Any ill effect firing DA/SA revolver in SA?

From a training standpoint if you use the gun for defensive purposes you are most likely to whatever you train to do the most. If that means shoot SA then you will be cocking the hammer back under high stress. This may or may not be what you want to do.

If you don't cock the hammer back under stress the greater accuracy you enjoy from the SA operation will disappear and your shooting will actually be a bit worse then if you had simply trained in DA.

When I carried a revolver for SD (and it's been a good long while) when training I would shoot the first round SA and the rest DA. Never had to use it for SD luckily.
 
If there was, would they design them that they could be fired S/A. Would they design a car that you could use automatic or manual, but using it in manual would damage it.
 
Sevens said:
So when you shave the spur off the hammer of a double action revolver and you do not change the mainspring, that hammer falls FASTER. But does it hit HARDER? I believe that it does not... but typically, not so much that it makes a difference.
Click to expand...

You'll have to define "harder".

The lighter/faster hammer doesn't hit with more energy, since the (unchanged) spring supplies the energy (the hammer merely transfers that energy).

But (within some limits) a lighter/faster hammer will hit with more "power", since power is energy per unit time (or energy x velocity).
 
But (within some limits) a lighter/faster hammer will hit with more "power", since power is energy per unit time (or energy x velocity).
Click to expand...

For the same energy, the lighter hammer will hit with less MOMENTUM. It is an unfortunate mis-use in common terminology to call the momentum the "power factor" in establishing requirements for competitions. Power is energy per unit time, not momentum. (The fact that you used quotes around "power" tells me that you already knew this, though).
 
Last edited:
Hank- no.
Shoot it any way you want, you're not going to damage the gun by sticking to SA for your target applications.

No need to over-analyze. :)
Denis
 
Mike_Fontenot said:
For the same energy, the lighter hammer will hit with more MOMENTUM.
Click to expand...

Actually, no.

You can use simple physics to show that, assuming the spring remains the same, a hammer that's 20% lighter (or more correctly, has 20% less inertia) will have 12% more power and 10% less momentum.

By definition, you'll always have momentum and power in some balance. When you lighten the hammer, you shift the balance towards power.

I do agree with DPris, though, that this is getting into off-topic over-analysis for this thread.;)
 
Double action puts more strain on the firearm. The alloy double actions are worn out and long gone, but I still have the single actions.
Click to expand...
I have and had several S&W double actions all of which were steel. Even various light-weight alloy S&W double actions, the pivot pins, hammers, rebound slides, triggers, hands, hammer blocks... all the contact parts. were steel. So, did S&W make a revolver that I do not know about?
 
You can use simple physics to show that, assuming the spring remains the same, a hammer that's 20% lighter (or more correctly, has 20% less inertia) will have 12% more power and 10% less momentum.
Click to expand...

"Power" (in the correct physics sense) has NO relevance at all in this scenario. "Power factor", as it is mis-used as a qualifying number in shooting competitions, is actually momentum (expressed in non-standard units).
 
QUOTE If the hammer strike is much more powerful in SA than in DA, will that give you any increase in muzzle velocity? QUOTE

This question from Springer99 hits on another truth!

It has been proven when a primer is whomped by a SA stroke, the ignition
gives oomph to the bullet, increasing velocity by at least 50 feet a second,
sometimes more, in a typical .38 Special.
 
I carefully shaved most of the hammer spur off of one of my 38 snubs. The dents from where the firing pin hits the primers don't seem any different than they used to be.
 
Nope. I've been doing it that way for decades. Sounds like you & I approach shooting the same way. I currently have close to 30,000 rounds through my main range gun since it was rebuilt and it's still got plenty of life left in it. I did break the hammer mounted firing pin at around 20,000 rounds but that was not replaced during the rebuild. I bought the gun used and shot it quite a bit before the rebuild. It no doubt was the original firing pin. I don't know how many rounds that amounts too but it's a lot.
 
Shoot it any way you want, you're not going to damage the gun { or any revolver } by sticking to SA for your target applications.

No need to over-analyze.
Click to expand...
+1 .... Just shoot it and enjoy.
 
Under most conditions, shooting gun the way it was designed to be shot does not damage it.

