Safety On or Off?

[Turtle]

Love my XD-9 best safety, works naturally, and its cool! (thanks to the 1911 design)

 

[FordMan08]

I carry with the safety on. But sometimes I carry two or three pistols...im kinda paranoid.

 

[gage]

I like to carry S&W 357...easy to tote without holster, no external hammer, no safety

 

[jeremy]

What safety?

I carry a Sig 226, so I guess you would say off. Since the closest I have to a safety is the hammer drop.

 

[Dogman]

If it has a saftey I use it if it doesnt well I dont lol !

 

[G McBride]

One in the chamber, safety on for 1911

One in the Chamber for XD45C or the LCP.

 

[ryanmercer]

Safety... only safety by Beretta 96 has is my finger (quite literally, no safety other than the operator), and that is the way I like it.

 

[Lars]

Ah. "Chicago" carry.

 

[dburkhead]

Ha! I carry a picture of a gun in my wallet. Then, when somebody robs me and opens my wallet to get my cards/money, won't he be surprised!

Actually, I carry a 1911 Condition One ("cocked and locked") and a Kel-Tec P3AT BUG which doesn't have a safety.

 

[kludge]

i carry with one in the chamber and not have the hammer cocked when i carry the 1911,

Condition 2 (hammer down on loaded chamber) is inherently less safe with higher chance of accidental discharge than Condition 1 (cocked and locked - safety on). Condition 1 is safe.

Condition 3 (empty chamber) is also safe, but you must practice how you carry.

The problem with Condition 2 is that it increases the chance of an accidental discharge if the gun is dropped or the hammer is struck, also at issue are the process of cocking the hammer is generally slower than racking the slicde from condition 3, and also that to put the pistol into Condition 2 you must lower the hammer on a loaded chamber.

 

[dburkhead]

Condition 2 (hammer down on loaded chamber) is inherently less safe with higher chance of accidental discharge than Condition 1 (cocked and locked - safety on). Condition 1 is safe.

Condition 3 (empty chamber) is also safe, but you must practice how you carry.

The problem with Condition 2 is that it increases the chance of an accidental discharge if the gun is dropped or the hammer is struck, also at issue are the process of cocking the hammer is generally slower than racking the slicde from condition 3, and also that to put the pistol into Condition 2 you must lower the hammer on a loaded chamber.

Second problem with condition 2 is getting there with a 1911. You have to rack the slide to put a round in the chamber. You then have to lower the hammer. The only way to do this is to turn off the safety and pull the trigger. Most people use their thumb to hold the hammer and lower it slowly. If, however, your thumb slips....

 

[cce1302]

With Beretta Tomcat, round in chamber, hammer down, safety on. (can load round in chamber without cocking hammer, so it's gtg.) Booger hook off bang switch.
All others (XDs, P95, revolvers) no safety, round in chamber. Booger hook off bang switch.

 

[40calPUNISHER]

I carry a 357 Magnum 6 shot Mexican style with the hammer back. I just jam it down my pants and Im ready to rock!

 

[Marc]

on my 1911 i got the ambi safety and it feels too easy for my hand to comedown and hit the safety off (condition 1). ive already done that once. i would prefer not to have to rack the slide (condition 3) due to all the noise it makes and i dont want to alarm anyone if they cant see me. (ie. due to a breakin and i am home)

If, however, your thumb slips....

thats happened once and it didnt go off. (im not saying your wrong, im saying i most likely got lucky, cause it only happened once.) after it slipped my heart got to racing thinking something bad had happened so when i do it now i use 2 hands. i really dont trust and lone oily finger.


also (not trying to sound like a smartass) but whats the difference between how i carry and other people carry when they have a round in the chamber and no safety, if they drop their gun and the shock of the drop trips the trigger and it accidentally discharges.

(im not saying anyone is wrong when it comes to this, im just wondering the facts, as much knowledge is well appreciated about gun safety while carrying and prepped for defense, SO NO ONE TAKE OFFENSE TO WHAT I POSTED PLEASE!!!)

 

[cce1302]

also (not trying to sound like a smartass) but whats the difference between how i carry and other people carry when they have a round in the chamber and no safety, if they drop their gun and the shock of the drop trips the trigger and it accidentally discharges.

Most (I believe all, but am not sure, so I say most) new guns will not fire when dropped. XD, Glock, Ruger, etc. all go through testing for this. The LCP was just recalled to correct a drop-test failure.

 

[Marc]

i knew the glock was "drop proof" but i didnt know about the others.

 

[kludge]

Not only is there a trigger safety on the glock, but there is a firing pin safety - it blocks the firing pin until the trigger is pulled. There is no like device in the 1911.

On the XD, the grip safety activates a lever that allows the striker to be released, without a proper grip the striker can't be released.

On guns with a hammer and a decock lever, there is a mechanism that prevents the hammer from hitting the firing pin, but again no like device on the 1911.

 

[dburkhead]

Not only is there a trigger safety on the glock, but there is a firing pin safety - it blocks the firing pin until the trigger is pulled. There is no like device in the 1911.

