Do you use the 1911 slide stop as a slide release?

[The Real Hawkeye]

I have come to the conclusion that it is best to not use it as a slide release. It will usually work just fine in that role, but I think it was not intended for it. I believe Browning's intent was probably that we use the rear gripping groves on the slide to disengage the slide stop by pulling the slide all the way to the rear and sharply releasing it. It will always go properly into battery that way, and you will not risk causing the extractor to snap over the rim of the chambered round, which can cause damage to the ejector, diminishing future reliability. Anyone have any thoughts or information on this?

 

[Dobe]

Many tactical schools are teaching to use the slide instead of the slide release, because of gross motor skills vs. fine motor skills. During high stress, fine motor skills are lost or at least impaired.

The idea is that it may be a little slower, but it is a lot more sure.

Dobe

 

[The Real Hawkeye]

It's a hard habit to break. I was trying to drill today using the rear groves instead of the slide stop. On rare occasion, if I use the slide stop as a slide release the round will not go all the way into battery. Any fooling around with it at that point can cause the extractor to snap over the rim, damaging the extractor. I am going to try to eliminate my use of the stop as a release entirely for this reason. It's also, as you say, less prone to failures to go completely into battery, which doesn't often happen, but once in three thousand is too many for me. Using the rear slide grooves never causes problems.

 

[Seraph]

I do use the slide stop as a slide release, and I'm pretty sure JMB designed it to be used this way. Why else would he have put the checkering on the top surface and none on the bottom surface? Yeah, I know the tactical gurus are preaching about fine motor skills versus gross motor skills, and I appreciate the philosophy, but I submit that this action is not a fine motor skill at all (at least for me). If you do believe that this is a fine motor skill, then you must also believe that using the mag release is a fine motor skill. If you can't perform the fine motor skill of using the mag release, you'll never arrive at the point where you need to worry about what fine or gross motor skills you'll use to drop the slide.

I've used this crazy method to drop the slide on my main carry gun many hundreds of times, incurring nary a resultant malfunction, and with zero damage to my extractor, or to its state of tune.

 

[dev_null]

Umpteen thousand rounds and never a problem releasing that way.

 

[The Real Hawkeye]

Umpteen thousand rounds and never a problem releasing that way.

I cannot recall a failure either by doing it that way with this particular weapon, until today, which is why I decided to switch to pulling the slide back. Could also be that my recoil spring has finally worn out and needs replacing after about 3,000 rounds, but be that as it may, pulling the slide back and releasing it is far less prone to this weak spring problem than using the slide stop/release. More forward momentum.

PS, I currently own seven 1911s, and have owned many more in the last 25 years. I have also been an active shooter in that time period. Although it is extremely rare, I do seem to recall this happening in the past to some of them at one point or another, using the slide stop/release to close the action on a live round. Whether it was due to a weakened spring needing replacing or not, the fact still remains that it is less likely to happen if the slide is fully drawn back and released, even with a warn spring.

 

[Chris Rhines]

...pulling the slide back and releasing it is far less prone to this weak spring problem than using the slide stop/release. More forward momentum.

Not so. Pulling the slide back and releasing it opens up the possibility of riding the slide forward, which will often cause a first-round failure to go into battery. A number of trainers have gone back to using the slide stop to release the slide just for this reason.

Just goes to show that conventional wisdom, usually isn't.

Use the slide stop. Hit it with your off-hand thumb. This is much less a fine motor skill than grasping a slide with sweaty slippery hands, pulling it back against a rather tough spring, and releasing it without accidentally riding it forward.

Oh, and replace your recoil spring.

- Chris

 

[Diamondback6]

Well, I always use the slide-stop "release", and haven't had a problem with it. Then again, I'm a southpaw... Plus, working the mag-release and slide-stop with my index finger help enforce "removal from trigger when intent to fire is absent."

 

[wardog]

I do use the slide stop as a slide release, and I'm pretty sure JMB designed it to be used this way. Why else would he have put the checkering on the top surface and none on the bottom surface? Yeah, I know the tactical gurus are preaching about fine motor skills versus gross motor skills, and I appreciate the philosophy, but I submit that this action is not a fine motor skill at all (at least for me). If you do believe that this is a fine motor skill, then you must also believe that using the mag release is a fine motor skill. If you can't perform the fine motor skill of using the mag release, you'll never arrive at the point where you need to worry about what fine or gross motor skills you'll use to drop the slide.

I've used this crazy method to drop the slide on my main carry gun many hundreds of times, incurring nary a resultant malfunction, and with zero damage to my extractor, or to its state of tune.

Seraph, well said.

 

[Seraph]

Thanks, Wardog. By the way, I recognize that quote in your signature as a line from the Survivors, a hilarious movie, even if it is kind of anti.

