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Metal vs plastic experiment


glocklover

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I'm thinking of buying a Tanfoglio or a CZ sp 01. I've shot a Glock in production division for about 5 years. I'm a A class shooter. I have steadily improved over the years with my Glock 35. I really like Glocks for many reasons, which I won't go into detail here. However, I see a lot of top shooters shooting Tanfoglios and CZs and it makes me think that maybe if I buy one it could take me to the next level. I would like to get to Master class.

So, here's the experiment. I took my Glock 35 and shot El Pres 10 times yesterday. My best hit factor was 8.5. My worst was 7.5. So, my average was about a hit factor of 8. Today I took my Kimber 1911 single stack and shot El Pres 10 times with the same ammo. My best hit factor was 8. My worst was 7. I did worse! I thought that I would do much better with my Kimber. It's a heavy gun. It's has a beautiful 2.5lbs crisp trigger. My draws were slower with the Kimber. They were about 0.2 seconds slower. My reloads were about 0.3 to 0.4 seconds slower. I thought that with the weight of the gun and the nice trigger I would do much better.

Conclusion: I'm going to stick with my Glocks for now. I'll still keep experimenting. However, I'm not convinced that buying a new gun will improve my shooting.

Has anyone tried this? Give it a try and let me know what your results are.

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Is the kimber one that you regularly have to draw from holster? If it is a less familiar gun to you, on the draw at least, that makes a big difference. Also, reloading a single stack, vs reloading a double stack is a huge difference. That is why they are put into completely different divisions. Maybe borrow a steel DA/SA double stack gun from a buddy with the rig, poractice with it for a day or two, then run your test again. How did your splits compare? Just my 2 cents...

That being said, there are plenty of people that make M or GM with plastic guns. I don't think any gun is going to just make an A shooter an M or GM shooter.... If you keep working hard with your Glock, i'm sure you will continue to improve and progress through the classes.

Edited by EngineerEli
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I shoot my Kimber a few times a year. I will practice drawing and reloading it and do the experiment over again. My split times were better with my Kimber than my Glock 35. However, even if my draws and reloads are the same as my Glock 35 I would have the same hit factor. Shouldn't the single stage trigger and the heavier gun put me at a much higher hit factor? All other variables are the same. Same ammo. Same minor scoring.

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without a doubt, I shoot better with the gun I practice with the most. Even switching from my 9mm 1911 to my 45 1911 takes me weeks to get really comfortable.

At any rate, this year's nationals results seem to show that shooting a glock shouldn't keep you from making M or higher.

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without a doubt, I shoot better with the gun I practice with the most. Even switching from my 9mm 1911 to my 45 1911 takes me weeks to get really comfortable.

At any rate, this year's nationals results seem to show that shooting a glock shouldn't keep you from making M or higher.

Is it worth the effort to switch to a different gun a Tanfoglio or spend the $1500 on ammo?
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I think you should shoot the gun you enjoy shooting the most. If that's a glock, then you should shoot that and get good with it, and when you beat people shooting fancy metal guns, you should say "wow, i musta got really lucky to beat you and your fancy gun with my crappy plastic glock. Oh, and your wife says Hi."

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If you switch to a gun that feels better or looks better or smells better or you think makes you look cooler you will be more likely to have a desire to practice with that gun, which will lead to improvement. I shot Glocks for 5 or 6 years as well and was starting to get a little bored so I made the switch.

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I think you should shoot the gun you enjoy shooting the most. If that's a glock, then you should shoot that and get good with it, and when you beat people shooting fancy metal guns, you should say "wow, i musta got really lucky to beat you and your fancy gun with my crappy plastic glock. Oh, and your wife says Hi."

Sometimes I wish there was a way to 'like' posts, lol! :devil:

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Wow! I didn't know that.

What is the shooting like on your planet? Are there a lot of clubs? Is .22 ammo available there?

heh heh, seriously, it's been big talk around here about nils and bob bringing the plastic heat. I personally prefer metal guns, but not because they're superior, just because I like them.

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Somewhere I saw a chart from Nats of who shot what but I can't find it now. I think it was 4 of top 10 were plastic, 6th was TGO with a XDm, 7th was Max with a 320. Also there was Shane at 11th with a GLOCK.