The biggest risk when shooting a DA revolver SA is running into one of the "tactifools" that are DA only fanatics. They will tell you (with passion, and often at great length) how shooting a DA in SA mode in practice means that you WILL shoot SA in a defense situation, and that shooting SA in a defense situation means that you will die, DIE, DIE!!!

They are, of course, idiots, and I think they have some close DNA connection to Mall Ninjas and the like. Their way is the only "right" way, and you will die if you don't do it the way they do. I've actually heard (and seen) some people say that, and they were being serious!!!

I wouldn't own a DA only revolver. I see no point to deliberately throwing away half the utility of the gun (and the bigger half by quite a bit, for me).

Now, before someone jumps in and tells us about all the things one can do when you've mastered DA shooting, how you can be accurate, and fast, I will concede that it is true, for SOME people. Maybe for anyone willing to put in the time and practice to learn.

I'm not. I'm not a cop, and never going to be one. I'm the old grump still stuck in the old ways, who considers the DA function of a DA revolver to be an "emergency use only" feature. Something you use like an parachute or the emergency exit. Something for point blank range and point shooting.

Something you should know how to use, and practice enough that you do know that you can use it, but not the normal day to day way to use the gun.

If you are a DA only shooter, and your wants, and needs are met that way, be well, live long, and prosper. I won't tell you that you are wrong, because you aren't. For you.

UNLESS you try to preach to me that your way is the only way, then, you ARE wrong.
 
44 AMP said:
Maybe for anyone willing to put in the time and practice to learn.
Click to expand...

Therein lies the rub.

Your distortion aside, I fail to understand what makes those who have put in the time and practice idiots and mall ninjas.
 
That isn't what 44 AMP is saying at all. He is saying that if you are one of those over-zealous folks who preach that double action is the only way you should ever shoot a revolver AND you preach that shooting for fun in single action mode means that you will automatically default to single action in a crisis and doing do will end up getting you killed in a fight...

...then you are a tool.
 
I prefer to do nearly all of my revolver shooting in double action mode for the simple reason that thumb-cocking my hammer for single action shots SEEMS to alter my grip consistency on my revolver. I have either found or FEEL like I have found that using my thumb to cock the revolver interrupts my string of shooting and I need to re-grip my revolver because it simply doesn't feel consistent. That occurred to me quite some time ago and since I focused on shooting double action nearly all of the time... I have found that I am capable of shooting very well in that manner.

And yes, I keep saying "nearly" simply because one of the things I do enjoy doing with my revolvers is to rest them on a sandbag on the rifle range and slap steel at 100-300 yards and I admit that when I do that, I tend to shoot single action. But when I am shooting my revolvers from 0-15 yards, I much prefer to shoot double action.
 
If you are a DA only shooter, and your wants, and needs are met that way, be well, live long, and prosper. I won't tell you that you are wrong, because you aren't. For you.
Click to expand...
No, you will not tell them that they are wrong, only "tactifools, idiots, Mall Ninjas and the like".
 
There are three reason that I have removed the spur from some of my double-actions and made them double-action only:

1. No one has ever listed a likely reason why a revolver for the purpose of only defensive shooting, ever needs single-action capability. As I see it, it is a "snatch" weapon of last resort (when other options like retreating, running away, etc.) when I must shoot to preserve my own life. Those who insist that they need single-action for an occasional long shot, never adequately explain what that scenario would actually be. Sometimes it borders on the dangerous and ridiculous. For instance, "...when someone is taken hostage...". Let it be known that if I am taken hostage, please do not go cowboy and shoot in my direction to "save" me. I would not do it because despite shooting double-action virtually every day, I never would want to be put in the situation of having to explain to a prosecutor that I did not mean to shoot the hostage in the head while aiming at the perpetrator.



2. Hammer spurs are great snaggers...if you are going to shoot double action with a perpetrator very close and bent upon your destruction, a hammer spur serves no good purpose except to snag on something. Like your jacket, shirt, belt loop, or in my prefered carry method, my pants pocket.

3. Removing the hammer spur will lighten the double-action pull ever so lighter. When lightening the double-action pull, it is a matter of a combination of factors...the weight of the hammer only being one of them.

Unless of course I could be a, "tactifool, idiot, Mall Ninja and the like". Been called worse.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top