cuerno de chivo asks:
I've heard that a Ruger DA can "malfunction" if you fire them too fast. Something about the trigger return being slow or the way the action is designed.
Assuming that you're speaking of a Ruger DA/SA revolver, this is one of the few "I heard" pieces of information around, the terse responds of
44rugerfan and
Robert Foote withstanding.
I first identified it on an early SP101 I was T&E'ing for
Combat Handguns… not having a great deal of experience with Sturm, Ruger wheelguns, I thought it was perhaps anomalous until I spoke with several well-known 'smiths, one of whom offers a popular "street" conversion on the Models SP101. It was explained to me that this was endeminc to the Ruger DA/SA revolver triggers… I don't know if it also applies to their DAO revolvers.
Specifically, performing what the guys at Petersen's used to refer to as "fast, double action work" (usually "at seven yards"), there is a point at which the shooter can cause the trigger to "lock-up" hard. And another point where the sucker will actually "free-wheel." Both conditions are recovered from by the simple expedient of releasing the trigger and re-stroking.
Is is, as
parachuterigger and
whitebear suggest, "operator error?"
Absolutely!
But one I wouldn't want any part of in a PDA such as the otherwise excellent SP101… in my decades of shooting, I've fired a whole lot more S&W and Colt's DA/SA revolvers than Rugers, and have
never experienced such a condition. (And not for nuthin', but I competed in sandpit combat matches throughout the '80s with an S&W Model 686, and regularly used to take out six steel plates in under three seconds… 'tain't Jerry Miculek speed by any means, but it's definitely "fast, double action work.")
The upshot is that the mono-syllabic responses of Mr.
Foote and
44rugerfan are inaccurate, probably because it hasn't happened to them… yet.