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Thread: Lightening cuts on slides for RDS, yay, or nay? plus a breech face question

  1. #1
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    Lightening cuts on slides for RDS, yay, or nay? plus a breech face question

    OK my quest for knowledge continues.

    BTW mods, if this better belongs in the RDS forum, please move.

    I'm trying to join the ranks of the pistol RDS community.

    If I send a Glock slide for an RDS mill job, should I be looking at getting lightening cuts to offset for the increased weight of the RDS? Not necessarily a complete cut either, but just some material to lighten the slide. In fact I'd rather not have a complete fenestration, but if it makes the gun run better with lightening ditches, or whatever you'd call them, I'd totally be open to do it.

    So yay, or nay, to lightening ditches, or even complete fenestrations?

    Or will a Gen3, 4, or 5 slide run completely fine, with an RDS, with only the mill job and no other chop shop action?

    Also! Do any of the common aftermarket RDS slides, from Primary Machine, Agency Arms, et. al., have breech faces optimized to keep brass out of the glass?
    Last edited by DacoRoman; 05-15-2021 at 06:13 PM.

  2. #2
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    I’m in the same place on this. Does it really make that much difference?

  3. #3
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    Note that a Glock MOS doesn’t have any additional lightening when you put an optic on over running without it. Just the absence of the plate.

    If you run weak ammo, you might need a lighter recoil spring to account for the slower slide speed in relation to the mag springs. But I wouldn’t intentionally lighten the slide to compensate.

    Having run a competition gun with 3 oz taken out of the slide to make weight for division versus having a slide with all the weight plus the optic...

    The heavier slide combo is softer shooting.

  4. #4
    My sense is that most optic cuts remove enough metal to offset the weight of the RDS, and most lightning cuts are primarily cosmetic. I do like forward serrations so I don't have to grab the optic to work the slide.
    Likes pretty much everything in every caliber.

  5. #5
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    Quote Originally Posted by GJM View Post
    My sense is that most optic cuts remove enough metal to offset the weight of the RDS, and most lightning cuts are primarily cosmetic. I do like forward serrations so I don't have to grab the optic to work the slide.
    Yeah I can’t find the data now, but I looked at this at one time and was surprised how much the optic cuts did to semi rebalance the overall weight.

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by DacoRoman View Post

    Also! Do any of the common aftermarket RDS slides, from Primary Machine, Agency Arms, et. al., have breech faces optimized to keep brass out of the glass?
    If you’re referring to the breechface cut/notch found in newer production Gen5 guns, I don’t believe that any of the aftermarket slides incorporate it and I haven’t heard of anyone offering to machine it into existing slides. The cut is nice to have since it really seems to improve consistent ejection but the guns without them (millions of Glocks prior to the Gen5 guns) seem to run just fine.
    My posts only represent my personal opinion and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or official policies of any employer, past or present. Obvious spelling errors are likely the result of an iPhone keyboard.

  7. #7
    Site Supporter Lon's Avatar
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    I’ve never cut lightening cuts into any of the slides I’ve added RDS cuts to (4 total - 2 Sig, a CZ and a Glock) and have never had an issue. The brownells RDS slide I bought had the lightening cuts purely for cosmetic reasons.
    Formerly known as xpd54.
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  8. #8
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    Quote Originally Posted by JCN View Post
    Note that a Glock MOS doesn’t have any additional lightening when you put an optic on over running without it. Just the absence of the plate.

    If you run weak ammo, you might need a lighter recoil spring to account for the slower slide speed in relation to the mag springs. But I wouldn’t intentionally lighten the slide to compensate.

    Having run a competition gun with 3 oz taken out of the slide to make weight for division versus having a slide with all the weight plus the optic...

    The heavier slide combo is softer shooting.
    Good info, thanks. And presumably Glock would have lightened the slide more if it was a requisite for rds reliability I’m surmising.

    Copy regarding recoil impulse but did you feel like you could pull faster splits with the lightened slide ?

    And to expound to others’ potential experience, has anyone noticed slower splits when running a heavier/rds slide ?

  9. #9
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    Quote Originally Posted by GJM View Post
    My sense is that most optic cuts remove enough metal to offset the weight of the RDS, and most lightning cuts are primarily cosmetic. I do like forward serrations so I don't have to grab the optic to work the slide.
    Quote Originally Posted by luckyman View Post
    Yeah I can’t find the data now, but I looked at this at one time and was surprised how much the optic cuts did to semi rebalance the overall weight.
    Roger that, makes sense and good to know .. it will sure save me some money too!

  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by DacoRoman View Post
    Good info, thanks. And presumably Glock would have lightened the slide more if it was a requisite for rds reliability I’m surmising.

    Copy regarding recoil impulse but did you feel like you could pull faster splits with the lightened slide ?

    And to expound to others’ potential experience, has anyone noticed slower splits when running a heavier/rds slide ?
    That’s a very complicated question.
    With my very heavy TSO slide, I can do 0.09-0.11 splits.

    There’s a lot more than slide weight to fast splits.

    The short answer is that if your springs and ammo all work together it doesn’t really matter.

    I prefer heavier slide myself.

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