Years ago, I came up with the 2,000 Round Challenge. Essentially, it involves putting two thousand rounds through a pistol without cleaning or lubricating the gun between the first round and the last. While absolutely sacrilegious to some, the fact is that most modern handgun designs can handle the challenge without a hiccup.
Not everyone wishes to subject his gun to that kind of torture and that is certainly understandable. But too many gun owners simply assume a gun is reliable because it’s a brand name or because some other people on the internet said so.
It’s a mistake to assume that a gun will run properly right out of the box.
It’s a mistake to assume that if a gun fires a magazine’s worth of ammo, it’s reliable.
Just peruse your favorite gun forums and blogs. Stories about pistol that developed problems after 50, 100 or even more are commonplace. Springs and small parts get worked, grind together, and begin to wear. Some critical dimension that was on the very edge of a tolerance may now be out of spec and suddenly the gun doesn’t work.
My standard practice is to put 300 or more rounds of basic practice ammo through a new gun first to test basic function. If it runs without a hiccup, next I fire 200 rounds of my chosen carry JHPs to verify there are no odd compatibility issues. To be honest, with modern designs there is rarely a problem with specific JHP ammo, however, so if someone wanted to fire 450 rounds of practice FMJ and just 50 rounds of carry JHP that would probably be adequate.
Is 500 rounds a guarantee that the gun will never develop a problem? No, of course not. But a gun that cannot go 500 rounds definitely has a problem.
Train hard & stay safe! ToddG
OK …. I’ll bite. I agree 100% with this post. I generally use 500’ish rds as my benchmark before trusting a gun. Of that I generally don’t run more than 50-100 rds of carry ammo …. unless it’s something like a 1911 or LCP. These might get more of each type of ammo.
This bring us to the Gen4 GLOCKs. Given the issues some have had where would you feel comfortable drawing the “good-to-go” line? I have ~300rds through my Gen4 G21 (all flawless so far) and plan to put another few hundred down before I say its GtG. Do you feel that is adequate?
I’ve seen too many gen4 9mm Glocks start to have problems between 1k and 2k. The reality is that until you’ve put a lot of ammo through one, you just don’t know for sure.
Which reminds me, I really need to put some rounds through my new backup G17.
I kind of knew that was the answer. O well. I guess we’ll wait and see.
It is said that glock with the release of the gen 4 series of guns has degraded their reputation so bad, I have been shooting glocks for close to 20 years now and they have always been reliable. I am sitting on the fence right now on buying a gen 4 and am waiting for the Gen 4 G34 to hit canada togive one a try, hopefully they will have the bugs worked out by then.
My gen 3 G19 started to crap the bed just after 1000 though the gun.
It really sucks that when I used to be really happy that my gun was reliable is now when I have to start to worry.
And I don’t want to clean my guns because???
I take a different approach to that issue. I remember a combat type shoot that was held in my area every week. One particular night a “loud mouth type” showed up bragging on about how his Glock had 10K rounds through it without being cleaned. Guess who’s gun stopped up tighter than a virgin on prom night?
ANYTHING I trust to possibly defend my life is going to be taken care of wisely and often. I see NO reason to take chances.
I too have to agree with this post! My first sidearm was a Walther P99QA when I returned from Iraq in 2007. Constantly wanting to test my intended carry weapon, I eventually shot more than 1600 rounds through it before it was ever cleaned or lubed. Between it’s purchase and eventual cleaning a few friends look at it when we would shoot together and comment on the dryness and filth that had accumulated. I’m happy to say that I never broke to cleaning and lubing until I was ready. When I finally cleaned and lubed my weapon I was headed to Combat Arms Training and Maintenance school for the Air Force. I’m personally satisfied with the fact that my weapon is durable and dependable…as well as now keeping it clean and lubed after every range day!
Are your standards for determining reliability different for a new gun vs. previously broken/unreliable gun? You could have:
A new gun that runs fine
or
A gun that once ran fine, had significant issues, and was repaired.
I’m waiting on the return of my previously broken Gen4 19 and have been wondering when I’ll consider it carry worthy. I’m thinking (2) 2000 round challenges.
>I’ve seen too many gen4 9mm Glocks start to have problems between 1k and 2k. The reality is that until you’ve put a lot of ammo through one, you just don’t know for sure.
And this is pretty much what put me off of buying a Gen4 as my new carry gun despite the fact that I really, really wanted to like them. I just don’t have the time+money to invest a few thousand rounds into a gun before I find out that it’s broken.
So first off to save the negative nancys out there some typing, I DO UNDERSTAND this is about the 9mm G4. However, in December I finished up my Basic Law Enforcement Training, and my class was the first of the students to get to use the G4 22 (I know 40 not 9) at our school. In a matter of 7 weeks we ran through a total of 4865 rounds before our 120 rounds of qualification(day,night,combat course) The weapon issued to me had 0 failures of any type. The few (3-4) my classmates suffered were in the first 500 rounds. Two of which(ftf) I am pretty sure were on part of the user. I will be running my 750th round thru my personal weapon this afternoon and have no reserves on calling it gtg after the 500th mark.
Thanks for all the great info and entertainment this wonderful community provides
Rod W
JV — The answer to your question depends a lot on what the problem was beforehand. But if it was a true reliability issue stemming from internal parts or major components, then I would want it to pass at least 500 rounds, preferably with as much of it as possible being my carry JHPs, before depending on it.