The Spanish Radetec (Rade Tecnologías) was founded in 2004 and is specialized in the development of electronic devices for firearms such as round counters. In 2012, we reported about the establishment of their US branch and later in 2013, about some of their early products seen at SHOT Show 2013. During the past couple of years, the company has been bringing to exhibitions the prototype of a more advanced system called Smart Slide that features a display built into a handgun slide which shows different ammunition and firearm status related data. Recently, Ratetec has announced that a limited run of Smart Slide kits for Glock 17 pistols is now available for preorder.

The Radetec Smart Slide is compatible with the fourth generation of Glock 17 pistols. This system apparently consists of a replacement slide with the integrated display, a new backstrap with a micro USB charging port at the bottom portion, new magazine followers that work as magazine capacity sensors and a number of other sensors that gather data from different parts of the pistol such as the extractor. Despite this integration with the parts of the firearm, Smart Slide does not alter the function of the gun and in case the electronics fail or the battery dies, the gun will keep running.

The slide integrated display of Radetec Smart Slide shows the remaining amount of ammunition in the magazine in real-time as well as tells whether there is a round in the chamber or not. You can also opt to see the number of rounds fired from the magazine instead of the number of remaining ammo – in other words, it can count up or down. The screen will flash a red light when you are low on ammo and the system will keep records of rounds fired through the pistol. Additionally, the display shows messages alerting that the slide is locked back or the magazine is not inserted. The control buttons are located on either side of the display.

The Radetec Smart Slide is priced at $999.99. They’ll be only making 1000 Smart Slide kits. The estimated start of shipping is mid-October 2021. Although the Smart Slide is a drop-in system not requiring any permanent changes to the host gun, for retrofitting your Glock 17 Gen4 pistol with this system, you’ll need to send your gun to Radetec for their armorers to properly install the Smart Slide kit.

Pictures by Radetec, www.radetecusa.com