When it comes to stipple and frame modification on your glock or other ploymer framed hand gun, there are a lot of special terms and wide variety of improvements and adjustments that can be done to your frame that can sometimes be difficult to explain without seeing it. We are fortunate to have a full time frame work specialist here in house who is very talented in creating these textures by hand after years of creating stipple dot art by hand. He has the ability to do a wide range of modifications to your frame, but sometimes it can be hard to communicate this clearly and effectively without first showing you what we mean by certain terms. This blog will attempt to illustrate to you all of the different frame modification options we offer here and a little about what they do, and we will update this as we are able to after releasing new services and options.

For starters you have stipple itself, which is the literal texture being added to your grip itself. To simplify everything for our customers we always include all of our frame work options for free with any stipple texture choice (with the exception of grip reductions )

We offer three types of stipple here:

Hand done stipples – most aggressive – each of these shapes is individually hand laid by our in house stipple tech.

Signature stipple – (hand or laser) moderately aggressive (most popular)

and Laser stipple – less aggressive – This is done by polishing the frame smooth and lasering the texture into the polymer. Currently we are only able to get the clean results that we are going for from Glock Black polymer, The Sig, and CZ polymers as well as Glock polymers that have been dyed to be a different color (19X tan or sometimes green etc…) react to the laser very differently and will often leave a slaggy, messy, difficult to clean and polish surface that in our opinion is not acceptable to return to the customer. On the Sig, they are using a nylon filled polymer, which is why all laser stipple you see on Sig Sauer polymer grips looks like it has a bunch of grainy lines through it vs looking clean and crisp.

Currently, we have a wide variety of hand stipple patterns, 1 signature stipple, and 2 laser stipple options.

the first step to getting frame work done will be to choose how aggressive you want your stipple, and then select which pattern you want. (it should be noted we can only do these modifications to polymer frame pistols and non glock pistols may have limits on the other frame work services that are possible, for example there isn’t enough room for us to make an undercut on the p10c frame as deeply as we can on glock without compromising the trigger guard.)

Generally speaking all of our frame work pages are set up primarily for glock pistols, however we are able to do frame modifications to most if not all polymer framed pistols like the STI in the header image.

We should also note that we can do completely custom stipple art as well, so feel free to reach out to us so we can talk over your idea and figure out pricing on a custom stipple.

Once we have the stipple texture chosen, all of the following frame modifications are all included in your stipple package, they can be hard to describe so we are going to break them down for you in image examples. As I mentioned before, some of these options may not be available for non glock pistols depending on the pistol. call in or shoot us a text or email if you have any questions.

Single Undercuts (sometimes called a finger groove undercut):

The purpose of this modification is to allow your middle finger to ride higher on the frame and get you a better bore axis grip on our gun. to put it simply, the higher your grip is and the further forward the better control you ahve over that recoil impulse. We find this the most popular, most comfortable, most noticeable and most essential upgrade for glock frames. There really isn’t much reason not to do this in our opinion. even if you have small hands/fingers, bringing the hand higher up on the grip is better.

Double Undercut (trigger guard undercut):

This modification can come stippled as pictured or non stippled (without that texture, or polished smooth) which is used to allow your finger on your support hand to rest inside the cut area, and have a nice ledge to hang out in. Adding stipple here allows you to get some grip off of that interaction, which may or may not be your thing.

Docked Trigger Guards:

This modification removes the U shaped ledge on the front of factory glock pistols and replaces it with a much more aesthetically pleasing docked surface that is less intrusive when using your support hand.

Trigger guard chamfer:

This modification cuts and angles surface on the underside of your trigger guard effectively cutting the squared off corners at an angle to make a new surface. This can be both for grip improvement and for looks. It is also a nice tool for muscle memory with your support hand.

Bordered Vs Non bordered stipple:

By default all of our stipples are “Bordered” like pictured which means we created barriered off sections of the stipple with a clean space between sections. We can also stipple everything except laser stipple outside borders where it completely wraps around the grip upon request. Typically we think it looks cleaner and works out the best to create these borders, which are standard, you can see in different images we use the same border for our stipple.

