Interesting Glock Malfunction

[Father of 3]

Yesterday I ran about 200 rounds through my Gen3 G17. About 50 rounds in, the gun fired and the slide cycled like normal, then click. I waited a few minutes thinking just a misfire. Well I rack the slide and out pops an empty case! Now I was thinking maybe a failure to extract, but wouldn't this have caused a malfunction, like a double feed, prior to going click on an empty case?

Never had this happen before. Just curious as to what this malfunction is called and how it happened. The ejection pattern was erratic and I noticed that some were so weak they barely cleared the slide. I got this Gen3 on a trade so I am uncertain on the date of manufacture.

[Tzintzuntzan]

Yesterday I ran about 200 rounds through my Gen3 G17. About 50 rounds in, the gun fired and the slide cycled like normal, then click. I waited a few minutes thinking just a misfire. Well I rack the slide and out pops an empty case! Now I was thinking maybe a failure to extract, but wouldn't this have caused a malfunction, like a double feed, prior to going click on an empty case?

Never had this happen before. Just curious as to what this malfunction is called and how it happened. The ejection pattern was erratic and I noticed that some were so weak they barely cleared the slide. I got this Gen3 on a trade so I am uncertain on the date of manufacture.

What ammo are you using? Erratic but not BTF ejection is common in Glocks but dribbling out the slide is definitely an issue. Have you cleaned out your extractor every 1000 rounds or so and replaced the recoil springs with factory parts every few thousand rounds?

[Trajan]

This happened to me once. I attributed it to bad ammo. However, my round was much quieter then the others. I had figured it was a squib so I stopped immediately.

It happens with mass produced ammo.

Did the round sound different? I think it's impossible for the slide to fully cycle and not kick the spent casing out.

[ST911]

Yesterday I ran about 200 rounds through my Gen3 G17. About 50 rounds in, the gun fired and the slide cycled like normal, then click. I waited a few minutes thinking just a misfire. Well I rack the slide and out pops an empty case! Now I was thinking maybe a failure to extract, but wouldn't this have caused a malfunction, like a double feed, prior to going click on an empty case?

Never had this happen before. Just curious as to what this malfunction is called and how it happened. The ejection pattern was erratic and I noticed that some were so weak they barely cleared the slide. I got this Gen3 on a trade so I am uncertain on the date of manufacture.

Need further info. What ammo? Mag inserted? How many in the mag when the malfunction happened? What are the letters in your ser#? Any modifications to the gun?

If the "slide cycled like normal", something other than what you experienced should have happened.

[thatpanda]

If you ended up with an empty case still in the chamber after you fired than your slide didn't cycle back far enough to eject the empty case and pick up a new round from the mag, aka you have low slide velocity. Rounds dribbling out the chamber during firing is also indicative of slow slide velocity because the slide isn't moving fast enough for the extracted case to hit the fixed ejector with enough force to properly clear the weapon. First thing to try is different ammo, if it goes away with known good ammo (hot) than the ammo your shooting sucks and you shouldn't shoot anymore of it, thats a squib waiting to happen. If it still happens with known good ammo than make sure your gun is fully broken in. I know you got the gun in trade but is it new? I've found that glocks usually need roughly 1k rounds of quality ammo through them before they're fully broken in and are able to cycle weak loads. Personally I like to break my glocks in wet with lots of lube but its up to you, some people like to break them in dry. I wouldn't consider malfunctions during the break in period a problem as long as your using good ammo, any gun in my book is allowed to malfunction before its broken in.

If the gun is fully broken in and it still doesn't fire known good ammo, than you may have a mechanical issue thats causing the slide to drag. Possible issues could be excessive crud in the rails (clean it), bad magazine feed lips (isolated to one mag), an out of spec part (aftermarket part, recoil spring, trigger bar, etc), or something weird and out there that you don't see very often. If something is dragging your slide down you should be able to feel it when hand cycling the slide. The slide should have consistent resistance throughout it travel from the point its unlocked all the way back to where it stops. If you feel excessive resistance between those two points look fore something dragging, usually visible with excessive wear or metal shavings. This is extremely rare, and more than likely its either an ammo issue or your gun isn't fully broken in yet.

Let us know what you find.

[Talon167]

Yea, I am thinking it was a weak round that was able to cycle the slide back far enough to reset the trigger (which isn't very far), but not far enough to eject the spent casing & grab another round. Hence the no double-feed.