Introduction

What is the Glock 23F? It is a Glock 19 (or 23, if you prefer the .40 S&W caliber) or to be more precise it is an immitation of the Glock 19C or 23C (where C stands for Compensated), with the added functionality of full-auto fire thrown in as a bonus. In other words, a shorter Glock 18.

As far as I know, there is no real-steel Glock 23F pistol, so this is probably the result of some aggressive marketing on behalf of the Airsoft companies. Maybe Glock should follow their lead and offer such a pistol?

The G23F was a kind contribution of our sponsor, Airsplat, who send it to me as an early Christmas gift. The Glock 23F was my first fully automatic airsoft pistol, so I was a little anxious to try it out. A big "Thank you" to Airsplat for their gift, is in order.


Description

The KWA Glock 23F arrived in a box, similar to the one the Glock 19 had come to me.



As you see, the box even says "Glock 19", the only difference being the sticker which clarifies that this is not the simple pistol, but the Model 23F, full- and semi-auto.

Upon opening the box, I found the usuals: the pistol and its magazine, some BBs, a couple of alen keys, the traditional documentation etc.



I picked up the gun, which featured the same stealth look, as the previously tested Glock 19 (absolutely no inscriptions, names or anything), but which had a very ugly orange tip at the muzzle end of the slide.



Upon closer examination, it looked as if this orange tip was going to be a much bigger problem, than the one I faced with the G19 and other pistols.



Where other pistols had some orange water-based paint applied, which was easily removable with some alcohol, this one had a solid, very hard and well applied paint, which refused to be removed with any solvent I tried on it. Well, there was no way I was going to keep the pistol like that, so I started thinking how to remove the orange paint.



While I was thinking the best approach to remove the orange tip, I was also examining the pistol that Airsplat send me. The 23F came with the same problem as the Glock 19. Due to some pattents issue, all KWA and KSC Glock replicas are imported in US, without the trigger safety found in the real Glock. The ones imported in European countries have the normal triggers with the trigger safety. Having installed a "European" trigger in my Glock 19, I asked Airsplat, if they could find me a trigger. Kent Wu, at Aisplat was kind enough to oblige, so the trigger was send to me (more on that later).

Moving closer, what sets the Glock 23F and the Glock 19 apart are two big differences.



The first one, is of course the selector lever at the left, rear end of the slide, which allows you to select either semi-auto firing (selector at the upper position), or fully-automatic firing (selector at the lower position). These two positions are marked with a single dot for semi and two dots for full-auto. What is interesting, is that the selector lever can be set at another position, horizontally in the middle, in which the pistol is rendered safe, in other words the pistol does not fire. I am not very familiar with the real Glocks, so I do not know if the Glock 18 has such a feature or not, but I found it useful, on this replica.



The second feature that differentiates the 23F from the Glock 19, is the ported barrel. The barrel of the 23F has four holes drilled on a ridge, which mattes with a cut-out in the slide. On the real Glock C models, this compensator is used to reduce the guns recoil. Of course, they serve no real purpose on an airsoft gun. On the picture above, you also see the marks from my first attempt to remove the orange paint.



The front sight is dovetailed on the ridge of the barrel, as you can see on the picture above.



Here you can see the two cousins, together. The Glock 23F frame is less black than the one of the Glock 19. It has a strange, greyish color.



Since these two are made by the same company, I would expect the frames to be identical, but no, they are a little different, at least as far as color is concerned.



Before proceeding any further, I dediced to use some emery clothes, to remove the orange tip. After spending a lot of elbow grease, the orange paint was removed, but so was the black paint below it.



The aluminum of the slide was exposed, and I started cursing whoever had the idea to install such a stubborn orange tip on this gun. It was evident, that whatever I do, there was no way I could avoid refinishing the slide.



Then I got an idea. What if I completely remove the paint and polish the slide? Actually, this wasn't my idea, I've seen it done on a Glock 19 in another site, so I started working on it. First I had to remove everything from the slide, and then bring out my collection of Wet&Dry papers. Soon, I had a bright "stainless-like" slide. I am sure Airsplat would be surprised to see this pistol now!



Last summer, I found a shop in Athens, which do powder-coatings on car wheels, maybe I'll visit them one day and have them coat my slide black again.



With the slide in an acceptable condition, I focus again on the pistol's features. This Glock has a different rear sight than the G19. Its sight looks more like a very low profile Novak, than anything else, which is something I like. It has a pair of white dots , which match with the single white dot, on the front sight. However, the front sight's dot is not very visible. Maybe I'll add a drop of Bright Eyes to improve the visibility of the front sight.



The magazine that came with the pistol is the standard G17 magazine, with a special collar around its bottom, which completely matches the lower part of the frame. It takes 23 BBs.



Of course, any Glock 17 or 19 magazines you may have, can be used on this pistol without a problem, as well as longer (50 round) magazines. Actually, for the rate of fire this gun is capable of, the capacity of the standard G17 magazine (23 rounds) is quite small, so I think I should order a 50 rounder, together with that trigger. Airsplat do you hear me? I need one of those!

With the G19 in my left hand and the G23F in my right, and vice versa, the two pistols felt exactly the same, so I guess I should say, what I mentioned in the G19 review. That this pistol made me change my opinion about the Glocks. They feel very nice in my hands and the short models (like these two) balance very well for me. Now, after you have read that, erase it from your memory!!!! My reputation is in danger!!!

Please continue to Page 2 of this review.