Is second strike capability vastly overrated?

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zahc

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I don't understand it when people knock glocks et al. because they don't allow a second strike on a dud round.

I can understand the superiority of a DA revolver because the failure drill is to pull the trigger again, which brings up a different round. But if you get a FTF with an auto, don't you want to rack the slide anyway? Isn't it a waste of time to pull the trigger again and hope the second strike sets the prmer off? Does that EVER happen anyway?
 
Zahc - I have second strike potential on SW99 and R9 but in truth I doubt in extremis I would ever go that route. In fact I should even include about any DA/SA - instance my SIG's or Rugers, even if they are hammer and not striker.

Reason is I think it is better to always have the same failure drill for any semi - revo's obviously in their own category. If a round won't ''go'' - ditch it and get the heck on to a fresh one!!! Tap-rack-bang is main drill plus of course dealing with stovepipes etc.

We may have no thinking time and time taken for a second strike almost certainly has to be better employed chambering fresh - even the hesitation while brain decides to second strike could be lethal!!

I think actually this fits autoloaders best.
 
Tap-rack-bang is main drill plus of course dealing with stovepipes etc.
Click to expand...
If you are stressed you will probably already have pulled the trigger a couple of times before you realize the gun didn't go 'bang'
I've had light strikes before that went of with the second hit but not the first.
A second strike option isn't a deal breaker for me on a gun, but I don't think it hurts anything anyway.
 
There was a failure to fire in a glock 33. It would be nice to have second strike ability with the .357sig since it never happened with any other caliber. It was probably just a bad primer.
 
I agree with faustulus on this.

I know that I don't practice enough. I know that even if I did (is there such a thing as enough practice?) there is still a good chance that under stress I going to pull the trigger a time or two before I realize that I've had a FTF. The chances of my being in a lethal force situation and having a FTF that is resolved by an accidental second trigger pull is remote and it is not a primary consideration in my handgun selection process.


David
 
I like it, but don't train otherwise.

I like the 2nd strike capability of my PT145. I reload with CCI primers and had a batch of 100 that were particularly hard to ignite. They all went off on the second strike. There were about 5 in the batch. For competition, practice tap-rack-bang. For plinking, I like to send them all downrange, even if it takes a second strike.

My new witness offers the same capability, but with the heavier DA trigger after the SA trips the sear. Still don't see it as an issue. I can't say I like a primer not going off, not in the least.

But I have to agree with the other poster, that if you're in a situation that you really need it, you'll have squeezed the trigger a few times befre you realize it did not go bang and you come to your senses for a tap-rac-retap.

jeepmor
 
Is second strike capability vastly overrated?

NO

There is a group of guys that would dispute this claim but unfortunately they are dead.

Tell me about that long first round DA is so inaccurate and uncontrollable. It takes less time/effort to figure that out then it does to practice SURPRISE! Tap, rack bang.

I prefer Pull the Trigger Again..... then TRB.
 
Medmo,

Please post some verifiable instances where someone died because their gun did not have second strike.

Overall, was your post supposed to make sense?
 
I think its completely pointless. Noone in their right mind is going to keep pulling the trigger on a weapon that just failed to fire, and if they were so untrained and paniced as to do so they would almost certainly just keep on pulling it over and over again without any change in result (click click click click). If you pull the trigger and it doesnt do a damn thing that tells you to stop pulling it and try something else.

This argument is even more assinine when it comes from people who are pushing 1911's over Glocks on this principle. The idea being that it actually makes sense to recock the weapon and try again.

Further proof that revolvers are just plain better because you dont even have this issue. :neener:
 
c_yeager,

As much as I would like to image myself prepared, I foresee the distinct possibility that in the moment I will not function as well as I would like. I think this is a more realistic assessment than "I'll just do my clearance drill and everything will be fine." I don't see it as assinine for a person to consider the fact that they may default to very predictable behavior under stress. This is going to vary with the individual, of course.

I hope for the best and prepare for the worst.

David
 
I always load my FTFs for another go. So far, all have gone off the second time.

My defense gun is a Glock but if I had a DA I would definitely want to squeeze again. The chances of the round igniting on the second strike is very high.

Also, I only have FTFs with really cheap factory ammo. I've never had one with high quality defense ammo. That's not to say that it doesn't happen, but on the rare occasion that it does I wouldn't hesitate to drop the hammer on the same round again.
 
I keep hearing about tap-rack-bang...you guys do that when you have a misfire? Whatever happened to leaving the cartridge in the gun with it pointed safely downrange for 30 seconds? The last thing I'd want is an uncontained detonation from a "slow to ignite" cartridge when it's less than a foot from one of my body parts (or your range partner's). I'll pull the trigger again. For 99% of us, 100% of our shooting will take place in a somewhat controlled environment. We all practice in case we're the 1%...I'm still following the 30 second rule when I'm on the range. I don't want my gun to fire out of battery, and I don't want my hands around the ejection port if it eventually decides to fire. Maybe I'm just used to big guns. You learn to wait thirty seconds with a bolt action rifle...we've seen what that bolt can do when it travels into a shoulder.

