Dry firing? The truth

The primer (or snap cap) stops the pin. Otherwise, the pin wants to over-travel due to inertia, and therefore the spring has to work harder if no cartridge or snap cap is present.
 
The part I was questioning was 'a lot'. I think the amount of continued free travel after the would be primer strike is very minimal is it not? I doubt this would have any affect on the spring.
 
Quote:
dry firing compresses the FP spring a lot more than actually firing.

Hows that? Can you explain?
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When the FP goes farther forward because there's no primer to stop it, the FP spring must compress more. That puts more wear on it and weakens it sooner.

NOTE: When you see the little tear drop configuration on primers after firing, that's a sign that the case is coming back from recoil faster than the spring can contract. That's the fired primer hitting the unretracted FP.

With some high pressure cartridges like .40 S&W or .357 Sig, that's normal, but I've seen it with standard pressure .45 and 9mm. Whether that's a sign of a weakened FP spring, weakened recoil spring, or a combination, I'm not sure.
 
Make sure you understand the difference...

between "snapping", and dry firing for training. Snapping the gun to store it uncocked normally hurts nothing, even .22s. But we are talking the occassional dry fire here, amounting to a few dozen times a year, or so, give or take. No well made firearm should break any part from being dry fired once in a while.

Dry firing for training is another matter. Unless the manufacturer states its ok, it should never be done to any rimfire. And many designs of centerfire do not tolerate it well. Guns made in recent decades, intended for military service should, and generally do tolerate it without problems, but each individual gun is just that, an individual, and sometimes things do break.

Snap caps are cheap, and while you may not be concerned with the cost of a replacement firing pin or spring(s), when they do break, your gun is out of comission until you get it fixed.

Hundreds-thousands of snaps (without snap caps) may not harm your gun, but why risk damage when its not needed?
 
I brought my old S&W to a gunsmith once for a checkup and he told me I could dry fire that gun until I was old and grey (which is a while from now).

His name is Rusty and he has John Wayne posters in his shop. I trust him.
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Apparantly you missed this post by Eagle:

I was dry firing my S&W model 66 when the above described firing pin broke off. That is the only failure in over 30 years of use.
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Microgunner, Glocks have been known to have strikers fail from dry fire without snap caps. Are you calling Glocks prissy?

Here's the thing, if you are going to do a lot of dry firing, snap caps are not expensive, and they last a long time. Why not just get some?
 
Well, we trained on Glock 22s, 23s, or 35s at the academy and did thousands (and I do mean thousands) of dry fire drills with them. Every day for about half an hour for 22 weeks. I still have that Glock 35. It's running great.

*this is no indication your experience will be the same
 
the truth is dry fire will probably never hurt your gun. That said snap caps are cheep and are good for insurance... hey are also good for practicing reloading. In an automatic it helps you instinctively know how many times you can shoot before reloading and helps you learn to reload your mags faster.
 
I avoid dry firing any gun but I might do it very seldom. It's not worth the risk and it's too easy to just use snap caps or spent shells.

Some people discount the value of a broken firing pin but this is far from a trivial matter when the goal is to have the firearm in working order at all times. A good firing pin is a very big deal when you need one and don't have it.
 
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