Nearly shot my friend from defective pistol...

DAOs are fine except for one thing - I cant stand them

Blackhawk,

Much respect to you, but I disagree.

DAOs may be fine for you - but if I had to give up my 1911 and all the ones I plan to buy, I would go become an Anti just out of spite ;) (JUST KIDDING!)

Actually, I would probably give up pistol shooting all together.

I would carry a DAO for a deep concealment piece - a Keltec or Seecamp or Guardian, but for a full size sidearm, nothing beats the joy of Mr. Brownings 1911.

The ergonomics, the crisp short trigger - yumm.

I do not like the LDA and I would not buy one.

I am fine with you prefering DAOs - to each his own - I refuse to take up action preference as a religious jihad.

HOWEVER - I do think that these kinds of failures are so incredibly rare as to be statistically insignificant - at least as a factor in selecting a personal weapon.

If the "extra safety" makes you like the gun more - more power to you. I am extremly careful with my 1911 and how I handle it.

In fact, part of me wonders if - if a bunch of people started converting to DAO because they are "safer" how many people would loosen up on "the rules" - since having a much safer gun makes them less necessary...

Not saying you or anyone here would do that, but if you took a cross section of 1000 DAO owners and 1000 1911 owners, I am not convinced that the 1911 owners would have more safety problems.

Also - the SA guns tend to attract people who are REALLY into their handguns - there is a history and mythology associated with the 1911 that does not really go with any other modern pistol. This is pure, unadulterated speculation, but I think that when you look at the whole picture, 1911s and their owners are just as safe, probably more so than DAO owners.

To clarify, I am not saying that people who own DAOs and love them are not "really into it" or that they are not experts - many of them are, I just think more go for the 1911.

[ok, next post I will use DAO and 1911 even more often]
 
Blackhawk,
Great calcs, had to double check them:D
Don't forget about the deflection angle becoming greater as a revolver hammer is rotating backwards, the primer would likely deflect early (before the hammer was half way back and the rotator cuff had rotated the cylinder) But I have seen weirder happenings.
M1911 has the best idea and I too shudder at the thought of "hey that was different lets try it again!" I would not want to be on that firing line.
 
Blackhawk - Actually, I agree with your points more than I disagree with them. My main point was that we (and I do include myself) shouldn't discount the possibility of a problem, rare though it may be, because of our knowledge of the workings of any particular gun. With the number of firings over the years in any model of gun, almost anything is possible.

Springs can break in some strange ways. They don't always, or even usually, stay in line, end to end to end to end.

(BTW, you did say "never" and "cannot" in your post of 7:46 PM EDST 6/24. I guess it stuck in my mind. :) )

'Nuff said. Like I said above we agree more than we disagree.
 
Pendragon,
Much respect to you, but I disagree.
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And I disagree that we disagree! :D

My favorite pistol of all time is an M1991A1! And I'm not advocating DAO pistols over DA/SA ones or Glocks. A DAO as a target pistol? Gimme a break!

My point is, and ONLY point is, that DAOs are much less likely to go full auto when you rack the slide to chamber a round than a DA/SA pistol is, no matter how improbable that is! It's a mechanical thing, it's a fact, and nothing's going to change that.

So how does this "fact" change my life?

After I clean and load my Kel-Tec P-11, I can still be assured that when I rack the slide, I can let it slam home into battery -- safely, while pointed in a "safe" direction.

But when I clean and load a DA/SA, I'm NOT going to let the slide slam home into battery when I load the chamber. Furthermore, I'm not going to load the chamber with more than 1 round in the magazine.

But I need to develop a new and safer "habit" so what I'll do is:
  • When ready to load the chamber, insert a magazine with only 1 round in it.
  • Slow rack the slide by holding onto it while it goes into battery, bumping if necessary.
  • Fill the magazine, then insert it into the pistol
  • Do the above steps for ALL semi autos, regardless of their action.

Before Mantis' post, I was liable to get an EAA, fire 700 rounds through it, then clean and load it at home, very late at night, and by inserting a FULL magazine, racking the slide letting it slam home, then topping off the magazine.

Now, I'm not going to follow that procedure, which I've followed for a LONG time, because I think the new one is better and safer.

Now, does any of this mean I like DA/SAs or Glocks less and DAOs more? Not a chance. I'm just going to handle them all a little differently.

Still think we disagree...? :D
 
dj1726,
I too shudder at the thought of "hey that was different lets try it again!" I would not want to be on that firing line.
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It would sound an awful lot like a short burst from an M60, and I'd be wondering "who's got one here?" The really scary thing is that the total surpirse might scare the shooter into letting go...! :eek: :eek: :eek: :eek:
 
Mal H,
My main point was that we (and I do include myself) shouldn't discount the possibility of a problem, rare though it may be, because of our knowledge of the workings of any particular gun. With the number of firings over the years in any model of gun, almost anything is possible.
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Well said, and worth repeating... with emphasis!

