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I have a Glock 17 Gen 4 which I bought off CalGuns brand new through a police officer who had purchased it. I quickly ran into issues where every expended cartridge flopped on my forearm or flew straight at my face.
I researched and found MANY Gen4 owners had this same issue. My Glock had the recently updated RSA(Recoil Spring Assembly) and the new ejector marked 30274. I did not have limp wrist grip when I shot it and I was using basic Federal 115 ammo. Not even Winchester White Box which seems to be the problem ammo for the Gen4. People kept telling me it was my grip.
I talked to Charlie Vanek of Vanek triggers who said that it was the RSA being too stiff and made for hotter loads. He advised to go with a single spring recoil assembly which I purchased but did not try out yet because I contacted Glock who's customer service replied back to me 3 days after I emailed them and they told me to send it in for RMA. I followed up with further questions and got no reply.
I wrapped my Glock in bubble wrap and sent it next day air on 12/31/12 and got it back 1/17/13. I was please to see they included a new case, cleaning brush, loader, and marketing material. From what I could see, it looks like they stripped the lower and replaced the RSA again. (I know this because I marked the RSA I had and my trigger pins were as well and those are gone) They don't tell you what they did, the paper work just says RMA "Upgrade." I left my 4.5 firing pin spring in when I sent it and they pulled that out and put it in a little zip lock for me and placed it in the box and replaced it with the factory one.
I took it to the range yesterday and fired 150 rounds. Prior to the RMA I had 1 in every 7 rounds hit me in the safety glasses and every 7 out of 10 rounds bounce off my forearm. Two rounds would eject away from me but with no force.
After the RMA, out of 150 rounds of Federal 115 I had a total of 6 rounds hit me in the face, 4 into my shoulder, and the rest ejected perfectly with force to my right. A big improvement from before but the 6 rounds that still hit my face concern me. Had I not been wearing glasses two of the rounds would have hit me square in the eye. One round got stuck between my hearing protection and head and burned my scalp. I am ok with this because the G17Gen4 is not my defense firearm. My 45 takes care of that, but it's still concerning because what if I am in a situation where I might need to use it?
I group about 1-1.5 inches at 7 yards. The series i shot after being hit in the face increased my group to 3-5 inches at 7 yards. It made me lose focus.
I will be hitting the range tomorrow with the single spring recoil assembly and will give more feedback.
For those who have problems, here are the fixes I have found online though I do not know how much success u will find with them:
1) Replace the recoil spring assembly to a single stage. U can get these on ebay. They also sell Gen 3 recoil spring adaptors.
2) Make sure the ejector is marked 30274
3) Get the Apex Extractor
4) Call Glock and get an RMA.
Hope this helps people as this took me a long time to really understand what was happening with my pistol.
It's a big improvement, not perfect, but I want this to function like my Gen3 so I have no worries. I will post an updated if the new RSA changed anything.
****Update****
When home and sadly the singe spring RSA was not in the mail. So I went to shoot anyway. I fired 200 rounds this time, zero hit my face, I had one flop on my forearm and one eject to the left, but the rest stayed clear of my face. I'm guessing the RSA just needed to smoothen out.
I researched and found MANY Gen4 owners had this same issue. My Glock had the recently updated RSA(Recoil Spring Assembly) and the new ejector marked 30274. I did not have limp wrist grip when I shot it and I was using basic Federal 115 ammo. Not even Winchester White Box which seems to be the problem ammo for the Gen4. People kept telling me it was my grip.
I talked to Charlie Vanek of Vanek triggers who said that it was the RSA being too stiff and made for hotter loads. He advised to go with a single spring recoil assembly which I purchased but did not try out yet because I contacted Glock who's customer service replied back to me 3 days after I emailed them and they told me to send it in for RMA. I followed up with further questions and got no reply.
I wrapped my Glock in bubble wrap and sent it next day air on 12/31/12 and got it back 1/17/13. I was please to see they included a new case, cleaning brush, loader, and marketing material. From what I could see, it looks like they stripped the lower and replaced the RSA again. (I know this because I marked the RSA I had and my trigger pins were as well and those are gone) They don't tell you what they did, the paper work just says RMA "Upgrade." I left my 4.5 firing pin spring in when I sent it and they pulled that out and put it in a little zip lock for me and placed it in the box and replaced it with the factory one.
I took it to the range yesterday and fired 150 rounds. Prior to the RMA I had 1 in every 7 rounds hit me in the safety glasses and every 7 out of 10 rounds bounce off my forearm. Two rounds would eject away from me but with no force.
After the RMA, out of 150 rounds of Federal 115 I had a total of 6 rounds hit me in the face, 4 into my shoulder, and the rest ejected perfectly with force to my right. A big improvement from before but the 6 rounds that still hit my face concern me. Had I not been wearing glasses two of the rounds would have hit me square in the eye. One round got stuck between my hearing protection and head and burned my scalp. I am ok with this because the G17Gen4 is not my defense firearm. My 45 takes care of that, but it's still concerning because what if I am in a situation where I might need to use it?
I group about 1-1.5 inches at 7 yards. The series i shot after being hit in the face increased my group to 3-5 inches at 7 yards. It made me lose focus.
I will be hitting the range tomorrow with the single spring recoil assembly and will give more feedback.
For those who have problems, here are the fixes I have found online though I do not know how much success u will find with them:
1) Replace the recoil spring assembly to a single stage. U can get these on ebay. They also sell Gen 3 recoil spring adaptors.
2) Make sure the ejector is marked 30274
3) Get the Apex Extractor
4) Call Glock and get an RMA.
Hope this helps people as this took me a long time to really understand what was happening with my pistol.
It's a big improvement, not perfect, but I want this to function like my Gen3 so I have no worries. I will post an updated if the new RSA changed anything.
****Update****
When home and sadly the singe spring RSA was not in the mail. So I went to shoot anyway. I fired 200 rounds this time, zero hit my face, I had one flop on my forearm and one eject to the left, but the rest stayed clear of my face. I'm guessing the RSA just needed to smoothen out.
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