rbernie
Contributing Member
My weekly range guns for the last year or better have all been Glock Gen4s. On average, I put 200 rounds of cast lead handloads downrange every weekend, and almost all of that for the last year or better has gone through a single G17. The rounds that didn't go thru the G17 went downrange courtesy of a G20 or G21 or G22. All of my Gen4's are less than 18 months old, and use stock magazines and stock bits excepting a Ghost Edge connector and Heinie/XS sights. I clean my range guns maybe every 3-4 months or so - sometimes longer when I'm busy with other projects, and sometimes shorter when I'm playing with backstrap choices.
The ONLY failures of any kind that I've experienced in the last year have been failures to chamber a batch of oversized rounds (9x19 sizing die wiggled out and it took me a bit to notice). That's literally *IT*. I've had ZERO failures to feed, failures to fire, failures to extract, or failures to eject. Ejection on the G22 and G20 is, um, vigorous with some of my handloads and I will sometimes get BTF (caused as much by the brass bouncing off the lane dividers as anything else) as the power goes up for a given load. However, I really don't consider BTF to be a failure as much as an annoyance and my experience is that I can eliminate BTF largely though ammo/load selection.
I know that it's popular in some circles to poke at the Gen4's. I am certain that some percentage of folk that bought one have wound up having an issue, since statistically that's just gonna happen across a manufacturing run - I'm not going to take away anything from anyone's direct personal experience. I also know that the later Gen4's got a different ejector than the first ones, to cure FTE issues, so early adopters of the pistol no doubt have experienced less reliable operation than I.
But my point is simple - in my experiences with a number of Gen4's bought within the last 18 months, they have been as rock solid and appliance-like in their reliability as I expect and demand.
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PS: My favorites are the G17 and G21. They seem best tailored to the recoil characteristics of the rounds that they shoot. Conversely, I find the G22 and G20 to be snappier than needed, especially the G22. The G23/19/30/29/26/27 are all OK, but the bigger grip of the full size models simply fits my hand better.
Y'all have fun out there.
The ONLY failures of any kind that I've experienced in the last year have been failures to chamber a batch of oversized rounds (9x19 sizing die wiggled out and it took me a bit to notice). That's literally *IT*. I've had ZERO failures to feed, failures to fire, failures to extract, or failures to eject. Ejection on the G22 and G20 is, um, vigorous with some of my handloads and I will sometimes get BTF (caused as much by the brass bouncing off the lane dividers as anything else) as the power goes up for a given load. However, I really don't consider BTF to be a failure as much as an annoyance and my experience is that I can eliminate BTF largely though ammo/load selection.
I know that it's popular in some circles to poke at the Gen4's. I am certain that some percentage of folk that bought one have wound up having an issue, since statistically that's just gonna happen across a manufacturing run - I'm not going to take away anything from anyone's direct personal experience. I also know that the later Gen4's got a different ejector than the first ones, to cure FTE issues, so early adopters of the pistol no doubt have experienced less reliable operation than I.
But my point is simple - in my experiences with a number of Gen4's bought within the last 18 months, they have been as rock solid and appliance-like in their reliability as I expect and demand.
.
.
.
.
PS: My favorites are the G17 and G21. They seem best tailored to the recoil characteristics of the rounds that they shoot. Conversely, I find the G22 and G20 to be snappier than needed, especially the G22. The G23/19/30/29/26/27 are all OK, but the bigger grip of the full size models simply fits my hand better.
Y'all have fun out there.
