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I recently picked up, what I thought was a G20 with ambi mag release... turns out its a G21 frame, with G20 upper, and had what I thought was a bit of a poor stippling job by a previous owner.
but keeping with the theme of this G20 being a kitchen table experiment.....
I don't know where I got the nerve to do this, and in hindsight, I propably should have practiced on some Pmags, or something cheaper... anyhow here it is, keep in mind the texture isn't as agressive as it looks in the pictures, but definitely an improvement in grip, and feels better than the novice stippling it had previously.
Before pic...
Masking...
The point of no return...
I tested the epoxy by mixing up a batch and spreading it around a paper plate, then watching the clock, and as it dried, playing with the texturing process. All of the write-ups that I had read, said to used a popsickle stick or tongue depressor to mix it, then about 1/2 hour to an hour in, add texture by tapping the surface. I found that this didn't work very well at all, and only made the epoxy look like it was 'agitated', rather than give it a nice texture.
So, as it was drying I was scrambling for another method of applying texture. First, I grabbed a sponge and rolled it over the epoxy, which left a nice texture, but the epoxy wasn't set enough for it to hold, without blending back to a smooth finish within a minute or so. So then I moved to sandpaper, and had some 50 grit in the garage that I wrapped around my finger and pressed against the textured areas. It worked well, and by this time in the curing process, the texture pattern held up in the drying epoxy. However, it didn't give much of an improvement over the regular Glock texture, so I set the gun in the freezer hoping to slow the curing proccess, and went to Walmart. The only place with a hardware section open at 1am! Although they didn't have any sandpaper that was more coarse than what I had I lready tried, so I found one of these...
When I returned, I pulled the gun out of the freezer and slowly heated the grip over my kitchen stove. When I got the grip warm, it was now softer than I had left it, and I firmly pressed the edge of the sanding wheel against the epoxy, working across in a pattern, and this is the final product.
My only regret is that the epoxy actually dries a very dark shade of grey, so its not actually black and contrasts the color of the gun. Overall, I think it turned out well.
but keeping with the theme of this G20 being a kitchen table experiment.....
I don't know where I got the nerve to do this, and in hindsight, I propably should have practiced on some Pmags, or something cheaper... anyhow here it is, keep in mind the texture isn't as agressive as it looks in the pictures, but definitely an improvement in grip, and feels better than the novice stippling it had previously.
Before pic...
Masking...
The point of no return...
I tested the epoxy by mixing up a batch and spreading it around a paper plate, then watching the clock, and as it dried, playing with the texturing process. All of the write-ups that I had read, said to used a popsickle stick or tongue depressor to mix it, then about 1/2 hour to an hour in, add texture by tapping the surface. I found that this didn't work very well at all, and only made the epoxy look like it was 'agitated', rather than give it a nice texture.
So, as it was drying I was scrambling for another method of applying texture. First, I grabbed a sponge and rolled it over the epoxy, which left a nice texture, but the epoxy wasn't set enough for it to hold, without blending back to a smooth finish within a minute or so. So then I moved to sandpaper, and had some 50 grit in the garage that I wrapped around my finger and pressed against the textured areas. It worked well, and by this time in the curing process, the texture pattern held up in the drying epoxy. However, it didn't give much of an improvement over the regular Glock texture, so I set the gun in the freezer hoping to slow the curing proccess, and went to Walmart. The only place with a hardware section open at 1am! Although they didn't have any sandpaper that was more coarse than what I had I lready tried, so I found one of these...
When I returned, I pulled the gun out of the freezer and slowly heated the grip over my kitchen stove. When I got the grip warm, it was now softer than I had left it, and I firmly pressed the edge of the sanding wheel against the epoxy, working across in a pattern, and this is the final product.
My only regret is that the epoxy actually dries a very dark shade of grey, so its not actually black and contrasts the color of the gun. Overall, I think it turned out well.
