Difference between a Glock and a Jennings, a Rohm and a S&W?

[wiringlunatic]

Ok, I'm probably going to start a firefight here, but I do have a serious question. I've seen guns such as Jennings, Jiminez, Rohm, etc. degraded all over the internet as junk, often citing the aluminum/zinc alloy frame. I decided to do some research, comparing the Zamak alloy used for Jiminez and the nylon 6,6 used to make Glock frames. The following data is from www.matweb.com:

property______________nylon 6,6___________________Zamak

tensile strength________6250 - 13100 psi_____________41300 psi

shear strength_________6500 - 11000 psi_____________31200 psi

melting point__________374 - 460 °F_________________718 - 729 °F

I've heard people on this forum I think trying to insult the Rohm by claiming you could melt it down on your kitchen stove. I'm not sure if that's possible (700+ degrees on a stove?) but if that's a sign of poor quality, Glock and other guns using a nylon frame would be even worse! Added to that is the fact that Jennings, Jiminez, Rohm, etc use low pressure, low power rounds such as .22lr and .25 ACP while guns like Glock use much larger, higher pressure rounds and the S&W Bodyguard (which uses an aluminum alloy upper frame and a polymer lower frame) uses .38+P. Why is a low pressure Zamak gun junk and a high pressure nylon gun good? Also, from what I've seen on the internet, nylon can absorb water and weaken by at least 20%. Also, many plastics weaken with time. I still shoot my grandfather's shotgun on occasion which was probably made in the 1890's. Will our grandchildren be able to safely shoot Glocks that have been handed down for 2 or 3 generations? I'm not really trying to run down Glocks as junk here, I'm just wondering why they're considered better than aluminum alloy.

 

[Deus Machina]

Mostly, it's in the design and craftsmanship. Jennings run on the most basic design that works, leading to stress at pins and connections--which are often made of softer or more brittle materials than in pretty much anything else.

You don't hear about Jennings' slide failing, outside of manufacturing errors. It's the trigger assembly (mild steel versus case-hardened tool steels) or the rails which are machined poorly, and the like.

Not to mention things like fatigue resistance. Zamak doesn't like being abused repetitively.

Also that nylon isn't used in the same places Jennings uses their zinc. Zamak does not wear well. Perhaps better than nylon, but Glock uses steel inserts at those points.

The TL;DR version: it's not so much what the majority of the gun is, it's selecting the right material for the right points, the design, and the minute wear parts.

As for Glocks being handed down to grandchildren... maybe. They're made of a pretty tough material, but I personally don't expect it to go without getting brittle. The first run are still fine, but fifty years down the road? I think their saving grace there might be that the stress is mostly confined to the steel rails.

 

[jhco50]

I think you have stymied the board with your chart. I honestly believe if Jennings would change the Zamak slide to steel they would have a winner there.

 

[Fu-man Shoe]

I think this is one of the best gun forum troll posts I've seen in a long, long time. It's unique, and it's got an interesting, fresh angle on two solid raw meat topics; Glocks and Jennings, Jiminez, et cetera.

I like the way you set up the Glock vs. Saturday Night Special argument. The convincing display of a poor understanding of materials technology and application backed by a badly formatted chart is excellent. Really an authentic touch. The apples-to-oranges hearsay comparison of "melting down a potmetal Rohm frame" and a nylon Glock frame on a stove is also a good red herring argument. A classic fallacy, expertly done. It's very subtle.

Thank you sir. This is good stuff! I enjoy your work.

I do have some constructive criticism for you though. While I like how you've rhetorically framed this post as a "just curious" type of argument, your initial pre-emptive deflection kind of gave you away. You need to touch that up, it's a little amateurish. It was too much.

Just remember: when you're trolling the right way, people won't even be sure if you're trolling at all. You don't want to make it too obvious. I'd advise building up to the argument. You don't want to come out of the gate too strong.

 

[Shear_stress]

There's a simple answer to this. The barrel and slide endure the cartridge pressure, not the frame. The Glock's slide is steel. The Jennings' slide is Zamak.

