Striker-fired vs. Hammer-fired – which is better?

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Mr. Pub

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This thread ties in with my theory that the 1911 design is being kept alive and falsely presented as state of the art by an Evil Axis of 1911 gunsmiths, overly sentimental gun owners, shooting school “Deans”, gun magazines, custom gun manufacturers and on occasion, Tamara.


So what is better Striker-fired or Hammer-fired when it comes to semi-automatic handguns?


In my humble opinion, striker-fired is better for three main reasons:

1.) All moving parts are located inside the gun rather than outside. Less to snag and be exposed to the elements. Plus it gives the gun a smooth, more ergonomic shape.

2.) Striker-fired weapons require less force to ignite the primer than an (external)* hammer-fired system. Less force = less movement to throw off your aim. From what I read on a Saftek web site – under the German police protocol striker-fired pistols only need 8 pounds of force for cartridge ignition, whereas hammer-fired guns must demonstrate 12.5 pounds of force.

3.) Striker firing requires less mechanical movement than (external)*hammer firing. Thus, by design you should be able to fire more quickly.

And, for a coup de grace I ask you this - how many (external)* hammer-fired rifles, assault weapons or shotguns are there that are not just collector pieces?????

Why would virtually the entire long-arm design community switch to striker-fired & (internal hammer)* ignition if it weren’t better?

You don’t hear a lot of people in the long-arm world whining about not having second strike capability. Tap, rack – get that defective round out of there. You can examine it and play with it later.

Only in the U.S. handgun community do we accept a design that was considered obsolete in the long-arm industry many, many years ago - that’s right I said obsolete!

To sum it up, IMHO – striker-fired is better.

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The HK USP series and the SIG pistols are all hammer-fired. Even the Ruger MkII is hammer-fired.

And for some unfathomable reason, I tend to prefer them to striker-fired guns like the Glock or the Walther P99.
 
I like hammer fired. Purely a personal preference. Whatever floats you boat. They both work.
 
Seems to me you have something against the 1911 and it's design. Funny thing is, the striker fired pistols only difference between say a 1911 and a Walther, HK, or Glock is the striker.

As far as being faster, then you don't want an auto pistol. If you want to fire and fire fast, then you need a revolver. But I would fathom a guess that since the 1911 and the other semi-auto pistols all have to cycle their slides, then the which trigger is faster would then fall to just about any single action pistol out there, then to the safe fire systems and double actions.

You made a good attempt at trying to rationalize your shoices, but I think that you have come up short on some of your points.

Good effort though.

One last thing, I like it here in America where I have CHOICE!

gryphon
 
...how many hammer-fired rifles, assault weapons or shotguns are there that are not just collector pieces?????
Click to expand...

The AK-47/74, the AR-15/AR-10, the HK-91/93/94, and on, and on...

How many of these are short-recoil operated? Apples and oranges.

What works on a pistol don't necessarily work on a long gun, and vice versa. ;)

Besides, it's not a zero-sum game; just because you like one and see its' advantages doesn't automatically mean you think the other sucks, and is worthless.

Quick guess, Mr. Pub; what pistol is on my hip right now? ;)
 
Mr. Pub-

Ummm, I think you put your foot in your mouth. There aren't that
many striker-fired pistols, it seems to me that aside from the
Glocks, HS2000's/Springfield XD's, Sigmas, P7's, and the Steyrs are about the only ones (did I miss some?).

As far as long guns go, I've been active duty for a while (11-plus
years) and have FAM-fired, qualified, or finger-f***ed most of the military-issue stuff out there, and I don't recall one that WAS
striker-fired- the M16 series has a hammer, so the the Kalashnikov family, and the FAL family, the G3 and it's kin, the
Ruger AC556, the K-1, the SA80, the M14, and the BM59. Yes, in
some weapons, the manufacturer DOES call the firing pin a
"striker", but they're still hammer-fired.

What exactly are you asking?

ANM
 
"Funny thing is, the striker fired pistols only difference between say a 1911 and a Walther, HK, or Glock is the striker."

If I ever say anything so innaccurate, I hope somebody will take me to task on it. The latter three have different means of locking barrel to slide, different means of disengaging barrel from slide, different means of extractor tensioning, a double-action trigger (the Glock sorta), but the biggie is the one piece feed ramp of the modern semiautos vs. the 2 piece of the 1911s.
 
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The only striker-fired rifles that I can think of are the classic bolt-action rifles such as the Mausers, Lee-Enfields and Mosins.

