Re-loaded Ammo in Glock 40 cal

[octalman]

Would like to hear opinions and experience about using 40 cal reloaded or remanufactured ammo in a Glock. Brother-in-law went to a shop to buy reloading equipment for 9mm and 40 cal. At the counter mentioned he planned to reload primarily 40 cal for his Glock. The shop owner told him not a good idea to shoot reloads because 1)Glock barrel leaves too much brass unsupported, 2)40 cal brass wall thickness near the base is too thin - prone to bulging, and 3)40 cal dies do not resize full length of the brass.

Stories and pictures of Glocks going KaBoom are easy to find on the web. Very little factual information about root causes.

Anybody have fact based knowledge to share?

Other Brands also leave some brass unsupported so this is not meant to be a Glock good or bad debate.

 

[EvilKidsMeal]

I am no expert, nor do i reload, but i can pass on some things i have read as i was interested in reloading before as well.

from what i understand reloading with brass shot from a glock is not good due to the buldge from the unsupported chamber. but shooting bought brass or brass collected from a supported chamber is fine(?) basically what i read is simply you should not reload glock brass.

again this is from what i read, i'm sure someone else here has a definitive answer. don't hole me to it but i have looked into on more than one occasion. just trying to add a little help before more experienced members chime in.

 

[HICKMAN]

I have shot TONS of reloads in my Glock 9mm's. Most of it has been moly-coated lead and it works fine.

That being said, I have also reloaded and shot a lot of .40 of my previous Glock 35. According to the book "Glocks in competition", kabooms were more likely to happen from the stock barrels leading than anything else.

That and the higher pressure of the .40 lead me to upgrade to a Storm Lake replacement barrel. This replaced the polygonal rifling, which is okay for regular ammo, but not lead which is better served with traditional rifling. Link to Barrel

I also ran my brass thru a lee resizing die before running in my Dillon SDB. I often found that "Glocked" brass picked up from the range after being reloaded in my Dillon would fit in my case guage, but not in the barrel.

 

[zombiekilla]

I shoot .40 reloads in my glock 23 and no problems

 

[NIFT]

It is true that Glocks do not support cartridges, fully, at the bottom of the chamber--a very small price to pay for reliability.

Yes, there are plenty of "Kaboom" pictures of Glocks easily found on the Internet; however, I have never seen one and have only heard of one: the owner freely admitted he accidentally double-charged the reloaded round.

Reloading is not a problem with Glocks or with .40 cal. Glocks. Glock recommends using only jacketed bullets, but many folks have used lead bullets and claim no problems. Glock barrels are hammer forged; the rifling is forged into the barrel rather than machine cut. The result is a barrel that seals gasses well but is prone to leading. With extensive leading, according to Glock, excessive back pressure can cause a failure (Kaboom.)

I have reloaded thousands of .40 cal. ammunition for my Glocks with no problems, but I take the following precautions:

First, I never use "range brass" that might have suspect "heritage." Rather, I use brass that I fired with factory ammo, or purchased, or obtained from other shooters who don't reload, and I know it was once-fired factory brass, i.e., I watched them shoot it from a new box.

Second, I work up my loads carefully via function tests. I load about three rounds each in .2 grain increments, going down until I find where the gun will not function properly, translate, stove pipes. I, then, add .3 grains to that load and have reliable load that is on the very low end.

I find my brass not to have visible bulges after firing my reloads.

Hope this helps a bit.

 

[singlestacksig]

i have a speer reloading book that says do not use reloads in .40 s&w glocks.
it is a few years old, i know a lot of guys who got after market barrels to address this problem.. and there are sizing tools specifically for resizing brass fired from unsupported barrels.

 

[Chase515]

Lee makes a bulge buster die just for this problem. Bulge Buster Base Sizing Kit (380 Auto 40 S&W 45 ACP)

 

[drgnrobo]

I shoot a lot of lead I didnt want to worry about a Kaboom, So I got a Lone Wolf s/s barrel for my Glock 22

 

[snapping turtle]

Bar sto used to make 40 Short and Weak barrels I do believe they still do.

When you add in the cost of a barrel at 200-260 dollars plus 45 shipping and to the cost of a glock you could buy something a little more attractive and just about as reliable.

As you can tell I am not a big fan of the 40 or the glock.

 

[Leo]

I just throw away any brass with the big "pregnant belly" glock buldge. At 3 or 4 cents each for clean used .40 brass, why risk anything that makes you uncomfortable? You do not see nearly as much badly buldged brass these days. I am told that glock improved their design since the first generation models and there is a lot less problems. Either way, I never shoot Lead bullets through a glock and have never had any trouble with .40 reloads in a glock. I have never owned a .40 glock, but I have shot many of them.

 

[Sureshot129]

I run professionally reloaded .40 through my G23 most of the time with no problems and so do most of the .40 shooters at Kodiak. I think it boils down to the individual if your reloading for yourself, are with in specs and properly inspect and process your brass there should not be an issue.

 

[billybob44]

Bar sto used to make 40 Short and Weak barrels I do believe they still do.

When you add in the cost of a barrel at 200-260 dollars plus 45 shipping and to the cost of a glock you could buy something a little more attractive and just about as reliable.