 

[wardog]

Yes, a great flick. So many quotable lines.

"Would you mind if I just hopped in line here for a minute?" "Oh, no, not at all if you don't mind me biting off your nose and sticking it up your ...."

Ok, sorry to hijack, back on topic...

 

[Azrael256]

I do use the slide stop as a slide release, and I'm pretty sure JMB designed it to be used this way.

It was designed to work either way. If one or the other doesn't work, something is wrong.

I prefer to slingshot. It's more comfortable for me, and I can do it quicker.

 

[Double Naught Spy]

I have come to the conclusion that it is best to not use it as a slide release. It will usually work just fine in that role, but I think it was not intended for it. I believe Browning's intent was probably that we use the rear gripping groves on the slide to disengage the slide stop by pulling the slide all the way to the rear and sharply releasing it.

It will usually work fine in the role? When won't it?

I believe Browning's intent for the rear serations was primarily for the initial charging the pistol and that they can be secondarily used as part of the slide release system.

I do use the slide stop as a slide release, and I'm pretty sure JMB designed it to be used this way. Why else would he have put the checkering on the top surface and none on the bottom surface?

It was designed to work either way.

People keep talking about what the 1911 was designed to do such as with the slide release or with cocked and locked carry, but nobody has any design notes from JMB saying things one way or the other. It may work fine in either capacity, but saying it was or was not designed for that is a bit iffy without documentation.

Seraph's reasoning is interesting. If we were to follow the logic, then it part is NOT to be used to manually engage the slide because there is no checkering on the bottom. Even if the checkering on the top is for the part to be used as a slide release, is it that way for use all the time or was this simply an emergency feature designed into the gun for one-handed operation, if needed, in a critical situation? Parking brakes can be used as emergency brakes on cars, but that does not mean they are meant to be used as emergency brakes on a regular basis.

The point here is that design intent can be argued both ways. We don't know the intent by JMB or even if this was JMB's intent either way or not or simply a positive byproduct of an overly well made part that functions fine in a dual role.

Something to keep in mind is that design intent does not have to be critical or significant to application in cases where a part is over engineering. A hammer may be fine for hammering nails and that may be the job for which it was designed, but it will do a heck of a job as a precision bug smasher. If after over 100 years of Colt pistols with slide stops/releases being used in both capacities, if there was a problem, I would think it would have materialized, especially in the Model 1911 that has been so extensively used.

Many tactical schools are teaching to use the slide instead of the slide release, because of gross motor skills vs. fine motor skills. During high stress, fine motor skills are lost or at least impaired.

Swiping 'off' the slide catch (or swiping 'on' the slide release) is a gross motor skill. It is not as gross as using an entire hand to grab the slide, but it isn't as complicated either.

 

[1911Tuner]

re:

DNS said:

>People keep talking about what the 1911 was designed to do such as with the slide release or with cocked and locked carry, but nobody has any design notes from JMB saying things one way or the other.<
*******************

True...but studying a design long enough often provides insight into the designer's intent. Given Browning's penchant for redundancy, I'd say it was
probably both, as we choose. Or...it may have been neither, and both methods were arranged to give us a choice in case we blew the true intent...which is taking advantage of the detachable box magazine and keeping the pistol topped off before it runs dry. A locked slide on an empty gun is a stoppage, no matter how you cut it. A stoppage is the last thing you want in the middle of a fight. 'Nuff said.

Kawkeye said:

>It will always go properly into battery that way, and you will not risk causing the extractor to snap over the rim of the chambered round, which can cause damage to the ejector, diminishing future reliability. Anyone have any thoughts or information on this?<
*****************************

Unless there's a problem with the gun or the magazine, it should go to battery properly either way. If the round gets bumped ahead of the extractor
and does a snap-over return to battery with one method, it'll do it with the other. If the gun won't return to full battery via the slidestop release, that's a malfunction. Get it fixed.

The slidestop release with the left hand is both quicker and less fumble-prone than right hand release AND overhand/slingshot release. Slap a magazine into the well and look where your thumb is as you roll the pistol back into a two-hand firing grip.

 

[HighVelocity]

I use it as the release as well. It's easy to hit it while re-aquiring my firing grip after a reload. Grabbing the slide, pulling it back and letting go and then re-aquiring grip takes extra time.

 

[AndABeer]

My Kimbers don't let me go into battery any other way.

 

[The Real Hawkeye]

It will usually work fine in the role? When won't it?

When the recoil spring starts to weaken, at some point it will stop working with 100% reliability. If, however, you use the "slingshot" method, this should be less likely to happen because of the increased momentum behind the slides movement, i.e., more time and space to build up velocity to drive the round home.

