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To: ampat; The KG9 Kid
Was that one of those ultra safe Glocks?

Probably; not certainly. The Glock has had a spotty past with DEA, per following:

While Suffolk County P.D.'s "AD heard 'round the world" certainly lent impetus to Glock's "going public" with its upgrade, clearly this is something that had been in the works for a considerable period of time, and well before October 1991.

Documents first provided by a source professing to be knowledgeable about the situation, and buttressed by other documents released under a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, indicate that failure during the "Frisbee" portion of the 1991 test protocols (DEA-91-R-0023), led to the Austrian pistols being "rated as unacceptable" for broader adoption by the Federal law enforcement agency. (Whereas Glocks had been one of several DEA-approved handguns, subsequent to the tests, the agency selected the SIG P228 as their "official" handgun and removed Glock as an option. No existing Glocks were removed from service, however, and Glock's Walter stated at the time that "Glock is not going to protest the test results, since we feel they were fair and equitable.")

§L.16.1.b.(2)(c) of the agency's solicitation, Abuse Testing, required that submitted "weapons, with magazine inserted, will be thrown six times, three times in such a way as to land on the right side and three times in such a way as to land on the left side. The throw will be for a distance of approximately fifteen feet, not to exceed a height of approximately four feet, to land on a floor of quarry tile or concrete." From the FOIA request documents it was learned that beneath the Consensus Report heading of "Weaknesses" the evaluation committee stated:

Throw test: Frame 479 (with) slide 318, 1st throw left side the slide came off both rear rails. Frame 474 (with) slide 479, 1st throw right side slide came off right rear rails, rear pistol grip under landyard (sic) loop hole cracked and broke the grip after throw test, pulled the trigger would not fire. Tap, Rack, Bang would result in function of the weapon. Frame 477 (with) slide 305, slide came off right side rear rails on the first throw. Frame 318 (with) slide 474, 1st drop rear of pistol grip broken by the landyard (sic) loop hole. Based on the failure of the slides coming off the rear rails it was concluded that the weapons would not be further tested. Therefore no firing of the weapons took place after the throw test....
The original source explained:
Of all the tests of throwing Glock pistols, none before had ever been done with a loaded magazine in the pistol. Magazine out of the pistol, no problem. Magazine in the pistol, BIG PROBLEM. In the DEA tests the slide came off the frame and the pistol discharged. Gaston Glock and Reinhold Hirschheiter concluded that the slide rails were too short and that the firing pin safety needed improvement. Gaston determined that it would be too expensive to recall all pistols and replace the frames and firing pin safety systems.
At this point the narrative takes an especially interesting twist.
Karl Walter asked Gaston Glock to recall all pistols and fix the total problem. He refused and directed Karl to call the eventual project a product "upgrade" and NOT a recall.

The source expressed the opinion that this disagreement signaled the beginning of the end for Karl Walter at Glock, but, while stating that the upgrade of the "...firing pin system was the cheapest way out," described the chronology of a subsequent redesign. Even if the slide would still come off, the pistol would not discharge due to the new system. However, Mr. Glock did know that the frame rails were a big problem, in particular with future Federal bids, so he quietly lengthened the rails.

This is why there are at least three² different propagations of Glock receivers around, for the first attempt proved too long, and the subsequent "medium" length of frame rails seemed to do the trick.

In the final analysis, the April 1992 announcement of the "Six Part Product Upgrade" appears in retrospect to have been a temporizing measure while the frame was being re-engineered to withstand the harsh protocols of the "DEA Frisbee Test." Officials at Glock have refused to confirm this for the record, of course, but what is known is that the the newer pistols have not only been once again approved by the DEA, but have been adopted for issue by the FBI.
116 posted on 04/30/2004 11:54:37 AM PDT by archy (The darkness will come. It will find you,and it will scare you like you've never been scared before.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 95 | View Replies ]


To: glock rocks
Since Glocks are your weapon of choice, read carefully what archy posted.
138 posted on 04/30/2004 12:31:50 PM PDT by B4Ranch ( If everything appears to be going well, you obviously don't know what the hell is going on.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 116 | View Replies ]

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