In this image however you will notice the front section of stipple is wrapped all the way outside of borders, unlike the image below:

Thumb and index ledge stipple:

This is when we create a square or ledged surface that we stipple on top of, which is used a muscle memory position for your support thumb and trigger finger when practicing proper trigger control.

accelerator cuts (thumb and indexing ledges):

Accelerator cuts are angled cuts like the ones pictured above designed to give your support thumb a ledge to rest on when your grip is high and forward on the firearm. We can do these ledges stippled or not stippled and polished smooth. It just depends on the job you want them to do and how you want the aesthetic of your frame to turn out.

Finger Groove removal:

Just like it sounds, this is the act of shaving off some or all of the finger grooves on Gen 3 glock frames. You can see in the image above, the customer wanted one groove left behind and the single undercut rounded out a little, this is VERY comfortable for larger handed folks.

Grip Reduction:

Grip reduction can be hard to see, but it is basically the act of taking that almost exaggerated hump at the bottom of your backstrap and making it flatter and *closer* to a 1911 type grip profile. This feature is a preference based option, however we find that many people prefer this grip angle once they have felt it. We find that guys and gals that “hate” Glocks or don’t shoot them well will generally fall in love with one that has a grip reduction as it allows for a more natural feeling hold or pointing of the Glock. smaller handed folks like the grip reduction as they are able to get more purchase on the firearm which is going to effect felt recoil and control of the firearm for follow up shots and shot strings.

One Premium option is having cerakote applied over the stipple to make it a complementary color to your color scheme or highlight the texture aesthetically speaking, but from a cost/benefit analysis the cerakote over stipple is the performance option. Cerakote is a polymer ceramic coating, and applying it over stipple also makes the feel and aggressiveness of the texture last much much longer, gives the grip feel a little more ‘tooth’ as well as preserving the life of the stipple by making the surface harder than bare polymer. We sometimes compare it to anodizing on Aluminum, it hardens the surface of the substrate and makes it more durable.

Heres a look at some of our hand stipple textures available:

You’ll also notice in this image that this is a gen 3, which has had the finger grooves removed except one. this is also a service that is included in any stipple for gen 3 glocks, just ask for it!

generally speaking 1911’s cant be stippled because they are usually steel frame, however we can stipple polymer grips for them. We have also lasered grip texture onto 1911 grip panels before. call in text in or send us an email and we can go over options and pricing.

Custom Art stipple:

Art stipple is like a tattoo consultation for your grip. We can make custom stipple patterns, bits, drawings and augment the cleanliness of lines and text by lasering faint lines to follow with the hand stipple tools and make things come out super clean or gritty. Totally up to you.

here is one example of a unique stipple bit to create this type of very specific pattern as your stipple texture: This was for a local narcotics officer.

We can also laser engrave or stipple artwork into the texture of the stipple area: Below we have laser removed the black layer of cerakote exposing the tan layer of cerakote and the custom Mandalorian sigil on the grip. This is a 19X and so cutting the art into the polymer was not possible especially to get it clean and crisp like that, however on Glock Black polymer this would be totally possible as a deep engraved logo or sigil vs a cerakote surface mark.

As you can see, in the end the list of things we are capable of doing to your frame is quite broad, reach out to us to see get started on the perfect design for your frame!

Each of these stipple packages can be ordered through this site, to get started go to Custom shop, then select your brand of pistol. when scrolling down you should locate a frame modifications, or click the fast link at the top of the page and it will take you to the section that has the proper stipple options for your specific firearm! Please note, we have one stipple expert, he takes pride in the clean and careful work he lays down, each and every hand done stipple is done meticulously by him. For this reason, our stipple lead times can run from 4-10 weeks depending on the texture and other frame work being done, we highly appreciate your patience and understanding in this area.

Call us M-F 9-7 (mountain time) or text or email us anytime day or night (phones are in the shop so 3:00am texting is not waking anyone up, our number is 801-839-4841 (text AND picture messaging available) or by using the contact form on this site! We do also have a storefront for our local customers with a display that demonstrates each of these textures on an A2 grip so you can feel them in person. Our storefront is located at 1096 E 930 S in provo utah, 84606. We are open M-F 9am – 7pm.

Thank you so much we look forward to seeing you!