slide lock-or slide release

bluejeans said:

So Glock ( and apparently ruger too) have slide locks and berate any use of them as “releases”. Meanwhile 1911s , s&w semis, sigs, and likely others have ‘slide releases’ and allow their customers to use them as such...

Personally , I use the slide release; It’s faster and I don’t own any guns that disallow it’s use.

I watched a friend struggle with his reloads on an ar-15... his Glock pistol instructor had so drilled into him that could never touch the slide release that even or his AR he was pulling out the charging handle to drop the bolt after seating a fresh mag.
Side trail here... anyone ever notice that the controls are exactly the same between the 1911 and an ar-15? It cracks me up when tactical guys diss any pistol that has a manual safety yet with their tacticool ar it’s all “ muscle memory.. never even have the think about it.” Comparing the controls or the ar with the 1911 is what made me start carrying a 1911: identical thumb safety manipulation and now I operate the slide release of the 1911 with my left thumb on reloads same as dropping the bolt on the ar.

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I pasted the following from Glock's owner's manual. Like the P365, either option works. It sounds like your friend's instructor was misinformed.

If the slide (1) is in the forward position, hold your GLOCK pistol with your firing hand and, while keeping your finger off of the trigger and outside of the trigger guard, grasp the rear of the slide at the serrations with your other hand and pull the slide fully back (Picture 7) and then release it, allowing it to return to the fully forward position (Picture 8).

or

If the slide is locked in the rearward position, either press the slide stop lever (27) down to release the slide and return it to the fully forward position or grasp the rear of the slide at the serrations with your other hand and pull the slide fully back and then release it, allowing it to return to the fully forward position. The pistol is now loaded and ready to be fired by pulling the trigger.

For whatever it is worth, I will add the following observation from the competition "practical" games world:

It is very common for new shooters to USPSA and related gun games to come into the sport using the slide-rack method of releasing the slide, as opposed to using the slide-[NAME OF CONTROL HERE]. This is usually abandoned within 6 weeks, as it becomes very apparent to them that releasing the slide with the lever while rebuilding the grip is materially faster than fooling with getting the left hand from the magwell, up to the slide, yanking on the slide, and then getting the left hand back in place on the grip. That's a pretty significant kinesiologic detour.

So it seems logical to me that one should use the slide-[NAME OF CONTROL HERE] unless there is some concrete reason not to do so. With some guns, there is such a reason. But using the slide-[NAME OF CONTROL HERE] is a sensible default.

As for the "universality" of the slide-retraction* method, I wonder what kind of scenario people are contemplating where they imagine having run a strange gun that they aren't familiar with dry, need to complete a fast reload, and have a full magazine handy. I sort of doubt that has ever happened.

Now, if someone truly doesn't care about reload speed, ever, under any circumstances, then it truly makes no difference.

* I think the term "slingshot" is potentially confusing, as that same word is used to distinguish one of two different common methods of grasping the slide for retraction.

ATLDave said:

As for the "universality" of the slide-retraction* method, I wonder what kind of scenario people are contemplating where they imagine having run a strange gun that they aren't familiar with dry, need to complete a fast reload, and have a full magazine handy. I sort of doubt that has ever happened.

* I think the term "slingshot" is potentially confusing, as that same word is used to distinguish one of two different common methods of grasping the slide for retraction.

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Two very good points.

Do you use the Slide lock to release the receiver or do you releasing the slide by pulling it to th

I use the slide release to release the slide, although once in a while I will just drop the slide manually... it depends. Oddly enough, my Kahrs specify, in the owner's manual, that I drop the slide with the slide release... but I've found you can do either... as long as you don't ride the slide forward.

I'm not really sure why this is such an issue of contention... everyone shoots a pistol differently (minus the general basics, of course...) and unless you are forced into a specific doctrine because of training or the specific manual of arms, I don't see what it really matters.

Pull the slide lock to release the slide. It is faster and can be done one handed. If you are training to be in a gun fight, you want to be the fastest and most efficient as possible. Using 2 hands to complete a 1 handed operation is not the way to do that.

I use the slide stop/release whenever I can. I have stubby fingers, and on full-size 1911's my strong side thumb doesn't reach the release so I use my support hand thumb instead.