Over decades of experience with springs, not just with guns but also designing, making, and specifying them, I've never seen a broken "small" compression spring. Extension and torsion springs breaking is very common -- quite often due to sharp bends needed form eyes, etc. I've also frequently used open end compression springs in series to get a specific spring rate in test setups, etc. I'd say winning the lotto 3 times in a row is more likely than having a series of channeled compression springs (due to breakage or design) causing a jamming problem.
(BTW, you did say "never" and "cannot" in your post of 7:46 PM EDST 6/24. I guess it stuck in my mind. :) )
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That would have stuck in my mind if I had read it in somebody else's post too!

After all, I PERSONALLY RESOLVED to NEVER say "never" on July 18th, 1968, after being taught a very strong lesson about that forbidden term.... :D

Just goes to show how careless we can be when we REALLY know better. :D
 
The really scary thing is that the total surpirse might scare the shooter into letting go...!
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I would think that it would almost be better if you did let go.

I think the gun would stop cycling without someone holding it - although it may yet get a shot off which could prove ugly - dont recomend dropping a gun ever, but imagine if a PAra P-16 was going off - 17 rounds of .40 could cause problems - if you dropped it, it would probably jam instantly with no resistance on the frame.
 
Pendragon,

Gun goes off unexpectedly after being racked. Shooter lets go about as quick as when touching a live electrical wire. As the airborne gun rotates about the horizontal axis from the flip, the questions will be (1) has it rotated enough to be pointed at the shooter, and (2) will it fire again? :eek:
 
Pendragon - No, no, no!

If a gun ever goes full-auto the unlucky shooter should hold on tighter than ever until it's all over. There is no way to assure any control on the direction of the bullets if he or she lets go.
 
I feel that a very important question has yet to be asked.

Mantis, will you inform potential buyers of the problem you had with the gun?

I am not saying that you would not inform them, but were I to purchase a gun from someone who knew it had a deadly problem, and they felt fit not to inform me.....well, there would be a lot of consequences.
 
Bowser- I guess what you are saying is make a post saying what problems I had? Haven't I done that? The gun was brand new, just happened to be one of those defective parts i guess. I haven't got it back yet so i don't know what went wrong.
 
If I may intervene - I think Bowser means are you going to tell a prospective buyer of your gun what happened, i.e., after you get it back and put it up for sale.

And now the reason I intervened is to give my opinion on that - I wouldn't. Since you sent it back to the manufacturer for a complete repair and will (should) test it prior to selling it, you have no obligation to tell anyone what happened to it before the repair. That would make it considerably more difficult to sell and for no good reason. This is not the same as not telling a buyer of a used car it had been in a wreck and the frame is still bent or it still has problems. A gun is either completely fixed or it isn't. If it isn't you send it back again.
 
Blackhawk: your virtually impossible firing pin spring failure happened to me. I was shooting a Combat Commander .45, my ipsc gun; it was more than time for new springs (they were in the mail), but hey, what can happen, right? It didn't go FA, just jammed tight way out of battery: next round was nosed into chamber but the case head was under the protruding firing pin, and the FP retainer fell out in the dirt. Had to push the pin out with a punch past the remains of the spring.

Does it happen? Yes. Will it cause slamfires? I don't know. In this case the pin protruded ab't 3/16", far enough to prevent feeding. I do think it was stuck tightly enough to pop a primer if it had fed a round. I guess the question is whether the pin can stick out far enough to fire and still feed, and...I dunno. :confused:
 
I don't plan to sell the gun personally, I am trading it back to the store that I bought it from. They are also aware of the problem and are sending it to be repired for me. I am "trading up" for an nice bulgarian AK-47.
 
db4,

Thanks for that report!
your virtually impossible firing pin spring failure happened to me. I was shooting a Combat Commander .45, my ipsc gun; it was more than time for new springs (they were in the mail), but hey, what can happen, right? It didn't go FA, just jammed tight way out of battery: next round was nosed into chamber but the case head was under the protruding firing pin, and the FP retainer fell out in the dirt. Had to push the pin out with a punch past the remains of the spring.
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I've never had a Combat Commander apart, so I don't know the answer to this crucial question: Does the firing pin spring reside in a channel just a bit bigger than the outside diameter of the spring? If not, it doesn't fit my "virtually impossible" (did I say that?) firing pin failure scenario.
 
I am "trading up" for an nice bulgarian AK-47.
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Don't forget that the Kalashnikov series has no firing pin spring, making them a little more prone to slamfires :D.

BTW, I've got an SLR-100... awesome rifle.
 
Blackhawk- the spring measures .105 and lives in a .120 hole. Incidentally, the folks at Wolff Gunspring think enough of the possibility that they enclose a new fp spring with every 1911 recoil spring and strongly recommend changing them out at the same time.

And no, "virtually impossible" is my phrase- since i haven't figured out how use the "quote" feature.;)
 
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