glock and lead bullets

Not with the original barrel, (well, you can, but you won't know if your particular loads in your partiular Glock are OK until it is too late) but you can buy aftermarket barrels with conventional rifling and better-supported chambers that will allow you to use lead bullets.

Not knocking Glocks. The poorly-supported Glock chambers feed more reliably than a fully supported chamber, and the polygonal rifling works great with factory jacketed ammo. But the chambers overstress the brass on firing, and the polygonal rifling leads badly with cast bullets, and that's a really bad combination.

I throw away any brass that I pick up that has a rectangular firing pin mark (Glock) if it has even the slightest "hump" near the head.

There's a reason why the manual says, "The use of reloaded ammunition will void the Glock warrany..."

I just bought my first Glock ,a G20, took it to the range last week, it functioned flawlessly and was very accurate, I fired some hornady 180 grn,federal 180 grn and a box of Buffalo Bore and i noticed the rectangular firing pin mark on the primer of the buffalo bore .Is that a Problem?

...and i noticed the rectangular firing pin mark on the primer of the buffalo bore .Is that a Problem?

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No, it doesn't really mean anything, good or bad. It's just a signature of a Glock.

can my glocks shoot lead bullets?

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Ask this guy.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Vceh44UK-8I

Thanks zxcvbob
I've put off buying a Glock for a long time, I mainly bought it because i like the ballistics of the full power 10mm round

I shoot with a instructor who shoots nothing but lead through his Glocks, 21, 19, 36, & 34. He has not had a problem in several thousand rounds. He claims the key is cleaning after every outing. He bought a brand new 21 and the first he did was run 230gr lead SWC through it. Worked fine. So yes you can shoot lead through a Glock and you can shoot reloads through a Glock. Does it void a warranty? Sure, but it's a Glock and according to the Glock-lovers they never have a problem so why worry about a warranty. Every manufacture claims reloads void the warranty. Enforcing that is another story.

I shot them out of my 17C and wished to hell that I hadn't.
what a mess...
I was reading in a USPSA mag something about Glocks blowing up with lead bullets. confirm/deny anyone?
thus endeth my insipid comments.

I was reading in a USPSA mag something about Glocks blowing up with lead bullets. confirm/deny anyone?

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I've never personally seen it or read about it happening, but it can definitely happen. The lead build up can cause pressure in the barrel to reach dangerous levels. This is a pic of lead built up in my USP 45 w/poly barrel, and this is from shooting jacketed ammo.

Reloads in Glocks with unsupported chambers can cause a catastrophic failure.

If you have a Glock .40 S&W, look at your fired brass and you will likely see a bulge at the cartridge base - looks kinda like a pregnant guppy. This bulge is the result of an unsupported chamber.

Now imagine this bulge occurring in a reloaded cartridge that has already undergone the stress of firing - if this brass is too weak to withstand the bulging that occurs in the Glock, it's gonna let go.

Also, there are people who say that shooting lead thru Glock's polygonal rifled barrels could cause leading. If this leading occurs just forward of the chamber, it could potentially cause an unsafe over-pressurization event, otherwise known as a kaBOOM! - this is reportedly more of an issue in the .40S&W caliber, which is supposed to be very near the edge of safe pressure tolerances anyways.

On a related note, it is also reported that bullet setback of just a couple of millimeters in a .40S&W round could also cause a similar over-pressurization event.

People just love to point out that Glocks, especially the .40S&W's, have a tendency to kaBOOM! (whether statistically true or not - I'm not going to get into that argument).
If this is of a great concern to you, there are plenty of aftermarket barrels available for Glocks that address both the polygonal rifling and unsupported chamber.

Polygonal rifling causes more resistance, and the bullet must overcome that resistance. Lead build up between the rifling can reduce the bore diameter and lead to dramatic pressure increases.
This is especialy true if one was to use jacketed rounds after a lot of lead rounds. The jacketed rounds will be less capable of deforming to compensate and face tremendous resistance increasing the pressure high enough that the spot you normaly see with the "pregnant" bulge on your brass fails.

There is less danger if you only shoot lead, and obviously it is not a problem with just jacketed. Mixing the two makes for the most dangerous situation. Yet many will tell you how they intentionaly do just that to "shoot the lead out."

However even just lead can pose a problem, though it should take more rounds before it becomes unsafe.
If you are using reloaded brass though it can be more random, depending a lot on how often a spot that previously became a "pregnant" bulge is stressed. That has more to do with the unsupported chamber. Multiple factors can increase the danger though. Weakened brass, increased pressure from heavy lead fouling, and copper trying to overcome the resistance of all that lead and the rifling are a few of the variables.
The less you have the safer it is.

You will have to clean the polygonal barrel much more thoroughly than another barrel. The lead really imbeds itself deep in between the rifling, and has more space to build up than in other rifling.
If you choose to use lead clean it after every use. Also keep your range sessions to a reasonable number of rounds at a time between cleaning.

You can also buy a replacement barrel with conventional rifling and shoot whatever you want. Here's some reasonable priced barrels: http://www.lonewolfdist.com/Products.aspx?CAT=238 Mark

I guess the oldest Glock myth is the lead bullet one. The second is the unsupported chamber, followed by firing out of battery. I have fired tens of thousands of lead bullets through stock barrel Glocks.
It's just like anything else use a little common sense. The bullets I use are in the 18-20 hardness range.

Is the same true for teflon coated lead bullets?

absolutly not

I have been shooting Glocks since I was 6. Never use lead in a Glock they BLOW UP simple as that. 1 blow up on a family friend luckily all he got was a full pair of pants and some minor scratches and burns.

What Joe D said....common sense of knowing what you're working with. I have a friend that molds his own lead bullets and uses them in his Glocks, he's a big Glock fan, mostly of the model 23 and uses his bullets in them all .. has for years .. he makes outstanding bullets by the way, I've used them for years in my 1911's and when I load for my 9mm's, I'll try them in my Glocks as well.

For the life of me I can't understand why people would use a lead bullet if the manual says not to do so. Simply purchase the after-market barrels with cut rifling which are appropriate for lead. We are talking about the shootists' and others safety.

sure you can, but i don't if you are so inclined to shoot lead then get a aftermarket barrel, non polygonal rifled barrel and you will be good. i know people that do but i do not.

also in response to reloading there are often great deals out there on jacketed rds for reloading check out rainier. thats what i ues.

another advantage of the ole xd, no after market barrel to worry about buying it is lead friendly right out of the box and the majority of the rds through my xd's are lead, ultramax 180gr cnl as a matter of fact.

Doc, the Glock manual says nothing about lead bullets. It says not to shoot reloads, just like every other gun manufacturer's manual. Guess I voided my warranty years ago. My old G35 had over 100,000 rounds through it when sold - not the first round of factory ammo went down the barrel.