One major disadvantage of striker-fired pistols is their sensitivity to hard primers. As much as I like Glocks, they suck when it comes to snapping hard caps. I once had a lot of Fiocchi 9x19 with hard primers that needed multiple firing-pin hits in my glocks, but went off everytime in my hammer guns.
 
One major disadvantage of striker-fired pistols is their sensitivity to hard primers. As much as I like Glocks, they suck when it comes to snapping hard caps. I once had a lot of Fiocchi 9x19 with hard primers that needed multiple firing-pin hits in my glocks, but went off everytime in my hammer guns.
Click to expand...

Which brings us to a big engineering difference.

The striker is definitely the more "elegant" of the two from an engineering standpoint. Linear motion rather than rotary. Energy transferred from spring-to-striker-to-primer rather than spring-to-hammer-to-firing-pin-to-primer. Given equal weight springs, the striker will hit harder.

However, we will hardly ever see equal weight springs.

A striker-fired gun must, by necessity, operate from a coil spring within the slide; this kinda limits its' strength as you can only squeeze so much spring in there.

A hammer-fired gun, OTOH, can transfer its' energy from a large spring placed perpendicularly to the firing pin. A big ol' spring stuffed down in the pistol grip with enough excess power to overcome the slight loss of energy in the transfer through the hammer to the firing pin.

Locktime on a striker fired gun will be quicker. Primer strikes on a hammer-fired gun will be harder. You pays your money and you takes your chances; TANSTAAFL.
 
RON in PA,

Almost all current bolt action rifles are striker fired.




IMO, strikers and firing pins are the same. Some strikers/firing pins need a hammer to make them hit the primer, others just need spring force.
 
O.K., now that we got this discussion going….

…..what I was talking about was non-external hammers.

May they be strikers or internal hammers. So I would like to thank those of you who were kind enough to point this out for me. ;)

With this in mind, points 1,2 and 3 still hold as advantages over external hammers like on the 1911 design:

1.) All moving parts are located inside the gun rather than outside. Less to snag and be exposed to the elements. Plus it gives the gun a smooth, more ergonomic shape.

2.) Striker-fired (and internal hammer) weapons require less force to ignite the primer than a hammer-fired system. Less force = less movement to throw off your aim.

3.) Striker firing requires less mechanical movement than (external) hammer firing. Thus, by design you should be able to fire more quickly.

And yes, I still think that the 1911 design is obsolete.

What exactly are you asking? – Abominable No-Man
Click to expand...

I want a greater choice of handguns without an external hammer.

I want gun manufactures not to have to feel like they can’t sell a gun in the U.S. unless it has some 1911 retro/legacy features.

I want every American to have a chicken in every pot, a car in every garage and a wide choice of handguns in every gun safe.

That’s what I want.


.
 
Are those "retro/legacy" 1911 features copied because of sentimentality, or because in the course of history and gun sales people have discovered that they are the preferred, most effective layout of features? This covers more than just external hammers of course. Things like safeties, mag releases, and trigger set-ups are what I'm thinking of.

I personally am not a big fan of the European style heel clip mag releases that takes two hands to run, and some European designs have been changed to reflect this. (The Sig 232, I THINK. Might be wrong on that one, but there's others, I just can't think of them.) Granted, some features definitely represent American style, but hey, we're the biggest gun market in the world, so perhaps our greater experience with gun design speaks to everyone else.

And one fundamental thing I like about exposed-hammer pistols, (and the Winchester 94 and Marlin leverguns, VERY popular, for more than one hundred years.) is that one can tell at a glance whether or not the gun is cocked. A nice thing to know about an auto loader, methinks, when one cannot immediately see if the chamber is empty or not.

The same can be said for SXS shotguns. Even Jeff Cooper thinks hammerless shotguns are a bit self-defeating, as the hammerless thing started out as an artsy feature sort of made-up as an advance in design. It makes sense on a military arm, as sidehammers can catch on stuff, and dig into your ribs when humping your rifle around the countryside. But for the traditional "gun over the door", exposed hammers make more sense.

Of course, that point does not address things like loaded-chamber indicators, and striker-status indicators like on my Heritage Stealth, and on every bolt gun there is. I note that Springfield Armory has modified their barrel-hood set-up so that you can see into the chamber, somewhat like a revolver, so someone's at least looking at that aspect.

But can youtell if a Glock is ready to run by looking at it? Nope. If it's yours, I suppose you might remember if you chambered a round or not, but it might be nice to be able to see the status of the gun without opening it first.

