If you listen too much to the legions of Glock fans, you might get the impression that the Glock is a tool unlike any other since man first chipped a piece of flint to make a point. Nonsense. It is a pistol, like any other. The magazine goes in the bottom, the slide goes back and forth, and bullets come out of the loud end. There are, however, a few peculiarities you have to be aware of.

We're all up to speed on Glock disassembly, right? Check to make sure it is empty. Dry-fire, then ease the slide back a fraction while pulling down on the disassembly levers. Slide and barrel come off the front of the frame. With your Glock disassembly tool (a plain old punch), push out frame pins--one in the rear, one (older Glocks) or two just over the trigger. If you simply use a hammer on the larger pin, you'll break things before you get the Glock apart.

To remove the larger pin, you have to grab the slide-stop lever and wiggle it around as you press on the larger pin. The pin has a shoulder on it, which the slide-stop spring pushes the slide stop against. You have to wiggle the slide stop around until the shoulder clears the hole in the slide stop. Once the pins are out, yank trigger, connector frame and the rest out of the top.

The first thing to do is check the Glock for broken parts. While rare, it happens. Look at the frame just above the trigger. On very early 9mm and .40 S&W pistols you'll see only one pin. (The one-pin .40 is very rare.) The "one pin or two" design came from the .40 S&W cartridge. One-pin frames in .40 suffered from broken pins, so Glock added a second one. Checking is simple: Once they're out, are they broken?

Every pistol needs the breechface scrubbed. Neither the Glock nor the XD differs here. Get it clean.

Check the trigger return spring. They occasionally break. If you look at the slide on the .40 and .357 SIG pistols, you'll see a couple of bright spots. That's where the frame flexes during firing and lets the locking block tap the slide. After a little bit of denting, it stops.

Next, check the condition of your firing-pin safety. Look underneath the slide in the slot where the striker rides. You'll see the edge of a plastic sleeve sticking past the end of the slot. Use a punch to pull that sleeve toward the muzzle and then slide the rear plate off the slide. Exercise care or you'll chip the thin edge of the slide at the tunnel. Chipping doesn't hurt anything; it's just unsightly.

Now pull the striker assembly and the extractor-spring assembly out of the slide. Turn the slide onto the sights and push the firing-pin safety toward the tabletop. Pull out the extractor and then the safety and its spring. Check the extractor tip to make sure it is fully formed and not chipped.

Inspect the safety shoulder. It should be a right angle where the striker hits it. If it is peened or the edge is bent and worn down, it needs to be replaced. Wear here can allow the striker to weasel past the safety, and we don't want that.

Cleaning is easy: scrub off the powder residue, lint, dust and other gunk that collects on and in the Glock. The clearance slots on the rear plate of the slide allow lint in (like any other pistol does), and you can sometimes find impressive dust bunnies on long-term carry guns. If you use a cleaning solvent, be sure to get the solvent off, leaving the Glock good and dry. Scrub the bore.