Is it considered so wrong to keep track of the number of cartridges expended and do the magazine change with the last one still in the pipe?

Walkalong said:

I have, it's faster, and most anyone raised on 1911s has done it. Slam mag home, drop the slide with slide catch before you could even think of dropping it with the off hand by "slingshoting".

40 seconds in.


I have not practiced a single fast reload with my P-365 yet. I need to play around with it soon. I have simply practiced shooting it with one mag.

When I get around to practicing a mag change in the P-365, it will be interesting to see how I like doing it.

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Video shows why its the "best" your off hand is right there when you finish inserting the mag and start to resume the two handed grip. I don't see any benefit to the slingshot method, unless the gun lacks a lever. Its why I rate ambi slide lock levers far more highly than ambi mag releases -- my left hand index finger hits the right hand mag release often times better than my stubby right hand thumb does. I practice a fair amount left handed shooting. If i carry a backup its usually carried for left hand draw.

40-82 said:

Is it considered so wrong to keep track of the number of cartridges expended and do the magazine change with the last one still in the pipe?

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No, that is a fine way to do things. However, in a real gunfight, some folks find that they lose count...

Walkalong said:

Both.

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Pretty much. I use it with 1911s, always have, just works for me.

I use the overhand with Glocks and my 226 as the release is too small for me to reliably use at speed.

I honestly had to think about it a bunch to answer the question as it's so automatic I couldn't remember what I did.

When punching paper I slingshot.

When running drills I use the "lever".


Since the LC9s was mentioned and I used to carry one I will comment about it in this regard. Weirdest dang thing, with a loaded mag the "lever" was easy to use to drop the slide but with an empty mag it was not possible. It had to be slingshoted.

I always use the slingshot method.

it works in any pistol I can think of. (including the BG, and yes, I may actually have to use HIS mags when I take his pistol).
it increases the odds of properly chambering.
..increases the odds of going into battery.
..the slide has already picked up speed by the time the first contact is made with the first round in the mag, decreasing the odds the second round in the mag may move out of or into a bad/worst position, increasing reliability, including with a possibly weak recoil spring. (it doesn't slightly drag and pick up speed for chambering the first round).
it keeps the slide catch and, to a much lesser extent(harder steel), the slide cut-out sharp and with the correct angle, for when i actually need to use the slide catch as a slide release because I may have only one working hand, I don't want it coincidently not working then.


oh, and an AR15 is not a Glock, two totally different animals.

priler said:

I always use the slingshot method.

it works in any pistol I can think of. (including the BG, and yes, I may actually have to use HIS mags when I take his pistol).
it increases the odds of properly chambering.
..increases the odds of going into battery.
..the slide has already picked up speed by the time the first contact is made with the first round in the mag, decreasing the odds the second round in the mag may move out of or into a bad/worst position, increasing reliability, including with a possibly weak recoil spring. (it doesn't slightly drag and pick up speed for chambering the first round).
it keeps the slide catch and, to a much lesser extent(harder steel), the slide cut-out sharp and with the correct angle, for when i actually need to use the slide catch as a slide release because I may have only one working hand, I don't want it coincidently not working then.


oh, and an AR15 is not a Glock, two totally different animals.

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What if your weak hand is not available to "slingshot"?

If you’re practicing your tactical reloads with multiple loaded mags, which is always a good thing to practice,then the answer is “neither”.

Charlie98 said:

I use the slide release to release the slide, although once in a while I will just drop the slide manually...

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JohnKSa said:

I release the slide manually for two reasons.

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For clarity, while I'm pretty sure when you both (and others) say you do it "manually", you mean you grab the slide in some manner and pull it back and release it, I'll point out that using the slide stop/slide release to release the slide is also doing it "manually".

Unless your slide auto-forwards when you insert a mag, most guns will require you to release the slide manually by some technique.

JohnKSa said:

The other post quoted might not be quite as explicit about the specific contrast in question, but, given the topic of the thread and the context of the comment in the post, it still seems adequately clear.

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Indeed. Manually... that is to say not using the fixture (slide release) to drop the slide. I guess you could split hairs...

That's why these questions seem sort of specious to me... and this is one that is very likely to careen off on a tangent.