glocks | The Loadout Room

“Does It take Glock Mags?” Is about the most common phrase you’ll see after a new gun is introduced in a pistol caliber. Its gotten to the point where it’s just a stale meme. I might be sick of reading it in the comments but I get where they are coming from. The Glock series of pistols are ubiquitous and their magazines are not only affordable but reliable and easy to find. These days a variety of weapons outside of Glock pistols take Glock magazines so its no surprise the aftermarket has taken notice. The Amend2 Glock magazine is the newest contender in a market that’s quickly becoming crowded.

Amend2 is now producing a variety of Glock magazines. This includes the A2-17, for the Glock 17 that I have here. They also have models for the Glock models 19, 22, 23, 42, and 43. Capacities vary and the G17 variant holds 18 rounds of 9mm. The Amend2 Glock magazine is noticeably lighter than the traditional Glock mags. It lacks the metal inserts of Glock OEM magazines and feels very lightweight. The magazine not only holds an additional round but has a very large base plate which is nice with a big two holding it all together. It sports witness holes for every round and a bright red follower.

First Impressions

The weight made me think the magazine felt cheap and didn’t give me high hopes. The base plate is attractive as in my experience this makes the magazines easier to retrieve from a magazine pouch. The witness holes were also impressive. The Amend2 Glock magazine takes a page out of the Magpul school of Glock mags and includes a bright follower.

Although the follower is red and not bright orange. Bright followers are great for knowing when your magazine is empty or running low in low light conditions. If you stop, pop the mag out to check how much ammo you have left the bright red followers is easy to see through the witness holes in the back.

The magazine is also cut for the Gen 4 style reversible magazine release, but not cut for an ambi release. The magazine will function with every generation of Glock of course, as well as the 80 lower Glocks from Polymer 80. Inside the magazine, the spring is strong and is attached to both the follower and lock plate. The lock plate is a big red two that’s easy to push in for disassembly and robust enough not to every break.

Range Time with the Amend2 Glock Magazine

The Amend2 Glock magazine loads easily enough and it’s not a struggle to load 18 rounds into the magazine. The magazine will also load into a gun with the slide closed when completely full. The only way I know how to test a magazine is to load it, shoot it, and keep doing just that. So that’s what I did.

I shot a variety of ammo. The ammo that seems to kill mags the most is Winchester Steel. The rounds will often hang a follower up. In this case, the Amend2 Glock magazine ate a box of 50 with no issues. With regular brass cased ammo I went through another 150 rounds. Sometimes I loaded the magazine fully, other times I loaded just a few rounds for reload drills.

I live on a sand hill and I like to let the mag just fall into that nice sugary sand. Over and over again I dropped the mag, retrieved it, and did it again. Never did the sand cause magazine failure. Also, the mag drops freely completely empty.

Placing in the mag pouch showed how awesome the base plate is for rapid reloads. It’s wide, easy to grab and makes it less likely to experience a bad grab and a case of butterfingers with the magazine.

Durability Testing

As I said before the magazine feels light, and I often associate light with low quality. This isn’t always the case though. I did a few drop tests with the magazine both loaded and unloaded from the waist and head height onto concrete, wood, and gravel. I dropped it out of the gun, and from various angles. When fully loaded the Amend2 Glock magazine would spit out a round or two when dropped. Once you got down to 15 rounds this event seemed to stop.

After dropping it, and throwing it against a plastic fruit crate a few times I loaded it up and started shooting once more. Luckily the magazine never failed. The Amend2 Glock magazine never stuttered and fed rounds over and over. No visible damage is on the outside either. Disassembly is easy and I had no problems getting sand out of the body of the magazine.

Worth buying?

The MSRP of these magazines is $16.99, but I bought mine for 11 bucks locally. 11 bucks for a magazine that performs like this is a steal. I’ve only tested one magazine and would like to test more of them before I declared them suited for concealed carry or duty. However, for competition and training, I will give my hearty recommendation. I see no issues currently, but a duty or concealed carry recommendation needs a bit more testing over a few more magazines. If you’ve done some of your own testing, let me know what you’ve found below.

