I’ve owned my Glock 19 for many years. Over a decade. A Gen 3.
It’s been a reliable, trouble, free gun, and the only change/upgrade/modification that it has ever had is an upgrade to Trijicon night sights.
Several months ago, Brownell’s had their Glock 19 RMR cut slide on sale for about $100. I bought one, along with a Brownells barrel and new internal slide parts. New recoil spring assembly as well.
This weekend, I installed a new set of sights on the Brownells slide, assembled the internals, and mounted a Holosun 507C. Yesterday, I took it to the range.
The Holosun has a choice of reticle - a dot, dot and ring, or just ring.
So, some observations. The Brownells slide, comes with a very slick, and somewhat thick, finish. It’s black, feels like DLC. The finish obstructed the firing pin hole, and I had to clean that out with a pick. Fitting the Holosun was also a challenge, I could fit a Trijicon, though it was tight, but the Holosun just wouldn’t fit. There was not enough room between the screw posts and the rear of the cut.
I tried to remove just a tiny bit of the finish on the rear of the cut. But even a diamond stone, which I use for sharpening woodworking tools like chisels, did not make much of a difference. The finish is truly impressive in its hardness, if a bit thick. Knowing that I would only mount the Holosun on this slide, on this gun, I removed a few thousands of an inch of material off the rear of the sight itself, and it fit snugly, into place.
The photographs show the original slide, barrel, and sights along with the new Brownells and Holosun set up.
I find that I am much slower acquiring the red dot than I am acquiring iron sights. I think that’s because for irons, you instinctively know which way to move the pistol to get good sight alignment. Iron sights are easy for me. The red dot is quite different, and if the pistol is a few degrees muzzle high, or muzzle low, you don’t see the red dot.
I spent a few hundred rounds getting the red dot sighted in, and getting my muscle memory developed for finding it, based on grip angle and feel.
As cool as the dot and circle reticle appears, the plain red dot is better for me. I find that if I present the pistol and focus on the front site, the red dot naturally appears. The combination of the circle and dot as a reticle simply highlights the slight movement and shaking that’s present anytime I’m holding the pistol on target. I don’t notice that with sites, but with a red dot, that tiny bit of motion, that half an inch at 10 yards, is very evident, and it’s distracting.
It took a few hundred rounds for the new slide and new barrel to break in. When I had the pistol on my bench, before taking it to the range, it was difficult to cycle by hand. The lock up was super tight. At the range, I had five or six times that the pistol did not go into battery after firing a round. A slight tap forward on the slide and it went fully back into battery. There was simply too much friction with the new finish on all the parts, until a bit of wear took place. This with that new recoil spring and guide rod.
The last malfunction (failure to go into battery) was at about the 150 round mark. After that, the slide and barrel combination, were good.
I shot the last hundred rounds for accuracy, at a moderate speed, so not looking for target shooting, really, it was much more quick, accurate enough, reliability, and sight evaluation shooting. After 200 rounds previous to the last hundred, I was much more comfortable with the red dot. Again this is a gun that I have owned for a very long time and through which I’ve put at least 10,000 rounds. I also carry a Gen 5 Glock 19 as duty gun.
So, the feel of the gun is very familiar. The presentation, quite different.
At seven yards, the Holosun and Glock did well. I shot relatively quickly, as I said, looking for “good enough” accuracy and gaining familiarity with the new interface/sight picture. The last hundred rounds included four different types of ammunition, both ball, and Federal HST124 grain hollowpoint. The last hundred rounds were perfectly reliable.
Final thoughts. It took about 200 rounds to break in the Brownells‘s barrel and slide because the tolerances were quite tight, and the finish is quite thick. I had to fit both the Trijicon rear dovetail sight as well as the Holosun red dot optic because of that finish thickness. All new slide parts meant that the trigger pull was slightly heavier than it was on the well broken in slide, including the lightly polished firing pin safety plunger of the old slide. So, next time it gets cleaned, I will lightly polish that part on the new slide.
Now, broken in, it is reliable. Compared with other RMR cut slides and barrels on the market, I thought Brownells was a good bargain. At $100, it was a great deal. I am about $500 all in - Holosun, slide, barrel, and slide parts kit. If I had known how much the red dot would obscure the irons, I would not have wasted a good set of night sights on the slide, and simply reused an old set of Glock sights. Even with a bit of fitting, OK a lot of fitting, though, that rear dovetail is on there tight. So tight that I don’t wanna struggle through getting it back off. It will stay.
The transition to red dot for an experienced shooter, is not simple. It took me a lot longer to get used to it than I had anticipated. I own a couple of other pistols with red dots. Including my sig Sauer, P365 XL. But the Sig, as well as on the Springfield Armory Echelon, were red dots from the beginning. There was nothing to “unlearn”.
This was taking an older pistol with which I was very familiar, and changing the way I approached it.
After I cleaned it, it went back in the safe with its original slide and barrel combination. Should it be called upon when I really need it, I’m still more comfortable with the irons than I am with this new set up. But I look forward to trying the new set up some more.
