Glock Hears Your Cries of Slide-Bite Pain

January 18, 2012

Do you have meaty hands? Do you use a high grip on your Glock? Then you probably have felt the heartbreak of Glock-induced slide bite. And you continue to put up with it because you dig all that perfection. Well you won’t have to any more. At least not if you have one of Gaston’s Gen 4s . . .

That’s Glock’s Beau Phillips, above, showing off the just announced add-on beavertail backstrap. Pop out that pin at the top of the standard-issue backstrap, slip the beavertail on and replace the pin. You’ll think you’re shooting a 1911. Well kinda.

Again, they’ll only fit their Gen 4 guns. And they’re so new that Beau didn’t even have pricing info yet. There will be two models, a medium and a large. The medium will make your slimmer Gen 4 grip the same size as a Gen 3. The large will make it, well, bigger. But think how happy your hand will be.

19 COMMENTS

Ryan Finn January 18, 2012 At 21:00

I must have this
Robert Farago January 18, 2012 At 21:37

Never once had slide bite from a Glock. Or an XD. Or any other gun for that matter. I guess this’ll be great for people who do stupid things with their thumbs on guns and can’t be bothered to re-learn proper basics.
- Ice January 18, 2012 At 22:56
  
  +1
- Ryan Finn January 19, 2012 At 00:30
  
  Neither have I, but I still want one. Having a slight beavertail is one of the reasons I’ve found my M&P to be a better ergonomic fit than my G19. Of course the resulting grip thickness that comes with this new back strap may turn away people who bought Gen 4s for their SF setup.
- NCG January 19, 2012 At 01:26
  
  I learned the hard way from a Browning .22, still have the scar. I was young and inexperience, but it only took once, never again – the stitches weren’t bad, but the hour drive to get them was a drag. Nonetheless, beavertail is good, if you must shoot a Glock.
- Traye January 19, 2012 At 12:45
  
  I was thinking “slide bite?”. Not from my Glock 22, that thing is like a big ol piece o butter all the way around.
  
  In fact I just picked it up to see if it was possible at all, in any fashion to make it grab my hand fat. The results: I can’t figure out how I would actually be holding that thing to make it bite me. but ymmv I guess.
- ddbaxte January 22, 2012 At 00:40
  
  FLAME DELETED
  
  Anybody with larger hands who uses a proper thumbs forward grip is definitely going to be prone to slide bite from certain pistols.
  
  And anybody who thinks that it’s a symptom of poor training probably doesn’t know the fundamentals as well as they think they do.
- Tex January 31, 2012 At 00:49
  
  You obviously have girl-hands. It’s not the thumb that gets “bitten” it’s the meaty part of the hand between the thumb and first finger.
D.W January 18, 2012 At 22:01

Robert is right pay attention to the basics!! You know better than that follow the rules and pay attention you have a gun in your hand!

PS: Don’t look down the barrel to see if it’s loaded with your finger on the trigger.
- n January 19, 2012 At 00:54
  
  Don’t look down the barrel unless it is out of the gun.
Janice January 18, 2012 At 22:44

Sweet. I have a Glock 19, can’t wait for this new back strap to become available.
Moonshine7102 January 19, 2012 At 06:59

Wow. Only took ’em 30 years. Whatever will Gaston think up next?
Dirk Diggler January 19, 2012 At 07:40

glockstore.com has been selling these for a while.
Scott January 19, 2012 At 11:06

Can’t remember who makes it, but there has been an aftermarket beaver tail grip for the Gen 4s out for sometime, actually makes the grip feel pretty good.
- JR January 19, 2012 At 23:26
  
  It was Glock. And they announced it at SHOT Show 2011. They are the worst at this game.
Garrett January 21, 2012 At 16:51

I have very large hands…I can tell you..I’ve been around firearms since the mid 90s and I DO get slide bite occasionally on my issued Glock 22…even firing one handed. Especially when it’s hot ouside and my skin expands just enough while sweaty to push a small bit of flesh right in line with the slide.

I hope these come out soon. Last year they said they were doing beaver tails but they never came out. My guess is that they wanted to fix the Gen4s first.
Michael C February 18, 2013 At 13:59

I thought the beavertail grips were made to prevent hammer bite. A proper grip should be sufficient to prevent slide bite on most handguns.
Adam August 21, 2013 At 13:52

The only time I have seen this is when someone wraps there off hand around the back of their shooting hand. Had a friend I told him to stop as he never listened so I just let him do whatever, took some skin off the top of his off hands thumb. Now he shoots his glock right.
John Doe May 3, 2020 At 20:44

This happens. The low bore axis on Glock pistols is great for many reasons, but people with larger hands can get scraped by the slide even with a proper grip. It’s not bad technique, or lack of training, or failing to understand how to handle a Glock that makes this happen, it’s just a large hand. The beavertail backstraps fox this issue for these people.