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G17 Fish Gills slide, what so special about them?


Xander

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I have a 17, 19, and 22 all with the fish gill slide. They were only available with the rtf2 frame for a relatively short time.

There are many that complain about the grip being too aggressive, tearing up their hands. I use my hands to make a living, the grip is great.

The slide serrations are just different, nothing else.

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Apparently some people have had problems, on guns with the standard serrations which go from the top of the slide all the way down to the bottom, with the bottom part of the serrations abrading their shooting hand thumb with a high thumbs grip. I am not one of those people. However the idea behind the fish gill serrations was to get around that possibility. With the fish gills you don't have to worry (if you did worry) about the standard serrations abrading the thumb because now they're not a series of longitudinal cuts into the metal (in effect, if not actuality, a series of raised and lowered "teeth"), they're a series of semicircular lozenges that are actually inset (for all practical) purposes) into the metal and don't come down to the bottom of the slide.

Personally I think the fish gills look goofy as hell and have no use for them. Then again, if I was one of that small number of people getting their thumbs chewed up by the standard serrations I'm sure I'd like the fish gills one hell of a lot more than I do. :)

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I LOVE the ones that I have. I actually replaced the slides on two of my G-22s because they don't give me the bloody "Glock tracks" in the web of my hand.

I just wish I could find one for a 24, a 34, and a 35....

My biggest wish (since they've discontinued the fish gill slides) would be for Glock to terminate the current serrations about a 10th of an inch above the bottom of the slide. This would eliminate the sawtooth feel of that edge (and would only require about 10 minutes of re-coding on the CAM machine).

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The "fish gill" slide serrations, whether one likes the way they LOOK or not, do indeed WORK way better than the standard serrations... they're cut deeper and sharper into the slide than the usual/normal serrations by a lot. Also, they're not backwards, they're just engineered properly for function (not looks), if you don't believe me go look at the treads on an aggressive off-road 4x4 tire; with the half-moons oriented the way they are, pulling towards the rear direction allows the shape to guide more skin into contact with the slide, and a larger surface area into the recesses and on the slide to get grip (if they were turned around the shape would guide contact to a smaller surface area).

I'm a fan of the RTF2 Glocks and think function-wise it's their best evolution to date. I don't find their grips to be too-aggresive at all (well maybe for all-day IWB carry) and wish Glock would turn out a G34 RTF2 that'd be GTG for IDPA SSP and Production.

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I'm not sure the fish gills work better than the standard serrations, aside from not chewing up some folks' hands. Really, if the standard serrations work perfectly, as far as allowing enough purchase on the slide, anything beyond that is kind of superfluous, yes?

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I didn't really care for the RFT-2 - no offense, all power to those who do love it. For me that treatment was just way too grippy, it interfered both with sliding my hand into place on the draw and moving my hand on the grip during a speedload. But again, if someone else loves it and it works well for them, by all means have at it. :)

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  • 8 years later...

IMO the fish gills were a love hate thing.  Me, either or.

 

I love the RTF2 frame.  It gives me a nice grip plus the gun doesn't move in the hand when shooting.  I also use the standard Gen 3 frame which I  like.

 

I achieve my grip in the holster before drawing, because I wear the holster in the same position,  all of the time, and know where the gun is in relation to my hand.

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