The Jennings also relies on die castings that are fairly porous and prone to stress concentrations.

 

[fatcat4620]

This is like trying to say your '91 dodge shadow turbo is a better race car than a new corvette because it is lighter.

 

[parsimonious_instead]

They serve different purposes, anyway. Saturday Night specials in a criminal context are ultra concealable "hideout" guns for the stickup and drugdealing set - often used for intimidation value or for pumping your rival/victim full of small slugs, leaving him bleeding out, then dumping the piece in a trashcan or a sewer.
For legitimate self-defense, they're for those who can't afford something better made, or as secondary/tertiary BUGs.
Why worry about long-term durability, when they were not even intended for that purpose to begin with?

 

[JohnBT]

"I've seen guns such as Jennings, Jiminez, Rohm, etc. degraded"

They were degraded the day they were made. If you don't believe it, go spend your hard-earned dollars and try a few out yourself.

John

 

[22-rimfire]

You make a convincing argument ( ), now go buy some of those zamak guns and enjoy them. I'll stick with the Glock or something else.

The Heritage Rough Rider falls into this catagory also. That's why you can buy them for $200.

I have heard that the Jennings 22 pistols actually function pretty reliably, but I don't want one.

 

[gp911]

Fu-man, you just made my morning!

 

[lathedog]

+1 on Fu-Man comments

I also enjoyed the "reason for edit"....to make the chart more readable. Maybe before the edit it was in Galactic Standard, but now it is clearly in Earth English. It could use a format makeover, though.

 

[dagger dog]

Life and death

 

[wiringlunatic]

Actually, I was interested in the fun banter that would occur on this thread, but I really did question the difference. I mean, I use tools of every description all day long, and how they feel in my hand is important. I absolutely agree that Glocks are better than Jennings (DUH!) but I think as some of you noted, the issue is how they're built, not the materials per se. Fu, yes, the melting thing is a red herring, but it didn't originate with me. Someone was really trash talking Rohm and used that argument. I was just pointing out the stupidity of that argument. I wouldn't want to try to shoot ANY pistol that had been severely heated on a stove. I probably wouldn't own a plastic gun because I like the feel of steel in my hands. I do own a Rohm that a friend gave me, and like was said about the Glock, the important parts are all steel. The cylinder and barrel are steel, what the frame is made of is rather irrelevant. If someone wants to say the gun is poorly made that's fine. I get tired of people picking on guns saying that they're unsafe because they have alloy frames when the alloy is significantly stronger than is absolutely necessary (as evidenced by the fact that Glocks don't blow up 3 times as often as Jennings) Some of you brought up excellent points like issues with the steel on the Jennings trigger group. However, some of the Jennings has stainless slides -- are those now top quality pistols? Obviously not, it's the overall design and building, not the frame material. The frame probably takes less stress than any other part of the gun besides the grips. Just my two cents.

 

[wiringlunatic]

By the way, the chart was unreadable at first because I used spaces between the columns which then got deleted when posting so I had to put the lines in as placeholders.

 

[Mp7]

plus tests have shown that the Jimenez can be thrown way more accurately!

 

[dagger dog]

A zinc frames with steel barrel and chamber liners was and is a FACT in cheap revolvers.

Wether or not the Rohm is zinc I don't know, but if it is it can be melted in a frying pan, if you can turn up the heat past the 750 degree mark and hold it there long enough.

 

[NG VI]

http://glocktalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1403016

Check out post #8 or 9, the one with the photos put up by Canyonman of his Glock 20.

Picture any other pistol taking that kind of catastrophic damage, and ask yourself what the frame would look like. The slide is basically unharmed, the frame appears completely intact with no damage, the only thing that was actually damaged was the chamber portion of the barrel, which found it's way out of the ejection port and stayed in one (split) piece instead of becoming shrapnel.

That's the difference between a Glock and a Jennings. Most other quality, modeern service pistols wouldn't have any problem with a major blow-out either, because designers have put a lot of work into making sure their weapons are safe for the end user.

 

[evan price]

Simply comparing materials is not going to prove anything. People dissing a gun for having a Zamak slide are wrong.