Unless there's a problem with the gun or the magazine, it should go to battery properly either way. If the round gets bumped ahead of the extractor
and does a snap-over return to battery with one method, it'll do it with the other. If the gun won't return to full battery via the slidestop release, that's a malfunction. Get it fixed.

I have been super impressed with the total reliability of this particular weapon so far. Zero failures of any sort to more than 3,000 rounds. Yesterday was the first time it didn't go into battery by use of the slide stop/release. Here's what happened. It went most of the way, but not all the way. Not being familiar with this particular malf, I extracted the magazine, pulled back slightly on the slide and attempted to force it forward again. I felt resistance, and stopped this forward push to consider the cause. Then I realized it. When I pulled back slightly, I caused the extractor to disengage via the ejector from the rim the cartridge, and then when I pushed forward, the rim of the cartridge was coming into contact with the forward edge of the extractor. Had I pushed harder, it would have snapped over it and perhaps done some damage to it. Instead, I just removed the loose round and put it back in the mag. This got me to thinking that I could most likely avoid this ever happening again, weak recoil spring or no, by simply switching to the pull back and release method.

P.S. I have already ordered a replacement recoil spring.

 

[The Real Hawkeye]

My Kimbers don't let me go into battery any other way.

Any other way than what?

 

[BigG]

It works fine either way for me. Usually just pop the slide stop with my thumb and the old Colt loads up. Don't ask me abouit gross or fine motor skills, I'm not a doctor.

 

[Iggy]

Just a thought.. JMB built the 1911 for horse soldiers.

If you have ever tried to ride and rein a horse at full speed and reload a .45, you will find that one hand needs to (for the most part) involved in steering the horse.

You can manage getting a new magazine into the pistol etc., but you find you bring the gun to the hand holding the reins and mag rather than vice versa. It is also much easier to hit the slide stop/release while holding the reins of a galloping horse than to involve both hands in grasping and releasing the slide.

That is not to say that today's application is the same as that of yesterday's cavalryman, but I think it has some bearing on JMB's thought process in designing the gun..

Now as to designing the gun to be carried constantly in condition #1 in a flap holster on a horse??????

 

[The Real Hawkeye]

Good point, Iggy. Hadn't thought of that.

 

[Freddymac]

I use the silde release.

Although I used to be a rack the slide kinda guy. But I think the mani reason that I use the release now is from teaching new or almost new shooters. I like them to use the slide release because it allows them to chamber a round without having to move the muzzle. They can send the slide home and still keep a sight picture, all without moving the gun around. And for a new shooter, until they get used to shooting, the less they waive the gun around, the better. I have seen some newbee’s do some interesting things.

 

[rbernie]

First off - I don't really think it relevant to me to care what was running thru the mind of JMB or Gaston or Dieudonne or anyone else when they designed their pistols. I care what works for me when I have their pistol in my hand.

I have <cough> several <cough cough> different types of semiautomatic pistols. All have slide stops/releases, but each pistol positions the stop in a different place and in some cases the stop is very hard to find in a hurry relative to other designs. I have settled on the overhand method of releasing the slide simply because it works with equal success on all of the pistols that I own or shoot. Evolving to a single manual-of-arms that works in a hurry on any semiauto that I'm likely to grasp is A Good Thing <tm>, in my opinion.

Also, bear in mind that using a overhand or slingshot method of releasing the slide allows me to control the speed of the slide. This lets me lower the slide gently on an empty chamber, which is A Very Good Thing <tm> for 1911 pistols. Using the slide stop to drop the slide when the chamber is empty means that the hammer/sear is taking quite a battering that could or should otherwise be prevented. Of course, using one method when the pistol is full (slide stop) and another when the pistol is empty (slingshot or overhand) is inconsistant muscle memory training that I try to avoid.

Finally, think about the hand motions that you use to clear a stoppage. Chances are, you wind up grasping the rear of the slide with your off hand, racking it back to clear the malf, and releasing the slide back into battery. It appears to me that using an overhand or slingshot motion to drop the slide after a reload works to condition the mucles to react in a known and consistant manner to clear a malf condition.

 

[byf43]

I use the slide stop / slide release 100% of the time.
Never a failure to lock into battery. Recoil spring(s) are meant to be changed. I do change them.

I use the method I was taught and have trained with. This is not instinctive until you put it into use, over and over again, until it's second-nature.

It's like tying your shoes. You do it over and over again throughout your life.
Pay attention next time. You tie your shoes the SAME way, each time. It's the training.


Bottom line. . . . .

It's not the quantity of training and practice. . . it's the quantity along with the quality of training and practice.

 

[los]

We also need to break the habit of using the "R" (reverse) feature found on all automatic tranny equipped vehicles. It's best that we engage it in "N" (neutral) and push the vehicle back. Less wear and tear on the Tranny,... don't you think??