Can a person make a their own guide rod?

[CRASHNBURN]

Can a person make a guide rod? If they have time, a lathe & 304 or 316 stainless around. Is there anything really that special about them??? Or, is that a big no no? Thanks.

[Old School]

Originally Posted by CRASHNBURN

Can a person make a guide rod? If they have time, a lathe & 304 or 316 stainless around. Is there anything really that special about them??? Or, is that a big no no? Thanks.

Sure they can. If you have the tools, material, expertise and dimensions, you too can make a guide rod.

OS

[hibidi-shibidi]

Don's SS rods are only like 10-20 bucks. If you aren't making 15 of them, I would say just buying one is the most economical choice.

If you are just wanted to make one because you can, post pics and let us know how it goes.

[anodesjoinops]

Well the guide rod in my XD .45 Tactical is just a thin-walled piece of steel pipe. Not too much can go wrong with a steel guide rod as long as you get the dimensions correct.

Someone told me the ones in Glocks are actually plastic.

[XDONBOARD]

You can do anything you put your mind to.

[BwC605]

Originally Posted by anodesjoinops

Well the guide rod in my XD .45 Tactical is just a thin-walled piece of steel pipe. Not too much can go wrong with a steel guide rod as long as you get the dimensions correct.

Someone told me the ones in Glocks are actually plastic.

Yes the one in my Glock 27 .40 is a plastic of some type. Seems like a polymer maybe? It's pretty hard but the metal would still be preferable, however it's a compact that I've shot thousands of rounds through with no issues so I guess if it ain't broke!

[anodesjoinops]

Yeah if we're shooting polymer pistols we can't hardly knock plastic...have to go to the 1911 forum for that .

[scooter123]

Actually, you don't want to use 304 or 316 stainless, it's too damn soft. If you want stainless, use a 400 series such as 416 and have it hardened to somewhere in the range of 32-38 Rc. If you don't want to bother with stainless, half hard 4140 at 28-32 Rc is a fairly reasonable substitute and won't require any post machining heat treat.

[MD-Lucky]

As mentioned before: there would be no major issues with building your own other than cost.

For the price of Don's guide rod, you are WAY better off just purchasing one from him and moving on!

[Grizcat68]

My free time is worth at least $75.00 an hour, lets see, setup time, searching for material, taking measurements, machining time, cleanup time. I'd say a good two hours at least to get it done I think that either Don's or Wolf guides are a heck of a deal. Thought about it myself for a bit, wasted $1 just doing that!!