It's the design and execution of the Jennings, Raven, Bryco, Lorcin, etc that make them crap. Jennings J-22 used to have the interesting 'feature' that they could not be chambered unless the safety was off. If you tried you could force it to chamber a round with the safety on- but it when you switched the safety off it would then fire the round. Nice feature, eh? (Yes, I owned an early J-22)

You could also draw the same conclusion that a Daewoo Leganza is a better car than a Toyota Corolla because the Daewoo uses more metal. Thus, you ignore the crap engineering and design and parts fitment issues entirely.

Apples >< Pineapples

 

[LT.Diver]

I don't buy cheap parachutes, cheap scuba gear, cheap climbing ropes, cheap ladders or cheap guns. All for the same reason.

 

[FROGO207]

In the free market every product has a place. Now I have purchased a few examples of those and other offending firearms, more for the curiosity of finding what they really would behave like or when feeling sorry for the previous owner and helping them recover a bit of cash to buy a better example. My take is any of them WILL fire a round safely and with SOME accuracy when new but they will not hold up in the long run compared to a 3X or more expensive example. I will say that the Jimenez J9 has way too many parts inside for the price. Ever take the grips off one and try to clean it??

 

[deadasslast2004]

maybe it is the total parts to make it work count

or is it the number of potential pieces that could fail. i bet glock is lowset in this department as well.

 

[Deltaboy1984]

I had a Jennings back in the 1980's that I bought new for 40 bucks. But you could only hit a pie plate at 12 feet. I sold it later and got 70 bucks for it.

 

[trex1310]

You are trying to compare apples and oranges. Materials are just
one element out of the many hundreds it takes to produce a
finished product.

 

[wiringlunatic]

Ok, this is making more sense. Now people are coming up with better arguments than "it's zinc alloy, it must be junk." I fully agree that the Glock and S&W are better guns than Jennings and Rohm. My Rohm serves the slot of being an incredibly cheap gun to shoot and thus I can get a lot of practice for not a lot of money. That along with a little practice with my CCW (a 4" steel frame Taurus 85) should keep me ready.

I disagree with those who say that these cheap guns are only good for crime. That sounds like an argument straight out of the anti-gun lobby's playbook. That was what led to the '68 law that basically killed the Rohm in this country and made Jennings, etc. so big (they were domestic and thus not blocked by the law) No gun is only good for crime just the same as no gun is a criminal. a Rohm with the barrel sawed off shorter in the hands of a law abiding citizen is not a criminal weapon, and a $3,000 semiautomatic trap gun in the hands of a criminal is. Again, what you perceive a gun's purpose to be does not make it good or bad any more than the material it's made from.

I do find it interesting that people keep thinking I'm using the materials argument to claim Jennings and Rohm are better than Glock and S&W. I've clearly stated that I'm not. I'm just trying to make people think and make better arguments in the future.

 

[Fishslayer]

I think this is one of the best gun forum troll posts I've seen in a long, long time. It's unique, and it's got an interesting, fresh angle on two solid raw meat topics; Glocks and Jennings, Jiminez, et cetera.

I like the way you set up the Glock vs. Saturday Night Special argument. The convincing display of a poor understanding of materials technology and application backed by a badly formatted chart is excellent. Really an authentic touch. The apples-to-oranges hearsay comparison of "melting down a potmetal Rohm frame" and a nylon Glock frame on a stove is also a good red herring argument. A classic fallacy, expertly done. It's very subtle.

Thank you sir. This is good stuff! I enjoy your work.

I do have some constructive criticism for you though. While I like how you've rhetorically framed this post as a "just curious" type of argument, your initial pre-emptive deflection kind of gave you away. You need to touch that up, it's a little amateurish. It was too much.

Just remember: when you're trolling the right way, people won't even be sure if you're trolling at all. You don't want to make it too obvious. I'd advise building up to the argument. You don't want to come out of the gate too strong.

Excellent!

Anytime Glop comparisons are in the title it's a pretty safe bet it's a troll.

I agree this one was at least somewhat original and interesting...