So at the top you have Ben shooting a steel gun because he likes it, he will tell you strait out that the gun doesn't matter, he was winning with a Beretta before he went to the Tanfoglio

Heck there was even a international guy that would have been in the top 16 shooting a 4" Bersa of he understood Virginia count stages.

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Takeing it one step further, then would you say there is difference between an open Glock and a open Sti? If the gun doesn't matter.

empirically speaking, I would say that probably the current level of development of open Glocks is not sufficient to be competitive with S_I variants.

That makes sense to me, because the popular open guns are pretty much designed from the ground up, instead of being retrofitted onto a normal carry gun chassis, and the S_I guns have been developing and progressing for several years.

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I shoot my Kimber a few times a year. I will practice drawing and reloading it and do the experiment over again. My split times were better with my Kimber than my Glock 35. However, even if my draws and reloads are the same as my Glock 35 I would have the same hit factor. Shouldn't the single stage trigger and the heavier gun put me at a much higher hit factor? All other variables are the same. Same ammo. Same minor scoring.

How many more rounds and how much more dry fire have you done win the Glock over the Kimber? 5 times as many, 10, 20?

The weight, grip, trigger etc. are all different and in a sport where 10ths of seconds make the difference the unfamiliarity will add up in the draw, transistions, splits etc.

Any change takes time to get use to.

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Takeing it one step further, then would

you say there is difference between an open Glock and a open Sti? If the gun doesn't matter.

empirically speaking, I would say that probably the current level of development of open Glocks is not sufficient to be competitive with S_I variants.

That makes sense to me, because the popular open guns are pretty much designed from the ground up, instead of being retrofitted onto a normal carry gun chassis, and the S_I guns have been developing and progressing for several years.

No. It was said "the gun doesn't matter"

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I shoot my Kimber a few times a year. I will practice drawing and reloading it and do the experiment over again. My split times were better with my Kimber than my Glock 35. However, even if my draws and reloads are the same as my Glock 35 I would have the same hit factor. Shouldn't the single stage trigger and the heavier gun put me at a much higher hit factor? All other variables are the same. Same ammo. Same minor scoring.

How many more rounds and how much more dry fire have you done win the Glock over the Kimber? 5 times as many, 10, 20?

The weight, grip, trigger etc. are all different and in a sport where 10ths of seconds make the difference the unfamiliarity will add up in the draw, transistions, splits etc.

Any change takes time to get use to.

So, the gun doesn't matter it's what you gey used to?
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Takeing it one step further, then would you say there is difference between an open Glock and a open Sti? If the gun doesn't matter.

The gun doesn't matter comment is from the National Champion in production, so I assume he was referring to Production division.

Me personally, if the gun runs reliably and holds a competitive number of rounds of the appropriate power factor ammo for whatever division, I would say the gun doesn't matter. That said getting a GLOCK to do all that in Open is a bit harder due to the fact that you can't run super light recoil springs like you can in nonstriker fired guns. I shoot a 357sig GLOCK in open, and when I do my part and feed it reliable ammo i do not belive it is holding me back. What holds me back is not practicing.

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I shoot a G35 in Limited and I just bought my first 1911, mainly as a range toy. My thinking was "if this works well for me then I'm ditching the glock and getting a 2011 for Limited". After shooting the 1911, I really appreciate the aggressive grip angle on the Glock, the lack of an external safety, the low bore axis and the general ergonomics. It would take me a LOT of practice to get as comfortable and fast with the 1911 or a 2011. I'm sure the fast trigger would eventually show it's advantages, but for now I am much more content with my Glock and I think I'll stick with it a while.

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It has been said before to just shoot what your eyes/hands/etc, essentially whatever you shoot better. If you are bored, move on, if you are happy with Glock, by all means go with the tried and true. One thing though, at your level, you have ingrained a great deal of muscle memory. What some folks fail to realize is that we who train at these sports as in any sport are actually building in that muscle memory neural pathways in our brains. Over time, after years of dry fire and live fire with that platform, you may have ingrained some things I would call inefficiencies, that working one-on-one with a master level instructor might help eliminate. These are things that a shooter such as I a mere C in Production would not even notice.

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