I once owned Glocks but saw the light and traded them for M&P's. However I noticed something interesting. The M&P's seem to get dirtier inside quicker and after just a few hundred rounds the magazine follower becomes blackened with soot. Also my hands and arms get more dirty when I shoot the M&P's from what I remember from the Glocks. This holds true for my Shield, Compact and 5" Pro Series, all get pretty dirty pretty quick. This doesn't seem to effect reliability or anything, just something I've noticed. My guess would be the lockup time for the action is shorter for the M&P line in general over Glocks and shells are extracted before the round is entirely done firing. In my subjective experience the M&P is also softer shooting vs. the equivilent Glock as well, which may be related. What are your thoughts and experiences with this? Have you ever noticed it?
I have three M&Ps, a Shield 9, a Shield .45, and an M&P .40c. These are paragons of clean shooting compared to my FN FNX-45 Tactical. (A great pistol, BTW.) After 100 rounds of shooting my FNX, my right forearm looks like I've spent the day shoveling coal. So it's all relative, I guess.
I assume you are comparing them with the other guns you mention using the same ammo you normally use, otherwise I would say change to something cleaner like lawman. I've always found their ammo to be very clean burning. Then they also have the clean fire versions too which are even better.
I would say that you may have a point with unlock time if you're using the 1.0 versions of the M&P series... they're kind of known to be early unlockers. I haven't really paid that much attention to how dirty they get compared to others but it could very well be a thing. might be interesting to know if someone who has put one of the Apex barrels in their 1.0 noticed a difference in cleanliness. Randy solved the early unlocking of the 1.0's with his custom barrel so if it is due to that then the issue would be resolved after dropping an apex into it.
More than likely its just due to the design of the whole system but I wouldn't discount the idea until someone could prove it false.
In my subjective experience the M&P is also softer shooting vs. the equivilent Glock as well
Mass....M&P are heavier. more mass to absorb recoil. they were built first as a gun designed around the .40 S&W power and then adapted to 9mm Luger so they are tanks. Glocks were built as a 9mm luger and then adapted to .40 (and poorly in early generations). Its funny though because to me, my Gen4 G22 feels like it has less recoil than my full size M&P 1.0 .40 with the same ammo. Glocks still have a lower bore axis by quite a bit so I think that helps, as well as the dual stage recoil spring. My M&P .40 is more accurate though.
It is subjective though.. different folks...different strokes
Lockup time in M&P pistols
Linear Mode
