Recoil Spring Reduction for Glock 17's, Any Reliability Issues?

[E.Stoner]

Every single problem I have ever had with a glock (17/21/23) has been because I swapped out springs looking to make the Glock trigger "un-glock" like.

If chasing competition mods, check out Vanek drop in triggers. If personal protection, leave it alone....it is after all....Perfection ;-)

Yup.
I view competition more like training than gaming.
For the past two years my competition rig was set up pretty similar to my carry set up to get more time on the platform and running around under time pressure.
With Gen 5's, I think even a trigger upgrade is unnecessary.
Frankly trying to squeeze every extra bit of performance out of a Glock is going to get you diminishing returns pretty quickly and probably some sort of compensation for lack of skill/preparation. The most riced out Glock, with all the speed-holes and spring-jobs, is still a Glock except it's probably been rendered unsafe with a weird trigger bar geometry or completely unreliable.
Either way you've removed some of the two biggest benefit of running a Glock. It's always fun to sit back and enjoy watching dudes desperately cleaning their mags in between stages and or trying to make their $4000 single-shot-bolt-action 2011 space gun make it through a double of powderpuff hand loads during a qualifier.
If you want to go full gamer, Glock is a strange choice when there are so many other platforms that can be tuned to run way way faster, some right out of the box.

 

[dcmdon]

I'm with you. I just don't get the Gucci Glock trend. For the $2500 some people spend on custom glocks, they sure dont' get much. The trigger is still mushy. Its less reliable than stock.

 

[Larry Gentile]

I'm with you. I just don't get the Gucci Glock trend. For the $2500 some people spend on custom glocks, they sure don't get much. The trigger is still mushy. Its less reliable than stock.

There are some people who would buy a stock 5.0 Mustang (or insert preferred sports car here) and keep it 100% stock. There are some others who would put a nicer aftermarket exhaust and maybe some different wheels on it just to be different and are fine with that.

Then there are people like me. .030" bored over, Screw type blower or better yet, twin turbos boosting 22psi. That how i roll with everything I touch. Then again I am a mechanical engineer and have the fortitude to do everything myself with some thought behind it and not just slap a bunch of parts together.

As far as custom Glock triggers still being mushy and less reliable, well I guess you do not have much experience with someone who knows how to properly setup a Glock trigger. The mushiness or creep is often a result of the slide safety plunger and sometimes the trigger bar. There are many way to reduce or eliminate this by nothing more than eliminating machining burrs/high spots and Dremel polishing. As for reliability, it is important to use a aftermarket trigger that utilizes a stock trigger bar. Both My Apex and Overwatch triggers use stock trigger bar (highly polished or coated) so the trigger itself will function 100% like stock. When you start messing with the trigger connector and you change the stock trigger geometry that you need to know what you are doing. Often people who are not knowledgeable enough will just slap a bunch of aftermarket parts on it and not know what they are actually changing. First step in tuning any firearm trigger system is to learn how it works and operates and if you change something, what you are actually mechanically doing. Then of course you go out and do some reliability testing (which is the fun part).

BTW my daily driver is a stock Sig 365xl Romeo Zero and/or S&W Shield 2.0 with full Apex trigger kit.

 

[Deleted member 12999]

I just did a lesson with an NES bro that dropped an apex fss into an m&p.... AMAZING trigger.... but it fired without trigger safety being deactivated... hes lucky I noticed. Again... bleeding edge performance comes at a cost.

 

[Larry Gentile]

I just did a lesson with an NES bro that dropped an apex fss into an m&p.... AMAZING trigger.... but it fired without trigger safety being deactivated... hes lucky I noticed. Again... bleeding edge performance comes at a cost.

That is unfortunate. Did this guy ever find out why that happened? My Shield is a non safety model. For me It was either an Apex kit (5.5lbs trigger pull) or live with the stock trigger which on my gun was about 13lbs (Mass compliant trigger). My Sig 365XL (free state ver.) has an amazing stock flat trigger. No need to touch it. I did polish the fire pin engagement area which reduced any trigger creep. .

 

[Deleted member 12999]

That is unfortunate. Did this guy ever find out why that happened? My Shield is a non safety model. For me It was either an Apex kit (5.5lbs trigger pull) or live with the stock trigger which on my gun was about 13lbs (Mass compliant trigger). My Sig 365XL (free state ver.) has an amazing stock flat trigger. No need to touch it.