That turns out not to be the case (depending on series). Many 1911's (including mine, BTW, include a firing pin blocking safety activated by trigger pull. (Pulling the trigger presses on one leg of a bell-crank. The other end of the crank presses up on another lever, which then pushes a plunger in the bottom of the slide. The plunger is wasp-waisted so, when depressed, it clears a notch in the firing pin allowing it to move forward, otherwise the notch is stopped by the plunger and the firing pin cannot reach the primer.) The "gotcha" is that there is no decocker. The only way to release the hammer is to deactivate the thumb safety, engage the grip safety so the trigger can be pulled, and then pull the trigger. Not, IMO, a safe evolution when there is a cartridge in the chamber and I'm not intending to shoot.

 

[Cwood]

Not only is there a trigger safety on the glock, but there is a firing pin safety - it blocks the firing pin until the trigger is pulled. There is no like device in the 1911.

On the XD, the grip safety activates a lever that allows the striker to be released, without a proper grip the striker can't be released.

On guns with a hammer and a decock lever, there is a mechanism that prevents the hammer from hitting the firing pin, but again no like device on the 1911.

There are newer versions of the 1911 pistol do have a firing pin safety.

This is a article from American Handgunner in Dec of 2002

Handgun Safeties – The Firing Pin Safety: Second Time Around.
Charles Petty

When Colt installed a firing pin safety in the Government Model pistol in 1980, those who claimed it interfered with the trigger pull soundly cussed them. And it did. Interfere with the trigger pull, that is. Shooters decried the "new" Series 80 gadget and rent their hair and cried out, "Oh, woe is me." But they were wasting their breath. It seems the idea wasn't new at all.
In 1937, William L. Swartz designed a 1911 firing pin safety with no connection to trigger components. It was operated by the action of the grip safety. Today, examples with the Swartz safety are scarce collector's items, for Colt didn't make many. World War II proved the death of the Swartz safety, as wartime military pistols did not include it.
After the war ended the safety did not return. For reasons unclear, a firing pin safety became desirable in the late '70s, which prompted Colt to introduce a far more complicated system to do the same job.
We all know the most important firearm safety is human, not mechanical. But guns have used safeties for ages. Customarily, they prevent the gun from firing with a mechanical block that prevents the movement of a part, usually the sear or hammer.
Safeties can be active or passive. An active safety is a lever or button the shooter must move. We're all familiar with these. A passive safety does not require a deliberate operation to work. Guns have more of these latter ones than we tend to realize.

Series 80
Perhaps the best-known passive safety is the disconnector found on all semiautomatic firearms. This prevents the gun from firing unless the gun is properly closed and in battery. Firing pin safeties are also passive.
The original firing pin safety idea goes all the way back to 1909, but it wasn't until Swartz received U.S. Patent 2,140,946 on December 29, 1938, that Colt put one in a production gun. During the late '30s, the Colt National Match .45 pistol and the .38 Super were the only two Colt guns with the Swartz safety. It was approved by the factory for use in all Government Model pistols, but the onset of World War II prevented its installation.
The idea of somehow locking the firing pin is thought desirable because there is always a possibility a pistol might discharge if dropped. It takes a combination of things going wrong all at the same time for this to happen, but it can happen. Colt's answer was a design that prevents the pistol from firing unless the trigger is depressed. It was not well received and pre-Series 80 pistols were much in demand. They still are.
Criticism of the Series 80 safety was based largely on the fact that the trigger action included lifting the firing-pin lock installed in the slide. In other words, the trigger had to compress a spring and move a small part, adding to the poundage of the trigger pull. While this complaint has some merit, the fault lay more with the execution than the design.
Unless the Series 80 parts worked together smoothly, the shooter could feel a definite lurch in the trigger pull when the safety disengaged. It was not unusual to find rough parts or crooked holes that complicated things.
Some critics proclaimed it was "impossible" to obtain a match trigger on a Series 80 pistol. Of course that wasn't really true, but there was a certain learning curve for pistolsmiths to master the skills. A Series 80 trigger often took longer to hone than a standard trigger; gunsmiths consequently charged more.
But the Series 80 doesn't get as much criticism these days because of Colt's shrunken presence in the market. Hardly anyone buys a Colt right now, so hardly anyone complains. People are buying Springfield Armory and Kimber 1911s, both of which lack Series 80 parts.

Swartz Returns
Enter the Kimber Series II. In response to the needs of law enforcement agencies — which frequently mandate a firing pin safety — Kimber brought back the Swartz design.
Their Series II pistols have an updated Swartz safety. If I didn't tell you there was one, you'd never know. Okay, there is one way. Since the safety is keyed on the grip safety, if you were to fieldstrip the pistol and happened to depress the grip safety — something normally done when holding the pistol —
you can't remove the slide. It's one of those things that blindingly dawns on you after a few moments of absolute confusion. "Let go of the safety dummy," you tell yourself.
The safety uses a simple push rod that rides atop the point of the grip safety. When the grip safety is depressed the rod is pushed up and lifts the firing pin block located in the slide. The Colt Series 80 uses two little levers that are moved by motion of the trigger to do the same thing. In the Swartz design a "U" shaped block is lifted to release the firing pin. There's no effect whatsoever on the trigger pull, but the two designs accomplish exactly the same thing.
Today we can find some form of firing pin safety on most automatic pistols of recent manufacture. And, they operate in much the same way as the Colt. The good news about the Swartz/Kimber safety is that it's sneaky. Unless you know — you can't tell it's there. It just quietly does it's job with no fanfare. So you see, old is new again.

 

[sloughfoot]

Talk about thread hijacking.....

The OP specifically said he was not asking about 1911 style pistols..

Real entertaining though. Thanks for all the info.

Regards