Four months ago I bought a Glock 17 and ordered an Advantage Arms Glock conversion kit to shoot 22lr. I originally wasn't going to buy the kit, because it's pretty pricey: $315 for the kit and two extra 10rd magazines. 2000 rounds of Wolf ammo is only slightly more expensive as is a new Ruger Mark III. In the end, I did buy the kit. When it arrived about 6 weeks later and I took a better look at what ammo it reputably works with, I was prepared to return it. In my mind, everything has a hassle factor. Putting the high price and special ammo, would put the kit beyond my hassle factor threshold. If it couldn't reliably fire my preferred ammo, Remington Golden 36gr hollowpoint, then I'd return it. The Remington Golden Bullet shoots great in my 10/22 and is regularly on sale at Bi-Mart. Reading the instructions, it didn't look good. They recommended 40gr ammo and not hollowpoint. Just in case, I brought some CCI Stinger hypervelocity 32gr ammo. That too, is regularly on sale, though is still more costly than the Remington.
Before taking the kit to the range, I examined what it contained and how to install it on my Glock. It's well made and very easy to install. With the kit installed, my Glock is quite a bit lighter, though I didn't weigh the gun to find the difference.
I meant to lubricate the slide before the first range test, but I neglected to. I shot around 100 rounds at the first test, and only had a few misfeeds with the Remington ammo. I only shot 10 rounds of the CCI Stinger ammo and had one misfeed. I was having a lot of fun and then noticed that I was getting low on ammo and I still wanted to shoot the 10/22 a bit. Bummer. End of session. The kit performed really well. Recoil is a bit greater than I expected, but I don't have any experience with handguns beyond shooting this Glock. After finishing with the kit, I shot about 10 rds of 9mm. Wow! On the first round, I was completely surprised at the amount recoil. It wasn't until I fired maybe six rounds before the 9mm recoil felt normal again.
A couple of weeks later, I went out again but this time I made sure I had plenty of ammo. I quickly noticed that the slide wasn't locking open after the last round in the magazine was fired. I didn't have this problem during the first session. In any case, other than that the kit did fine shooting maybe 150 rounds with only a few misfeeds. Afterwards, I realized I still had not lubricated the slide and figured the locking problem was a symptom of not enough lube.
This last Friday I took the kit out again and this time I finally lubricated the slide. As expected, the slide locking problem went away. There were a couple of misfeeds in about 150 rounds. I had a great time and my marksmanship is definitely improving.
I like the conversion kit. I still feel it is more expensive than it should be, but I realize that after-market parts are generally overpriced. It's not just guns; I've made a lot of component upgrades to my racing bicycles and I'm always ticked off at the high prices. I definitely like shooting cheap .22lr ammo. I'm a handgun newbie and need a lot of practice. With the Advantage Arms conversion kit, I can practice away without a thought to the ammo cost. Unfortunately, It'll take a while to recoup the $315 kit price. In fact, we can calculate the savings in ammo cost so far. 400 rounds of .22lr at $15 for a box of 525 (2.8 cents a round): $11.43. 400 rounds of Wolf FMJ 115gr 9mm at $179 for 1000 (17.9 cents a round): $71.60. So in three range sessions, I've saved about $60. For a 150 round session, I save nearly $23. In approximately 11 more sessions, I'll hit the break even point.
2 comments:
Would like to know how often or much you still use the conversion kit at the range. I am in the same boat with a Glock 22 .40 cal. I would like to shoot more but with ammo being out of stock and expensive (.33 cents / rd) the conversion kit is tempting from AA. Any advice appreciated as I too am "kind of" beginning my hang gun shooting experience. Thanks for a great write up.
I haven't been to the range much this year, but without the conversion kit I'd probably be shooting even less. 9mm is no longer 17.9 cents a round; more like 23.9 cents. So with the higher cost of ammo, I'd say the kit makes even more sense.
Like with most skills, practicing consistently and often is the key to improving. At least for me, going to the range is a pain because of its location 20+ miles through a congested corridor. So, I purchased a .177 caliber pellet gun, a Beeman P17, for about $40 and a pellet trap. This allows me to practice in my basement. The maximum distance I can shoot at is about 25 feet, but it's still practice. As I improve, I move to smaller and smaller animals.
Post a Comment