It’s been a reliable, trouble, free gun, and the only change/upgrade/modification that it has ever had is an upgrade to Trijicon night sights.
Several months ago, Brownell’s had their Glock 19 RMR cut slide on sale for about $100. I bought one, along with a Brownells barrel and new internal slide parts. New recoil spring assembly as well.
This weekend, I installed a new set of sights on the Brownells slide, assembled the internals, and mounted a Holosun 507C. Yesterday, I took it to the range.
The Holosun has a choice of reticle - a dot, dot and ring, or just ring.
So, some observations. The Brownells slide, comes with a very slick, and somewhat thick, finish. It’s black, feels like DLC. The finish obstructed the firing pin hole, and I had to clean that out with a pick. Fitting the Holosun was also a challenge, I could fit a Trijicon, though it was tight, but the Holosun just wouldn’t fit. There was not enough room between the screw posts and the rear of the cut.
I tried to remove just a tiny bit of the finish on the rear of the cut. But even a diamond stone, which I use for sharpening woodworking tools like chisels, did not make much of a difference. The finish is truly impressive in its hardness, if a bit thick. Knowing that I would only mount the Holosun on this slide, on this gun, I removed a few thousands of an inch of material off the rear of the sight itself, and it fit snugly, into place.
The photographs show the original slide, barrel, and sights along with the new Brownells and Holosun set up.
I find that I am much slower acquiring the red dot than I am acquiring iron sights. I think that’s because for irons, you instinctively know which way to move the pistol to get good sight alignment. Iron sights are easy for me. The red dot is quite different, and if the pistol is a few degrees muzzle high, or muzzle low, you don’t see the red dot.
I spent a few hundred rounds getting the red dot sighted in, and getting my muscle memory developed for finding it, based on grip angle and feel.
As cool as the dot and circle reticle appears, the plain red dot is better for me. I find that if I present the pistol and focus on the front site, the red dot naturally appears. The combination of the circle and dot as a reticle simply highlights the slight movement and shaking that’s present anytime I’m holding the pistol on target. I don’t notice that with sites, but with a red dot, that tiny bit of motion, that half an inch at 10 yards, is very evident, and it’s distracting.
It took a few hundred rounds for the new slide and new barrel to break in. When I had the pistol on my bench, before taking it to the range, it was difficult to cycle by hand. The lock up was super tight. At the range, I had five or six times that the pistol did not go into battery after firing a round. A slight tap forward on the slide and it went fully back into battery. There was simply too much friction with the new finish on all the parts, until a bit of wear took place. This with that new recoil spring and guide rod.
The last malfunction (failure to go into battery) was at about the 150 round mark. After that, the slide and barrel combination, were good.
I shot the last hundred rounds for accuracy, at a moderate speed, so not looking for target shooting, really, it was much more quick, accurate enough, reliability, and sight evaluation shooting. After 200 rounds previous to the last hundred, I was much more comfortable with the red dot. Again this is a gun that I have owned for a very long time and through which I’ve put at least 10,000 rounds. I also carry a Gen 5 Glock 19 as duty gun.
So, the feel of the gun is very familiar. The presentation, quite different.
At seven yards, the Holosun and Glock did well. I shot relatively quickly, as I said, looking for “good enough” accuracy and gaining familiarity with the new interface/sight picture. The last hundred rounds included four different types of ammunition, both ball, and Federal HST124 grain hollowpoint. The last hundred rounds were perfectly reliable.
Final thoughts. It took about 200 rounds to break in the Brownells‘s barrel and slide because the tolerances were quite tight, and the finish is quite thick. I had to fit both the Trijicon rear dovetail sight as well as the Holosun red dot optic because of that finish thickness. All new slide parts meant that the trigger pull was slightly heavier than it was on the well broken in slide, including the lightly polished firing pin safety plunger of the old slide. So, next time it gets cleaned, I will lightly polish that part on the new slide.
Now, broken in, it is reliable. Compared with other RMR cut slides and barrels on the market, I thought Brownells was a good bargain. At $100, it was a great deal. I am about $500 all in - Holosun, slide, barrel, and slide parts kit. If I had known how much the red dot would obscure the irons, I would not have wasted a good set of night sights on the slide, and simply reused an old set of Glock sights. Even with a bit of fitting, OK a lot of fitting, though, that rear dovetail is on there tight. So tight that I don’t wanna struggle through getting it back off. It will stay.
The transition to red dot for an experienced shooter, is not simple. It took me a lot longer to get used to it than I had anticipated. I own a couple of other pistols with red dots. Including my sig Sauer, P365 XL. But the Sig, as well as on the Springfield Armory Echelon, were red dots from the beginning. There was nothing to “unlearn”.
This was taking an older pistol with which I was very familiar, and changing the way I approached it.
After I cleaned it, it went back in the safe with its original slide and barrel combination. Should it be called upon when I really need it, I’m still more comfortable with the irons than I am with this new set up. But I look forward to trying the new set up some more.
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