Got a chance to pick up a lnib 30rnds fired for good price. anyone have pros or cons on the compensated models? will be range use mainly, but I will carry it some after I ring it out. never really carried the 40cal much, mainly 9mm and 45gap. does the porting help with the 40 recoil or is it just for show?
The porting mostly helps with the muzzle-flip, not so much with the recoil (maybe a tiny bit, based on reducing the velocity; less velocity, less recoil). I have one, wouldn't hesitate to carry it, once I had tested it well with my preferred carry load(s).
Port-flash with cheap target/range ammo will be huge (fun to see on an indoor range); with quality defensive loads, it will be no worse than the muzzle flash on a non-ported Glock.
If you ever decide you don't want or like the porting, you can drop-in a non-ported barrel, and the 23C goes back to being a regular Glock 23.
I have a Gen4 23C, it's about the only 40sw that I shoot anymore. I have two 19C's and a 17C, which are probably my favorite Glocks to shoot. I carried a 19C for a while and wouldn't hesitate to do it again.
I've been shooting my gen3 22C and 23C for many thousand rounds along with my other regular 23s, 35s, 9s, and 27s. The .40C models seem to have just a bit less recoil.
It's a fine gun that I would trust my life with. I'm moving to 9mm though due to new found reasons. You can always put a 9mm conversion barrel in if you want to make it a G19 and/or to not use the C option...It does look good with a stainless steel barrel.
There are two very serious disadvantages to porting and two of lesser concern:
Problem 1 - For any specific ammo loading, ported recoil-operated auto-pistols always produce lower slide assembly recoil velocity relative to the frame. That always reduces pistol functional reliability. A ported pistol may be reliable for the load being fired and the grip used by the shooter. Still, it is less so compared to the exact same but unported pistol and ammo. That is an inescapable consequence of the governing physics.
Problem 2 - The visual flash of ported handguns is often cited as a disadvantage. However, that is usually an exaggerated fear with little real disadvantage. What condemns porting for weapons service, for which the shooter is extremely unlikely to have hearing protection, is the very significant increase in audible blast, especially indoors where many self defense shootings occur. Just because the shooter may not notice the blast in the heat of battle, that does not stop the permanent hearing damage that occurs with unprotected exposure to ported pistol blast.
Problem 3 - Bullet velocity and energy is reduced.
Problem 4 - Front sight markings may become obscured with powder residue.
Ported auto-pistols may have a place in recreational or competative shooting where:
Problem 1 - Loss of functional reliability can bring no serious consequences.
Problem 2 - Hearing protection is always used.
Problem 3 - Reduced bullet velocity- and energy-related bullet performance issues are of no importance for range games.
Problem 4 - Time is available to remove residue as required.
These characteristics of ported pistols limit their applicability to recreational or competative shooting only.
For weapons service, porting brings nothing but disadvantage. If a shooter requires the slight reduction in muzzle flip that porting provides in order to competently engage a real-world threat, then he is in the same box as those who require light and delicate custom trigger actions in a defensive pistol. Either he labors under the fantasy that shooting at a threat is the same as shooting at paper, or he needs training on how to competently employ a pistol that is configured as a weapon instead of a range toy.
There are two very serious disadvantages to porting and two of lesser concern:
Problem 1 - For any specific ammo loading, ported recoil-operated auto-pistols always produce lower slide assembly recoil velocity relative to the frame. That always reduces pistol functional reliability. A ported pistol may be reliable for the load being fired and the grip used by the shooter. Still, it is less so compared to the exact same but unported pistol and ammo. That is an inescapable consequence of the governing physics.
Answer #1: The reduced slide velocity may POTENTIALLY reduce functional reliability, or it may not; only testing with specific loads and shooters can determine this. Your claimed comparison is also based on non-ported Glocks being 100% reliable, which any review of the first two pages of General Glocking will show to be in error. In addition, the Gen3 .40 caliber Glocks seems to have PLENTY of slide velocity to work with, so much so that locking-block peening was a problem with some gun/load combos. When you have that much "extra" slide velocity/energy to work with, it's difficult to make a serious case for porting being a potential functioning problem, at least in the .40 caliber pistols.
Problem 2 - The visual flash of ported handguns is often cited as a disadvantage. However, that is usually an exaggerated fear with little real disadvantage. What condemns porting for weapons service, for which the shooter is extremely unlikely to have hearing protection, is the very significant increase in audible blast, especially indoors where many self defense shootings occur. Just because the shooter may not notice the blast in the heat of battle, that does not stop the permanent hearing damage that occurs with unprotected exposure to ported pistol blast.
Answer #2: Again, in pointing out a problem, you have failed to compare it to the other option, which is also hazardous to hearing. Once you get above a certain sound pressure threshold, hearing damage will occur, and both ported and non-ported pistols exceed this threshold in every circumstance where hearing protection is not worn. There is no advantage in either case.
Problem 3 - Bullet velocity and energy is reduced.
Answer #3: Usually, recorded velocities for a 10-shot string of rounds fired through a ported Glock will overlap many of the velocities found in the same load fired through a non-ported Glock -- they are that close. Occasionally, one or more rounds through the ported pistol will exceed the average or even the highest velocity of the test rounds fired through a similar non-ported Glock. In any case, a ported Glock will never reduce average velocity below that of the next smaller weapon (in the case of the G23, the velocity will always be higher than a G27), which are rarely (if ever) seen as unsuitable for personal defense. This is an ammo problem, and just as with subcompact defensive pistols, careful ammo selection can solve or minimize the problem.
Problem 4 - Front sight markings may become obscured with powder residue.
Answer #4: The front sight will never become so fouled that it becomes unusable with the amount of ammo carried or used in any realistic defensive shooting scenario. It's simply not a factor.
(snip)
For weapons service, porting brings nothing but disadvantage.
This is incorrect. Not only does it bring a measurable speed increase in multiple-shots-on-single-or-close-targets for those who practice enough to take advantage of it, porting also brings a significant defense against immobilizing gun-grabs used to prevent a weapon from cycling as the first shot is fired. There are online videos that show how to grab a pistol and hold the slide closed as the first shot is fired, without getting injured. Those techniques DO NOT WORK on ported pistols, and in fact, will result in a rather nasty and painful wound from high-speed port gasses, which will give the defender plenty of time to manually cycle the slide and create distance from the attacker, as the attacker attends to the partially shredded and burned mess that used to be one of their hands.
Congratulations on the new pistol doc606. I do like the g23 platform.
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