As you can tell I am not a big fan of the 40 or the glock.

Come on John--Tell us what you REALLY think about Glocks..HA Bill.

 

[billybob44]

Redding GR-X Die.

I prep a lot of .40 cal. range brass. All of my .40 S&W brass goes through a Redding GR-X Carbide pass-through die. All of these cases will fit a .40 S&W case gauge+my .40 S&W barrels. I lightly spray before with a mix of hand lotion/rubbing alcohol, and run them all through. Works well for me..Bill.

 

[Drail]

This is the funniest thread I've seen in a while. Unsupported cases, bulged brass, hand lotion/rubbing alcohol case lube?! Try some KY Jelly man. Slide Glide. But the absolute best has to be - "a very small price to pay for increased reliability." You Glock boys are killing me. Extending the feed ramp into the chamber to increase reliability is not a very small price to pay when the thing Kabooms. You do know that an awful lot of firearms designers have been able to achieve feed reliability without leaving brass hanging out over the feedramp for, oh, a hundred years or so. Perfection my butt. Oh my God I can't stop laughing!

 

[singlestacksig]

here is a thread that contains photos of Gen 1 chambers and replacement ones..

The legend of the Glock 40 caliber kBoom

 

[billybob44]

Glad to see you enjoy the thread.

This is the funniest thread I've seen in a while. Unsupported cases, bulged brass, hand lotion/rubbing alcohol case lube?! Try some KY Jelly man. Slide Glide. But the absolute best has to be - "a very small price to pay for increased reliability." You Glock boys are killing me. Extending the feed ramp into the chamber to increase reliability is not a very small price to pay when the thing Kabooms. You do know that an awful lot of firearms designers have been able to achieve feed reliability without leaving brass hanging out over the feedramp for, oh, a hundred years or so. Perfection my butt. Oh my God I can't stop laughing!

It is great to see someone enjoy a thread so much! By the way rail, do you own a Glock?? HA..........Bill.

 

[Drail]

You couldn't give me a plastic pistol even if you dipped it in bacon grease.

 

[Cam]

Ok, I'm gonna stir the pot here..........

Does a semi-auto pistol that has a "fully supported" chamber even exist? How can it if the barrel has a feed ramp? Revolvers have "fully supported" chambers. Case in point is the barrel out of my LCP. This is LESS supported than the Glock chambers in the factory barrels on my 22, 23, and 27. Should I avoid reloading for this gun too? I hope not cause I've already reloaded and shot several hundred for it and forgot to check the interwebz before doing so to make sure it was ok!

With that in mind, I've reloaded and shot thousands of rounds for my .40 glocks and all 3 of them are still intact....shhhh, [looks both ways] and that's with those horrible factory barrels...


Flame on!

 

[NIFT]

This is the funniest thread I've seen in a while. Unsupported cases, bulged brass, hand lotion/rubbing alcohol case lube?! Try some KY Jelly man. Slide Glide. But the absolute best has to be - "a very small price to pay for increased reliability." You Glock boys are killing me. Extending the feed ramp into the chamber to increase reliability is not a very small price to pay when the thing Kabooms. You do know that an awful lot of firearms designers have been able to achieve feed reliability without leaving brass hanging out over the feedramp for, oh, a hundred years or so. Perfection my butt. Oh my God I can't stop laughing!

Got that out of your system? Feel better now? But, thanks for sharing!

 

[rotortech]

I will preface this with the statement that I am not an expert. My friend and I both have Glocks in 40 S&W. Friend wanted to start reloading so I did some homework.

This is what I read from several sources (on line):
When the 40 cal round was developed the gun manufacturers modified existing 9mm guns to accept the 40 cal cartridge. That is why the big ramp is there in the barrel. Gock claims that many reported KBs are due to running too much powder.

But they also studied the problem and came up with this:

1. Some otherwise properly reloaded ammo had case swell that prevented the round from going all the way in to battery. When fired in this position the unsupported case wall is overexposed and blows out.

2. Loading then unloading a round of 40 cal even once, pushed the bullet back into the casing. When you consider your carry ammo, you might load and unload the same round once a day for a long while. Glock paid an Austrian ammo manufacturer to do some testing. They pushed the bullet back 1/10 of an inch. The resulting case pressures were 2X the design pressure. This is well over the proof pressure of 1.3 to 1.5X the design pressure. My friend verified this in his Glock. The bullet gets pushed back into the brass with every load/unload cycle. Scary. I guess the crimp is wimpy.

3. After feedback from reports in the field, Federal changed the brass design on their 40 cal ammo. They thickened up the case wall at the back end to build in some insurance against swelling and blow out. Other manufacturers reportedly just marked the ammo as "Not for reloading".

After digesting that information I have guessed that there were a bunch of problems several years ago and suspect that there are fewer problems now due to changes in the brass, etc.

I advised my friend to skip the reloading for now until we know what is safe practice. I haven't found that article yet. I believe that buying reloaded ammo would be a safe bet because the guys reloading 40 cal ammo are aware of the problems and have done the necessary homework. For now I am buying new ammo for my range trips.