I have a problem with striker fired guns, and I now have three. They're more likely to need second strike capability, and they don't have it.
 
Yes, it's overrated.

Some rounds will fire when hit a second time, many will not. Train to clear the misfire and get a fresh one in front of your firing pin ASAP. While I don't rush it at the range, I don't let myself develope the habit of recocking and taking another whack at it, either.
 
Yes it is over-rated.

Shooting for 35 years and NEVER had a failure to fire on centerfire ammo - NEVER. Not shotgun, rifle, pistol, revolver - Thousands and thousands of rounds - and not one. Could it happen? I guess - but I would rather have a nice trigger pull on every shot, and a TRB plan "just in case", then settle for a lousy trigger action by worrying about a non-issue.
 
If you have second strike capability, you have it, use it. If not, rack the slide and move on. I think it's nice to have, not essential by any means. I hate the triggers.
 
"second strike" is nice to have but not a show stopper - the 1911 does NOT have a "second strike" capability either.
 
I think it is overrated, but I do have a centerfire pistol that had some issues with first-strike primer detonation. It is an AMT Backup in 45ACP, and the second-strike capability was nice, but I cured the problem with a new hammer spring. Appearantly, I was getting light hammer strikes causing the failure to detonate. I was using WWB and they fired on the second or third strike. I don't recall having any other guns that had the problem, and I've never had any ammo that was inherently bad.
 
Please post some verifiable instances where someone died because their gun did not have second strike.
Click to expand...

+1

I keep hearing about tap-rack-bang...you guys do that when you have a misfire? Whatever happened to leaving the cartridge in the gun with it pointed safely downrange for 30 seconds? The last thing I'd want is an uncontained detonation from a "slow to ignite" cartridge when it's less than a foot from one of my body parts (or your range partner's). I'll pull the trigger again. For 99% of us, 100% of our shooting will take place in a somewhat controlled environment. We all practice in case we're the 1%...I'm still following the 30 second rule when I'm on the range. I don't want my gun to fire out of battery, and I don't want my hands around the ejection port if it eventually decides to fire. Maybe I'm just used to big guns. You learn to wait thirty seconds with a bolt action rifle...we've seen what that bolt can do when it travels into a shoulder.
Click to expand...

I will do my tap-rack-bang. You practice waiting 30 seconds before clearing your stoppage and then if you ever need that skill in real life that is how you will carry it out. I prefer to be shooting back!

BTW we are talkin about pistols, not rifles....operating at roughly 2 times the pressure.

Yes....it is over rated. Practice and drill what you will do in real life. For me it is tap-rack-bang.

It works in all autoloaders.

Charles
 
I picked up a bunch of Czech 9x19mmP once with hard primers. The relatively weak hammer spring of my Browning HiPower would cause about 30% failures to fire on the first strike. All of these first-strike failures would fire on the second strike. It's really nice to be able to just recock the hammer and have at it again. (And you really get a test of your flinch response in a situation like this too :)).

In a Lahti M40, with a heavier firing pin fall, only about 10% failed to fire on the first strike. But trying to fire them again is a horse of another color (with the internal striker/no exposed hammer system). Obviously, you have to eject the round to recock the striker by cycling the slide. Bummer...

So, if you're shooting some hard primer ammo, a second strike option is really nice. If you select your ammo carefully, it's not as important. If it doesn't go boom, rack the slide and drive on...

Forrest
 
zahc said:
I don't understand it when people knock glocks et al. because they don't allow a second strike on a dud round.

I can understand the superiority of a DA revolver because the failure drill is to pull the trigger again, which brings up a different round. But if you get a FTF with an auto, don't you want to rack the slide anyway? Isn't it a waste of time to pull the trigger again and hope the second strike sets the prmer off? Does that EVER happen anyway?
Click to expand...

So are you actually concerned about second strike capability or are you more at issue with people knocking Glocks for not having the ability?

If second strike is overrated, what does it matter to you? Opinions are fine, but not necessarily reality. How one feels about such a topic isn't germaine unless you are going to use that information to make another decision.

If you have a fail to fire on a semi auto, the procedure to clear it may be to rack the slide, but only if you don't have second strike capability. If you do, such as with a Colt Pony, you can pull the trigger much faster than clearing the malfunction and can have pulled the trigger an additional 2-3 times before the off hand is able to grab the slide to rack it. So it is not a waste of time to pull the trigger on a round that failed to fire on a Colt Pony if you are doing so in tendem with moving the off hand to tap rack. You may get the round to fire on the second pull of the trigger and if it happens, you have saved about 3 seconds of time that you would have spent doing a tap rack. In short, you can do both and not be wasting time.

On my Colt Pony, I found several types of ammo did not detonate properly and I would have to pull the trigger again. Rounds with primers always fired by the second round (although I had one without a primer that did not want to detonate - go figure). So YES, it does happen.
 
In my experience, most "duds" or "misfires" are in fact light strikes. Interestingly, I have never had a light strike problem with a handgun or rifle which uses a hammer.

So while second strike on a handgun is not make or break with me, I do tend to avoid striker fired designs because they invariably have less firing pin energy with which to strike primers than do pistols using a hammer.
 
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