I have no frame of reference for what a really dirty Glock looks like. Anyone have pics of a Glock in bad need of cleaning? My Glock 19 is the first gun I have ever owned. I went to the range yesterday and ran 200 rounds of WWB through my new Glock 19. I knew WWB was supposed to be really dirty so tonight I broke down my Glock and did my first cleaning. I honestly didn't see much. It didn't take many passes of Hoppe's #9 soaked patches through the barrel before they started to come out clean. Then I even took the nylon bore brush and ran it through and nothing much came out. I did a wipe down on the slide and didn't do much to the receiver. I'm not too worried that I missed something because I know a Glock will run dirty no problem and I will hopefully be shooting this weekend anyway.
Sorry, no pictures here, but in my experience, WWB isn't that dirty (as you've seen now). The only place powder really shows up on my 19 is near the muzzle, since I bought the OD frame. My barrel is usually clean after one or two brush and patch runs.
You are supposed to clean it before the first time shooting it and evry time after you shoot it. The whole gun should be cleaned not just the barrel. If it is a carry weapon then clean more often as lint and debris build up quickly. It is cheap insurance on the reliability and resale of your gun.
With good ammo, either factory or reloaded, you should be able to shoot thousands of rounds before you "have" to clean it. A dirty Glock is a happy Glock!
Im sure somebody has dirty glock pics but it wont be mine - i do way more cleaning then shooting. The gun gets cleaned after every shooting range visit. and i clean all my guns at least every 3-6 months if they havent been used - i never want to pick up a gun and find its a rusted piece of junk from sitting - what a waste of a good gun! Anyway you CAN leave them dirty if you wanted and many people do. Because the gun is plastic probably way more forgiving then an all metal gun to neglect. I'd always clean the barrel, at the very least, however - if it is going to rust here is where it will start. There's not a lot of corrosive ammo around anymore, (if you find it it's usually foreign made military surplus), but cheap ammo may not be the bargain it looks like at first. Corrosive ammo uses potassium chloride in the primer, which is a big rust catalyst. And corrosive ammo remnants, left behind inside the barrel, can kill it. Even if it doesn't rust completely it can cause pitting, which will destroy forever any accuracy from that barrel. If you just hate cleaning and can't make yourself do it, at least lock the slide back and run a patch and brush soaked with hoppes or break free and scrub inside the barrel. Then soak the barrel with break free again and that is better then nothing. Also you can just hose the gun with brake cleaner or carb cleaner (some people say use MAF sensor cleaner from the auto parts), then do the barrel cleaning thing, and at least you'll still be able to rack the slide, on a pit-free barrel in 5 years.
now picture yourself in the middle of a gun fight, you have gloves on and you reach for your pistol and fire and it jams...now you try to strip the magazine and it doesnt come out and you cant strip it out because the extra space that would allow for your finger/thumb this is taken up with that plug!!!
Now come on! The hole in front, is big enough to get your index finger while with the other 2 fingers grab that mag from both sides out (Even with the plug there is a lot of space to grab the rear of the mag with your thumb). There is a reason why the GLOCK magazine doesn't sit flush with the frame.
The range owned RTF17 I tried out was pretty dirty. So dirty it was gritty racking the slide, I stripped it for fun, It was caked. Couldn't hear the firing pin rattle. The barrel end was black & not a drop of oil on it anywhere. After firing 100 rounds without a problem I asked the clerk how often they cleaned it. He said they never clean the glocks. And said they never strip any of their rental guns. They wipe them down & put a few drop of oil in them each day & that's about it.
This is about the best I've seen... http://theprepared.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=90&Itemid=40 This is pretty cool too... http://theprepared.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=136&Itemid=40 (around the 4 minute mark on the second video, he loses the guide rod completely...and keeps shooting)
If you are shooting jacketed ammo, the barrel is the least of your worries in terms of keeping things clean. Competitive shooters often let their bores go several thousand rounds without cleaning. It does not affect reliability or accuracy. Doesn't even get really dirty. A dirty chamber or feed ramp can affect reliability. A cruddy extractor can affect reliability. Gunk in the striker channel will certainly affect reliability. Gunk between the connector and trigger bar will affect trigger pull. Really dirty magazines will affect reliability as well.
Come on now, I cant think of anyone but a small asian women who could fit their thumb in there with gloves on..
I was more hoping for someone to take pics of their glock field stripped and dirty so I know the problem areas I need to focus on when cleaning.
