Dry fire and racking the slide question...

[ATLDave]

I'm not primarily looking at it as a safety thing (though there is a little advantage), but more a convenience thing that the slide doesn't lock back when the slide is racked with no magazine in place.

Which is fine, although, as noted elsewhere in the thread, relatively few guns require an all-the-way-to-the-rear cycle of the slide to re-set the trigger.

 

[jar]

I'm not primarily looking at it as a safety thing (though there is a little advantage), but more a convenience thing that the slide doesn't lock back when the slide is racked with no magazine in place.

A significant number of my Semi-Automatics have a magazine safety. You can not pull the trigger unless there is a magazine inserted.

 

[JTQ]

Which is fine, although, as noted elsewhere in the thread, relatively few guns require an all-the-way-to-the-rear cycle of the slide to re-set the trigger.

Understanding the OP has a striker fired M&P, but your 1911 probably does, and chances are good that mag follower is going to really hold the slide back.

 

[JTQ]

A significant number of my Semi-Automatics have a magazine safety. You can not pull the trigger unless there is a magazine inserted.

Oh, I understand that, but the OP doesn't have that issue. If I had a Browning Hi-Power, I'd get some of those inserts from Safariland I linked to above.

Folks can really do whatever they want, but I've just not seen an advantage to dry firing with a mag inserted (mag safety equipped guns excluded).


Edit to add: I misspoke earlier, I do have an S&W 4506 that has a mag safety and does require dry firing with a mag inserted, and I do dry fire with the mag in the gun, though I typically cock the hammer rather than run the slide.

 

[JTQ]

Which is fine, although, as noted elsewhere in the thread, relatively few guns require an all-the-way-to-the-rear cycle of the slide to re-set the trigger.

It just struck me, when folks do this on a regular basis, is there a chance of them short stroking the slide during a malfunction. I'm not arguing, I've just never owned a gun that allowed this.

 

[ATLDave]

Understanding the OP has a striker fired M&P, but your 1911 probably does, and chances are good that mag follower is going to really hold the slide back.

I've got an M&P, also! Actually the only poly/striker gun I own. Haven't had it out for dry-fire in a while, but I don't recall it having a slide that had to go all the way back.

If I'm dry-firing a hammer fired gun, a lot of times I'll just thumb-cock the hammer.

 

[ATLDave]

It just struck me, when folks do this on a regular basis, is there a chance of them short stroking the slide during a malfunction. I'm not arguing, I've just never owned a gun that allowed this.

My experience is that when I get a malfunction in a situation where I want to clear it ASAP, whatever I have been doing during administrative handling doesn't matter... more than once I have cut myself on sights or serrations because I have applied a stupidly-large amount of force and speed.

 

[JTQ]

... more than once I have cut myself on sights or serrations because I have applied a stupidly-large amount of force and speed.

Understandable.

 

[JTQ]

I've got an M&P, also! Actually the only poly/striker gun I own. Haven't had it out for dry-fire in a while, but I don't recall it having a slide that had to go all the way back.

Since the OP is new to shooting, and the subject pistol is an M&P, how do you dry fire with your M&P (talking about manipulating the trigger)?

 

[thomas15]

With Glocks you can stick a rubber band into the ejection port to keep the gun slightly out of battery. This will give you "some" repeatable trigger travel.

The nice thing about double action revolvers is you an dry fire with a real trigger no problems.

 

[ATLDave]

Since the OP is new to shooting, and the subject pistol is an M&P, how do you dry fire with your M&P (talking about manipulating the trigger)?

The trigger has a pretty full travel without a reset. It doesn't have the "wall" at the sear release, but there's quite a bit of travel available.

If the purpose of the dry firing is to learn to negotiate that (springy/spongy) "wall" without bumping the sights around, then, yeah, just run the slide enough to get it to reset. But lots of reps with it not-reset for all other purposes.

 

[jmr40]

You've got it. With a striker fired gun you only have to pull the slide back a tiny bit to reset the trigger. Dry fire to your hearts content. If something breaks, and it will, it'll be at exactly the same round count if all of those trigger pulls had been with live ammo. And you'll be a MUCH better shot and have a lot of money to repair/replace the gun with broken parts with what you saved in ammo costs. 100,000 dry fires is free. 100,000 live fires will cost you $20,000 in ammo @ $10/box of 50. I'd expect any modern gun to not break anything within 100,000 cycles.

 

[ATLDave]

Since the OP is new to shooting, and the subject pistol is an M&P, how do you dry fire with your M&P (talking about manipulating the trigger)?

Just a follow up on this exchange: I dug out the M&P over the weekend. I can confirm that the trigger/striker resets very early in the slide's cycle - basically at the point where the barrel hood moves down out of engagement with the slide, which is something that happens very quickly in the M&P. Less than a half inch of slide movement resets the trigger/striker.

 

[Varminterror]

It just struck me, when folks do this on a regular basis, is there a chance of them short stroking the slide during a malfunction. I'm not arguing, I've just never owned a gun that allowed this.

I was going to reply to this thread yesterday but got sidetracked - but I’m glad this was asked.

YES - THERE IS A REAL RISK TRAINING LIKE THIS CAN INSTILL BAD HABITS THROUGH DEVELOPING AUTOMATICITY FOR THE WRONG TECHNIQUE.

When I first got a laser simulator for my house a few years ago, I absolutely loved it. I practiced all winter and my speed and accuracy improved significantly. And then I went out to my practice range after a the weather broke and deer season had ceased. I fired one shot, broke my grip, and caught myself as my hand automatically reached up to reset my trigger. After only a month or so of casual daily practice, I had retrained my hand (after over a decade regular shooting that particular pistol) to break grip, reach up, and partially cycle the slide to reset the trigger after every shot. That could have been disasterous if I had doneso in a stressed defensive shooting scenario.

I went home that day and bought a SIRT pistol with auto-resetting trigger and ordered an auto resetting practice trigger for my pistol. I no longer do any dry fire practice where I transition and reset my triggers manually. I do plenty of dry fire practice with them, but i either do single shots (drawstroke to first shot), or malfunction drills where I’m doing a full TRB between shots, and all of my transition work is either done with autoreset triggers, SIRT pistols, or DA pistols.

 

[Insignificant bill]

I dry fire my lc9s with a laser bullet in it. Reseting the trigger requires racking the slide about a 1/4 inch. If you follow all the rules of dry firing you should be perfectly safe. I never have any ammo anywhere near me or the gun and practice all the rules that I do when the gun has ammo in it.

 

[Good Ol' Boy]

As far as the magazine in the gun thing, I always practice with one in because I'm also practicing dry reloads. Though one could do this with no initial mag in the gun it's much more real world to have a empty in the gun.

Sounds like the OP is more trying to practice the basics in regards to the trigger so whatever is more comfortable for them, so long as it's safe, is fine.

As you progress you'll find lots of things you can practice with a empty gun besides trigger pull.

 

[Shawn Dodson]

If you carry this pistol for defense, and you wish to perform dryfire training with it, then I suggest you fully rack the slide like you normally do. No need to develop a different set of motor skills: 1 for dryfire and 1 for defensive shooting.