Firing 9mm with thumb over slide plate cover

[ny32182]

Every time that I am aware of that I have seen someone get their thumb behind the slide, dripping blood has been the result.

I wouldn't be any more likely to do this than I would be to stick my hand in front of the muzzle to make a 115gr go subsonic.

 

[56hawk]

I think a lot of people are forgetting that we are talking about recoil operated pistols. The slide and barrel are locked together until they have moved back 1/8 - 1/4 inch. All your thumb has to do is absorb the normal recoil of the gun.

On a blowback gun this would be entirely different. As someone mentioned this was difficult even with a 22.

 

[holdencm9]

The difference between slide bite and holding the slide shut with your thumb is like the difference between a bad shouldering of a high power rifle and a solid shoulder. If you hold it shut then it will be fine and not hurt so much. If you let it start moving it will hit you harder and the sharp edge of the slide will cut you. Just like if you hold a shotgun at 1" away from your shoulder bone and pull the trigger, versus shoving it nice and tight into your shoulder socket.

 

[1911Tuner]

I've heard you can fire a 9mm striker-fired pistol (Glock, M&P) while pressing your thumb onto the slide plate cover (rear of slide) and keep the firearm from cycling.

Yes. Not surprising at all if you understand how the locked breech short recoil operated pistol functions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gw8sbb8eDjg

 

[TimboKhan]

Huh. I confess that I didn't know this.

 

[kcshooter]

Yes. Not surprising at all if you understand how the locked breech short recoil operated pistol functions.

When you say it like that, I understand it.
I still don't get why you'd want to do it.

 

[labhound]

Why would anyone want to do this?

 

[1911Tuner]

Huh. I confess that I didn't know this.

An eye opener, eh what?

Sorta raises more questions than it answers, no?

Why would anyone want to do this?

For the same reasons that people climb Mt. Everest.

I don't know if the guy in the video understood why he could stop the slide with his thumb, but he knew that he could and he did it to show that he could.

 

[psyopspec]

Why would anyone want to do this?

It could be considered an induced malfunction for competition shooters, though snap caps or even empty cases loaded at random into a magazine would be more realistic for that scenario.

For those that train and carry for SD, it's good to have a skillset to defend ones self and retain the weapon in close combat, or to take away an adversary's. In those scenarios I was taught two things that relate to this:

1) If you need to disarm someone, your priorities are to get a solid grab on the slide and get the weapon pointed away from you. The gun will likely go off. Doing an experiment like the one in the video demonstrates that it's a viable technique and that as long as that pistol is pointed somewhere else it's not going to bring about serious injury.

2) Having carried out (1), when you complete the drill and take that gun away, it's likely to be in a state similar to the video - magazine loaded, empty case in chamber or FTE. The last part of disarming someone is Tap/Rack/Fight, so here too inducing the malfunction lets you train a specific step of a specific scenario.

 

[Sam1911]

1) If you need to disarm someone, your priorities are to get a solid grab on the slide and get the weapon pointed away from you. The gun will likely go off. Doing an experiment like the one in the video demonstrates that it's a viable technique that is not going to bring about serious injury.

Not to belabor this point, but if you can get that slide grip, and if the gun goes off (not INTO you), you've disabled that weapon. The bad guy may or may not be "gunny" enough to know exactly what to do to quickly get it back into service, and you can certainly occupy his attention (and hands) to try and keep him from doing so. At the very least, he cannot now simply pull the trigger to fire again, and that is a very good thing.

 

[DrewBegley]

Purposes:

I've also been told that it is a technique SOF and the like use to further silence a suppressed sidearm and to catch the shell for safe-keeping, which is viable though super secret squirrel.

The more reasonable answer is Sam1911s, using it against an attacker to create time and space.

When you think about it, it's not really that scary. Everyone is actually thinking of slide bite, not purposely holding the slide shut.

 

[General Geoff]

Just like breaking a wooden board with your hands, it's a matter of resolve and technique. Do it right and there's essentially no risk of injury.

 

[1911Tuner]

Just like breaking a wooden board with your hands, it's a matter of resolve and technique. Do it right and there's essentially no risk of injury.

It's not even that. The slide on a locked breech pistol really isn't hard to stop. We hear of shooters inducing short cycle by inadvertently letting their thumbs contact the slide.

The simple truth is that the slide just doesn't have all that much oomph...which tells us something about the warnings of frame destruction and the need for heavy springs and shock buffs.

If you can keep a slide from moving at all with your thumb while the accelerating force is working...how hard can it hit the frame after that force is gone and after compressing a 14-17 pound spring for 2.5 inches?

It's also a clue to how much of the slide's acceleration is lost due to the bullet's drag on the barrel and the resulting resistance imposed on the slide. If this trick had been attempted with a straight blowback 9mm...or as I prefer to say "Undelayed Recoil Operated"...with identical slide mass and action/recoil spring...it would have broken his thumb.

A final clue...

He could have removed the spring from the pistol and still stopped the slide.

 

[GLOOB]

If you think about it, it's no different then shooting a 22 oz 38 special revolver with just your thumb behind the grip. Well, at least if you could get your thumb inline with the barrel, anyway. That certainly wouldn't rip your thumb off.