Glock Ejection Without Magazine

[Doc_Glock]

I recently did a drill with my Gen 4 Glock 19 that required loading a single round then removing the magazine, then firing.

Out of fifteen rounds, I had one stovepipe, one round fall out the magwell and one extremely slow slide cycle where the slide locked back or hung up on something for a second then fell back into battery.

This particular pistol had some BTF and ejection issues in the past. I thought I cured it with the updated 336 trigger/ejector assembly. It has reliable for 900 rounds since that replacement, but I have never done this drill without the magazine before.

Is this typical behavior or should I be concerned?

[fishing]

BTF = Not normal and is generally inherent to the specific glock you get. It's either not present, present but solvable with some combo of parts and black magic, or present and almost unsolvable at which point its better to get a whole new pistol and try again.

Erratic behavior as mentioned while shooting without mag inserted = normal IMO, even with a gun that performs flawlessly with a mag inserted.

design relies on something being present applying pressure below the fired case as it moves backwards.



I cannot think of an unavoidable scenario (other than whatever drill you are performing) that would require firing the gun without a magazine inserted - but I am not all knowing.

[Rex G]

I recently did a drill with my Gen 4 Glock 19 that required loading a single round then removing the magazine, then firing.

Out of fifteen rounds, I had one stovepipe, one round fall out the magwell and one extremely slow slide cycle where the slide locked back or hung up on something for a second then fell back into battery.

This particular pistol had some BTF and ejection issues in the past. I thought I cured it with the updated 336 trigger/ejector assembly. It has reliable for 900 rounds since that replacement, but I have never done this drill without the magazine before.

Is this typical behavior or should I be concerned?

I have seen several anecdotes indicating that a Glock will be more likely to have an ejection malfunction if a round is fired with no magazine in place. I remember trying to burn this into my brain, in an effort to remember to avoid firing a shot during a reload, before the fresh magazine is in place.

[fishing]

I have seen several anecdotes indicating that a Glock will be more likely to have an ejection malfunction if a round is fired with no magazine in place.

as stated by me above, the design relies on a magazine being inserted (empty or not).

it is more than an anecdotal notion.

my fix is to not find myself in situations where shooting my gun without a mag inserted is necessary. it's been easy to do this.

[Doublestack45]

Video by Tim Lau (Modern Service Weapons).

[fishing]

Video by Tim Lau (Modern Service Weapons).


https://youtu.be/GYsHuLC0Kyg

should i upgrade my glocks if i am getting 100% reliable ejection from my glocks, with no BTF and do not plan on shooting my guns without a magazine inserted?

[Doublestack45]

I posted the video only because of its relevance to the OP's question.
Randy Lee(Apex Tactical) has tons of information in the archive section relating to Glock extractors and his design.

[JHC]

I had a Gen 4 Apex extractor kit I put into a G4 17 because I can. It ran well before. It's running well now. It still drops the cases through the chute. Meh.

[Nephrology]

From what I recall, this test is specific to 1911 pistols and doesn't typically provide useful information for other semi-automatic pistols. Per Tim Lau.

Some shooters have noted that quality modern pistols will not pass this test. This is not as much of an issue as with the traditional 1911 for the following reasons:
1. The coil spring setup of the modern external extractor is not prone to loss of tension like the leaf spring setup of the internal 1911 extractor. Once a pistol is set up from the factory, what you get (in terms of extractor function) on day one is what you will get until something breaks.
2. The feed lip and follower geometry of modern service pistols do not make them prone to having the empty case dragged into the feed lips should the extractor lose grip on the case rim during extraction.

[TAZ]

Have a gen4 G19 that has about 1k rounds down range with 0 BTF issues. It wont get through that test at all. Stove pipes, dribbling cases barely clear of he slide and my hand, brass out the magwell... It runs 100% with any magazine I have run through it. I am not about to fix something that isnt broken. Unless you get some freaky failure that locks the gun up, Id put this into the who cares category. If you have to fire without a mag for whatever reason then when you reload you will have to cycle the action which will let you clear a stove pipe.