All i know is he ripped it out. I didn't get a chance to look at it after we trained

 

[drgrant]

All i know is he ripped it out. I didn't get a chance to look at it after we trained

Hopefully he reported to Apex because most of that stuff is actually relatively safe if installed correctly... but if the FSS is some bleeding edge thing not surprised at it being f***ey.

 

[Larry Gentile]

The Apex FSS (Flat-Faced Forward Set Sear) is a user adjustable trigger. Link Looks like you can set it to your preferences. Lots of options and more "bleeding edge". I would have still contacted Apex. They are a company known for their reputation as a "just as reliable as stock". I bet they would responded favorably.

The Apex I put into my shield is more of a duty/Carry enhancement kit. Not very "bleeding edge" but very reliable and a nice trigger. link

 

[Dennis in MA]

Side question - I got a skeletonized slide for my G19/P80. Then I put a RMR on it.

Regular recoil spring? Heavy spring??? Is the slide gonna slam TOO much with a regular spring with normal-speed 9mm ammo?

 

[Broc]

Too much of a pain in the ass for far too little benefit. I prefer that my guns will touch off anything at any time and stay reliable. Even my CZ Shadow with the reduced power springs in it is still capable of setting off all commercial ammunition, cci primers, wolf, etc, you name it. A gun that requires special primers is a broken gun.

I agree.

In my opinion, you need to choose what you want your gun to do and stick with it.

If it is for self defense, a bug out gun, SHTF gun, whatever else you want to call it, it needs to shoot everything reliably. Russian ammo, American ammo, Asian ammo, all primers, steel, brass...

If it is for competition, then do whatever you want and make sure it works reliably with whatever reduced load you want to use.

You can use a self defense gun for competiton. But, although you can, you probably shoul not use a competition gun for self defense, unless it is your only option.

 

[dcmdon]

There are some people who would buy a stock 5.0 Mustang (or insert preferred sports car here) and keep it 100% stock. There are some others who would put a nicer aftermarket exhaust and maybe some different wheels on it just to be different and are fine with that.

Then there are people like me. .030" bored over, Screw type blower or better yet, twin turbos boosting 22psi. That how i roll with everything I touch. Then again I am a mechanical engineer and have the fortitude to do everything myself with some thought behind it and not just slap a bunch of parts together.

As far as custom Glock triggers still being mushy and less reliable, well I guess you do not have much experience with someone who knows how to properly setup a Glock trigger. The mushiness or creep is often a result of the slide safety plunger and sometimes the trigger bar. There are many way to reduce or eliminate this by nothing more than eliminating machining burrs/high spots and Dremel polishing. As for reliability, it is important to use a aftermarket trigger that utilizes a stock trigger bar. Both My Apex and Overwatch triggers use stock trigger bar (highly polished or coated) so the trigger itself will function 100% like stock. When you start messing with the trigger connector and you change the stock trigger geometry that you need to know what you are doing. Often people who are not knowledgeable enough will just slap a bunch of aftermarket parts on it and not know what they are actually changing. First step in tuning any firearm trigger system is to learn how it works and operates and if you change something, what you are actually mechanically doing. Then of course you go out and do some reliability testing (which is the fun part).

BTW my daily driver is a stock Sig 365xl Romeo Zero and/or S&W Shield 2.0 with full Apex trigger kit.

Agree with you 110% re cars. No point in spending money to be "different". My old 2004 STi looked completely stock. (How much better are you going to get than BBS??). But had a simple tune and catless pipes. With that it made 70 more whp than stock.

Re glock trigger mushiness. The mushiness comes from the fact that any trigger is going to have to pull the striker back a bit. So you are not just releasing a "sear". You are actively putting energy into the system.

It will never be 1911 crisp. But it doesn't have to be. A smooth mushy trigger is just as good, as a "crisp, glass rod, no overtravel" trigger when you are shooting seeking a balance between speed and accuracy. For pure bullseye work the traditional definition of a good trigger still applies.

And since there is always going to be mush, I've found that a fluff and buff, including the striker safety plunger, stock 3.5# connector with a ~3# striker spring and all other stock parts makes for a very fast but still mushy trigger with a good reset.

 

[weekendracer]

Edit: nevermind, I misread everything in initial post. I was thinking something else.