unsafe or is going to automatically cause one specific type of problem. It's also still technically incorrect because the bullet isn't 100% lead usually. Well...there's some cowboy action guys that still shoot some swaged bullets which are usually very light loads at very low velocities...but it's not that common commercially anymore.

I think that this won't be as much of a topic of discussion since plated and polymer coated bullets are becoming much more popular the last few years and are priced at an in-between point between hard cast and jacketed.