1911 Grip Safety Oddity

[Tom Servo]

Hi all. I've got a S&W 1911PD with about 700 rounds through. So far, so good: excellent, reliable and accurate.

When I was cleaning it today, I pushed the trigger back while wiping out the triggerguard, and the hammer fell, even though the grip safety wasn't depressed. I checked again (I don't want to do this any more for fear of grinding something), and sure enough, the gun can (presumably) be fired without the grip safety being disengaged. It's a hard pull, I'd say about 10-12lbs.

I've never had a 1911 that did this. Now, between rule #3 and the manual safety, it shouldn't be much of a safety issue, but is this something that needs to be addressed? Does it sound like it's just the grip safety, or might I have to send it back? From what I've heard, most of the 1911PDs have very stiff grip safeties, and one thing I noticed from the beginning was that this one required very little pressure to disengage.

Just seems really odd. Are there some 1911s that do this?

 

[Vernal45]

Check the sear spring, I could be wrong, but it sounds like a weak/worn sear spring. Trust me, Tunner or Fuff will be along, and they will set you right.

 

[glocker1911]

If the grip safety "leg" i blocking the trigger correctly, a weak sear spring should have nothing to do with it. I would say it will have to go back, or at least to a gunsmith. Smith should fix it under warranty, and that would be the way to go. BTW, since the grip saftey has to be depressed to activate the FPS, the gun shouldn't go off. Still, it sounds like something isn't "fit" correctly. Good luck.

 

[1911Tuner]

Grip Safety

Could be the sear spring...

The right leg might need to be bent outward slightly. Be sure to grasp it above the junction, or you could snap it clean off. (Go ahead and ask me how I figured that out... )

Do a quick test. Push upward on the tang lightly with your finger and see if
pulling the trigger will drop the hammer. If I does, you'll need to refit the safety. If it doesn't, tweaking the sear spring will probably correct it.

Luck!

 

[mattw]

that is strange.. i've never trusted the grip safteys anyway. (on advice from my father who spend 22 years with 1911s in the Marines)

 

[crucible]

I'm not an expert, but I do own a couple 1911's; if I could, see if the grip safety is rotating out all the way too. I say this because I just fit an S&A magwell onto my DW, and ran into the same problem. As it turned out in my case, I had to take the slightest bit of metal off the mainspring housing to allow the grip safety to rotate completely out (back) to fully engage itself, otherwise, I could could pull the trigger and it would fall without it being pushed.

Perhaps you disassembled it recently and somehow it didn't get put back in all the way, or maybe there's some grit between the sides of the grip safety interfering with it, or something.

Or not.

Just something else to check.

Chris

 

[Zach S]

To expand on crucible's post, removing the take-up from the trigger, or installing another trigger can do it too. On the subject of changing triggers and removing take-up, the grip safety in my Polymer Kimber hasn't worked in a year or so...

Go ahead and ask me how I figured that out...

Probably the same way I did...

On a side note, when it happened and I heard the ping, I thought "that sounded like a little garand," then I realized I broke the spring...