Specter Polymer80 failure. Glock store refused review.

[Poly80]

I'm sure by now some of you have seen or even purchased a Specter Polymer80 Glock lower. They are an easy way to have a gun you can say you had a hand in building. It's a very nice looking design and if you look for reviews on it you'll see that many people after 2000 rounds have had no problems with it. On the glock store .com all reviews are either 4 or 5 stars. It looks like a great product and I now know why it "looks" that way.

I have been using guns for meany years. I have experience with most types of guns and I'm the guy who most people come to when they have a problem with one. I can't call myself a gunsmith as I don't do it for a living but I'm no bubba. I've done trigger jobs, a few restorations, built full on customs as well as fabricating parts that were too hard to source out. I have however worked as a machinist so I can say that my skill is on par with what would be required to machine and assemble a Polymer80 lower.

In my build I used all factory genuine Glock parts. I was very careful to follow instructions as well as watched many videos and read many articles on the gun before I began. After the machining and drilling I assembled the gun. During the break in process I had only a few jams, failure to loads mainly, and It went smooth enough. I used only American Eagle 165gr factory loaded rounds. Nothing hot has ever been shot out of it. I took it out two or three times and it was a very good shooter.

If you're not firmiliar with the Specter Polymer80 Glock lower it is a 17/22 Gen 3 lower that uses a metal front locking block but a polymer rear one. That it what you have to machine down to make it a 100%. The lower comes with the rear raills not yet machined. On round 220 or so the rear locking blocks broke off. The one on the right (ejector side) broke off completely and the other side cracked almost all the way through. Now it's garbage. I can save the parts from it but the frame is useless.

That's not the part that really bothers me. I realized that if I purchased and built this lower that I would be responsible for the outcome of it. If it failed there would always be that question of if I did it correctly. The part that really bothers me is after it happened I tried to review the product on the glock store website. I left a very well worded story of how it failed. I left the same revied on the manufacturer's website. They both refused to publish the review in the review section. All I wanted to do was inform potential buyers that there is a real risk of failure but I've been silenced. They are probably afraid that it will affect their sales if a negative review gets out.

So now I'm bringing this story to as many people as I can. Potential buyers beware. This is not the perfect solution like they want you to believe. It can and has failed.

I'm hoping no one in this community will fall victim to Specter as I have.


Best regards to all
Experienced Shooter.

[smee78]

Thats a shame to hear, I picked one up but havent done anything with it. I would not build it into anything higher than a 9mm though, to much pressure from the other rounds.

[JJ45]

That's exactly why you can't trust reviews unless there are at least some negative ones in the mix. Even then it's hard for me to trust....

Because you know how people are and some are almost NEVER satisfied and never think they got there money's worth.

I wrote a review on Bushnell Dicoverer 7X42 binoculars for OPTICS PLANET that mostly praised the glass and was nearly all positive except on this otherwise excellent glass the eyecups would not stay in the extended position if given even just a little pressure which is a design flaw and a nuisance. The refused to show it even when most of the review was positive.

Why then would I ever trust any reviews at OPTICS PLANET?

[TunnelRat]

I've found some sites that won't let negative comments. They're not helping themselves nor anyone else for that matter.


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[armoredman]

I will never deal with Optics Planet again for other reasons, but that is also a good one.
Guns fail. Everything made by man can and will fail. Not letting that information out because you don't want bad publicity can lead to what we would call a bigger "fail".

[JohnKSa]

On round 220 or so the rear locking blocks broke off. The one on the right (ejector side) broke off completely and the other side cracked almost all the way through.

This was one of the concerns I had about the rear polymer rails. I've heard of a few failures of the rear steel rails in Glocks so it follows that they are required to stand up to at least some level of stress. I couldn't see how polymer rails of essentially the same size were going to last very well.

It appears that some of the Spectre frames (possibly the PF940C) may use some kind of a steel insert for the rear steel rails. I would expect those to hold up a little better.

[745SW]

I generally feel most sites do not have a user base large enough to make the comments creditable. The issue of tainted or restriction of reviews becomes rather obvious in many instances. In my view Amazon is one of the very few sites with a substantial user base with the least amount distortion.

Some folks will give the review based heavily on initial impression while others will give a more experienced viewpoint. Many lack detail. Overall there are times I get better product description from the reviews than the seller desciption. Other times The product failed under what might be unreasonable conditions and the details given makes the review interesting.

Than there's that lone negative review with details. I find that one review to be the most accurate at times.

[CDR_Glock]

Thanks for the heads up. You should cross post on other forums such as Glock Talk, Self defense Forums, Defensive Carry, etc.


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[armoredman]

OP hasn't been back again? No updates?

[Spats McGee]

Closing.