Grocery Shopping: T4M Training Glock Pistol

05/05/2023 by piro

Word of caution first. These things are often sold as "self defence tools" - they are not suitable for self defence, unless you want to smack someone with pistol frame itself. Sellers who feed upon unknowing people selling false feeling of safety should really be hold accountable for misinforming any potential buyers. However, it is still nice looking piece, and it has some potential for being "training" item.

Due to accidental shopping cart clearing, I've acquired an Umarex TPM 1 RAM T4E Law Enforcement .43 training pistol. While I like to shoot Glock 17, the gun that this training pistol was modelled on, I had no idea what to expect from this weird-market-niche product. Here's a store picture:

Product image of Umarex TPM 1 RAM T4E Law Enforcement .43 — Product image of training pistol in question.

Upon receiving the package and taking it out of shipping cardboard box, in sight we have nice plastic casing, not really looking like original Glock one:

T4E company logo embedded on plastic protective case.

With opening of two plastic latches (the one that can break off easily, just being part of the case mold, not separate pieces with hinges), we have whole content presented before us:

Gun itself, rubber cleaning tool for barrel (to clean from rubber/oil residue), spare magazine spring, hex key to tighten co2 capsule. Papers (Instruction and service manual) are hidden under top foam.

While handling the gun, we have a very nice iron sights with orange paint accents at disposal - weird colour choice, but it fits the blue-training frame (That's metal! Probably zn-al though, so don't expect it to be durable) of the gun. It compliments the colour theme well, and is much easier on the eyes than contrast red colour near blue one.

In front of pistol, under barrel, there's short accessory rail, that will allow you to mount unnecessary ad-dons like lasers and flashlights if you really want to:

DBAL-PL mounted on short rail under barrel, sticking out comically. Probably smaller aparatus would fit it better, but i didnt had anything else close to me. — DBAL-PL mounted on short rail under barrel, sticking out comically. Probably smaller apparatus would fit it better, but i dint had anything else close to me.

On picture above, note the distance slide is moved back - that's the max distance distance it travels, which have its pros and cons:
Pros - less CO2 gas would be wasted after shot for moving that part, as blowback (the movement of slide back and forth, that in real gun would cause ejection of casing when backing, and loading new round when moving forward) here is purely cosmetic, and not required by the way gun operates.
Cons - Blowback would be really low, almost nonexistent. Also, it's not very realistic if we consider it a "training" model, which might cause people to expect slide on real thing to also travel such small distance, potentially risking hurting fingers if they wander not where they should be. That's enough about complains about that, there's more on the way anyway. Picture below shows what we see when slide is locked in back position - this isn't a "bullet chamber", nor part of barrel:

top of magazine, shown through fake "ejection window" in slide — Top of magazine, shown through fake "ejection window" in slide.

This is top part of magazine, and that means whole shooting mechanism is done by magazine itself - gas valve, release button, seals, everything is contained in magazine itself - that means magazines will be very expensive, and technically you can shoot the bullet without the gun, just releasing gas manually without gun itself (not recommended). Here's magazine itself:

Magazine loaded with eight .43 rubber balls.

Front of magazine, with what should be considered "bullet chamber" with rubber ball stuck inside - behind the ball, there's gas valve that will push the ball out of magazine, and most likely, guns barrel.

Back of magazine - with piston your'e supposed to press (strike momentarily) to open gas valve at front.

That concludes visual tour around the item. This article will be updated when I have time and peace to shoot myself with it some target board at 10m to tell more about its accuracy, but I don't expect lot from smooth barrel and CO2 as propellant.