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The Glock 43 was Glock’s first entry into the single stack 9mm market. Most of us would say its about time. Let’s face it, Glock tends to lag behind just a bit when it comes to firearm’s trends. They make a good product, but damn do they take their time addressing their customer’s demands and needs. Is the G43 the single stack 9mm we’ve always wanted?

What’s the Glock 43?

Of course, the Glock 43 is a single stack 9mm, but let’s look at the specs and see just how small and compact this firearm is. If you’ll notice this is a burnt bronze G43. This is not a factory option, but a cerakote finish applied by Cerakote Services. It’s been roughed up quite a bit as you can tell, but still runs light a champ. The gun itself was provided for T&E by the online gun store Omaha Outdoors.

G43 Specs

Capacity – 6 rounds
Weight – 17.95 ounces unloaded
Length – 6.26 inches
Height – 4.25 inches
Barrel Length – 3.39 inches
Width – 1.02 inches

As you can see the gun is quite small. It fits in hand well and is quite carry friendly. This little pocket pistol sits right on the edge of pocket size. It’s certainly much more comfortable to carry and draw from with a standard holster.

Carry Comfort

The G43 is a comfortable gun to carry. It’s flat surfaces and thin nature makes it easy to conceal under a t-shirt in an OWB or IWB holster. The weight is nice and comfortable, and it never feels like a boat anchor when carried.

Ergonomics

It’s all Glock when it comes to ergos. It’s simple. There is no manual safety or excess controls like a de-cocker. It’s just a trigger, a magazine release, and a slide lock.

The controls are all easy to reach without having to move your grip around. The magazine release is easy to reach, the trigger and trigger safety work, but the slide lock sucks. Maybe its just me, but with small guns, my thumb always rides on the slide lock. This means the slide rarely locks when the last round is fired.

Also, the grip is finger grooveless, which I really like. I’ve never wanted the Gen 3 and 4 finger grooves so to see them eliminated on the G43 is nice. The grip itself is just long enough with the extended magazine to fit most of my pinky on. I hate a hanging pinky. For reference, I wear an XL/2XL glove.
The trigger is also stock Glock, which is okay. The trigger is stiff, but the pull is short, and the reset is very nice. It’s tactile and audible which I appreciate.

On the Range

The Glock 43 handles quite well. It’s small but controllable. It’s a good balance of size versus control. The sights are standard Glock sights, nothing to brag about here. They work, but are plastic, and not exactly the most robust sights on the market.

Double taps and rapid and accurate fire is possible. So is more extended range, more precise slow fire. Of course, both take practice, and my position with the Loadout Room lets me get a bit more practice than most.

Out to 25 yards, I didn’t have any issues placing shots in the vital zones of my MGM targets. I could also ring steel out to 35 yards with decent consistency. On average I could score 13 out of 15 shots at longer ranges.

The downsides associated with small guns are present. The weapon has a limited capacity, the shorter sight radius isn’t conducive to making small groups, and the thin magazines aren’t as easy to reload with. With that said, dropping magazines is easy. The little guys fall freely when the magazine release is pressed, and they are mainly launched out of the gun.

Glocks run, and they run, and they run, and they run. This gun has never hiccupped in the reliability department. It doesn’t matter what I put through it. Tulammo, Wolf, Winchester Steel, Winchester White box, SIG Elite, JHPs, FMJs, it doesn’t matter it all fed, and it all ran like a smokestack. The G43 eats everything and in a gun made for concealed carry that’s vital to me.

Logistics

Logistics win wars right? Glock and the aftermarket have mastered handgun logistics. Magazines are readily available and affordable from Glock and companies like ETS. As are triggers, sights, and even frames. If you want to customize a gun and tinker with it, then Glock and the G43 are excellent gotos. I don’t know of any other weapon in the single stack territory that offers the same degree of customization as the G43.

Glock may have been late to the show, but they delivered a platform that performed. I’m no big Glock fan, but I will say the G43 is a reliable gun that delivers. I wouldn’t hesitate to carry this gun to defend myself or my family.

The Amend2 Glock Magazine: A New Contender