That's my two pennies. Wanna pitch?

Tamara, that bit about the Texas DPS can beat up the FBI is an outrageous non-sequiter. I love it.
 
Mr. Pub:

Re: your point #2, gotta disagree, a primer is designed to pop with a certain minimal force applied to it and a firing-pin, whether in the form of a striker mechanism or in an external hammer mechanism has to deliver that minimal force.
 
Mr Pub's points"

1. I'll grant the snag resistance. But smooth is not always ergonomic. Ergonomics relates to OPERATION, this is not the Bauhaus studio, we are not giving style points for sleek appearance.

2. See Ron's post

3. The striker of any gun using one has a free fit in its tunnel, required to avoid drag and provide for full impact against the primer. There must be a lot of sear engagement for safety margin. There is also opportunity for variation in sear engagement and therefore in trigger pull as the striker sears up differently from shot to shot. Not theory, S&W's Straightline single shot target pistol was a failure vs their older hammer fired designs because of erratic trigger pull on its striker action. Glocks and some of their competitiors and imitators use quasi-double action operation that is so coarse as to cover that up. Bolt action rifles have room for complex sear systems to give the crisp pull that comes natural to a hammer.

Then there is safety; I recall an old article by John Lawson describing how his striker-fired SA pocket pistol went off by itself in his jacket pocket hanging in the closet. The lug broke off the striker under constant striker spring load. A hammer has a leverage advantage against mainspring load and usually has more metal backing up the full cock notch. If that fails anyway, most have a half cock to catch it. Which is why striker guns need a firing pin safety that is unwarranted on older designs like 1911, and another reason why the Glock is sorta DA.

The 1911 IS obsolete. Modern manufacturing technique apparently does not adapt well to a 90+ year old design. It is not that a good 1911 does not shoot as well as or better than newer models, it is that we hear of so many poor 1911s from all makers. The new guns, engineered instead of invented, either work better, or are readily repaired. Or are cheaply replaced. I just ranted on sigforum that the P- Sport guns should have a safety instead of a compensator, that would give them a chance to compete with a modern, produceable design. Even if it does have a hammer.

I have seen no 1911 (nor any other pistol) produced during my lifetime that can hold a candle light to the 1939 NM I saw last week. Too bad.
 
HAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAA!!!

Thank you, Mr. Pub, for your amusing comments.

Yes, JMB had a master plan. All these guys think he was a genius for designing numerous firearms; actually, he had a nefarious plan to hurt the American people by keeping them in the dark ages (at least in gun designs).

If there was really a conspiracy, don't you think that once any striker fired handgun came on the market, no one would buy ANY of the old fashioned, obsolete (external*) hammer weapons? Oh, that's right, we're not very smart, just overly sentimental.

You are apparently very happy with your Glock. Good for you. Like most religeous fanatics, you are unable to understand that the rest of us don't really want to convert to the Church of Glock.

By the way, I don't just own 1911's. I own revolvers, a German designed (and built) semi, and several other... OH, my, I just realized! They all have one thing in common! They all have external hammers!!!!! I've been victimized!!

My opinion, FWIW.

Casey
 
As far as I know, the only commonly available striker-fired lever-action rifle is the Savage 99.

Ruger's new lever guns may be striker fired; the Winchester 88 may also be striker fired.
 
One major disadvantage of striker-fired pistols is their sensitivity to hard primers. As much as I like Glocks, they suck when it comes to snapping hard caps. I once had a lot of Fiocchi 9x19 with hard primers that needed multiple firing-pin hits in my glocks, but went off everytime in my hammer guns.
Click to expand...
I have a Glock and I encountered the light-primer-strike problem with Chinese and Fiocchi ammo. When the opportunity arised I bought both the lighter (16N) and the harder (31N) firing pin spring.
I put the harder spring in the gun and found the (so far) only design flaw in striker-fired handguns:
The trigger bar pushes against the firing pin, which compresses the firing pin spring, which pushes the slide rearward. When I hold the gun vertical and slowly cycle the slide manually while holding back the trigger, the slide won't go into battery.
Ergo: The harder spring, necessary for a reliably ignition, causes the gun to be less reliable.

But the engineer in me soon found a solution for this problem: a recoil spring with a reduced spring-constant (dF/ds), but that is more compressed, to give a higher force for pushing the slide into battery, while the integral of the absorbed recoil energy (F(s) ds) remains constant.

Or: simply avoid ammo with hard primers. ;)
 
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