Advanced Armament Corp. has built a reputation for hosting some pretty impressive parties at Shot Show.  This year they were good enough to send us a couple passes to the first annual Big Bang Shoot where we managed to complete a firearms lifetime quest and get some trigger time on a Glock 18C.

This is a view of the top of the slide on the Glock 18C with a cutout on the top of the slide designed to vent gasses from the top ports on the barrel, thus helping to control muzzle rise.  One might imagine that a small sidearm like the Glock 18C with a rate of fire in the 1200 rounds per minute range might need some assistance in the muzzle rise department and the venting does its job as you can see from the video below.

My impression was that a pure fully automatic mode on this sidearm is of limited utility.  I’d think that a 3 round burst mode would be far more effective and less wasteful of the limited ammunition that is in each standard magazine.  It should be noted that there are extended magazines available for the Glock, though I’ve never seen them offered by the factory.

Additionally, it should be noted that a 3 round burst rather than fully automatic would reduce the potential collateral damage given the mission of this particular weapon with personal security/close protection details.

Ed: Two days later the editor (Steve) had a drink with the Glock employee who helped us with the Glock 18C. He described the Glock 18C as “the greatest marketing tool ever invented”.