[Leica] Re: glass or plastic

[Alexey Merz <alexey@webcom.com>]

"Dan Post" <dwpost@email.msn.com> wrote:

> It makes me recall the experience we had at the police department
> when the detectives were issued Glocks; there was concern over the
> plastic resin slide. 

You mean the frame, not the slide. The Glock slide is made from steel 
because it needs to be dimensionally stable.

> They were afraid the plastic would not stand up, plastic melts, 
> plastic is inferior. Actually, the lead in the cartridges would 
> melt before the plastic, and with impacts tests, the Glock, 
> singularly, survived a multistory fall from a building, where 
> are the more traditionally made weapons didn't.

Yes. The Glock is for the most part a superbly designed firearm. 
It is unfortunate that the stock configuration has a rather soft 
trigger pull and no manual safety, however. For this reason the 
Glock has a deserved reputation for discharging too easily. 
I hope that your department chose to mandate the heavier ("New York") 
trigger modification. The police here in Portland also use Glocks, 
and have shown a tendancy to stop firing only once they have 
exhausted an entire clip. I suspect that a heavier trigger (and
better firearms training) might ameliorate this.

Anyhow, the Glock is the EOS1n of pistols: reliable, plastic,
accurate, and (to me) fundamentally unsatisfying to shoot. The Heckler
& Koch P7, on the other hand, reminds me of the (on-topic) M6: compact,
solid, simple, predictable, reliable, expensive, and of unusual design. 

- -Alexey
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Alexey Merz | URL: http://www.webcom.com/alexey | email: alexey@webcom.com
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