I've seen Robert Burke's video. However, if I'm not mistaken, he did all of his testing on a fully seated sear, not on a gun with a dead trigger. The trigger goes back, the trigger bar moves forward, but not quite enough to fully release the sear. The striker is now perched on the primary sear (red circle). Also, the striker safety is well clear of the striker, as it is designed to at this point in the firing cycle (blue circle).


P320 by kpkina, on Flickr

The operator notices the no-bang, and holsters the weapon. At some point a random vibration allows the striker to clear the sear notch, and the round goes off, inside the holster.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: kkina,

quote:

Originally posted by kkina:
The operator notices the no-bang, and holsters the weapon. At some point a random vibration allows the striker to clear the sear notch, and the round goes off, inside the holster.

If the 'operator' notices a malfunction, and then holsters the weapon, anything that occurs afterward is on them! ANY weapon that malfunctions should be cleared, and the cause of the malfunction determined...Period!

quote:

Originally posted by nhracecraft:

quote:

Originally posted by kkina:
The operator notices the no-bang, and holsters the weapon. At some point a random vibration allows the striker to clear the sear notch, and the round goes off, inside the holster.

If the 'operator' notices a malfunction, and then holsters the weapon, anything that occurs afterward is on them! ANY weapon that malfunctions should be cleared, and the cause of the malfunction determined...Period!

I can't agree, since the unsafe condition should never be occurring in the first place. Things happen in the real world, like when you're tangling with a perp. Also, the Vancouver documents discuss striker release after a dead trigger condition and the gun is subsequently shaken or the slide touched. None of this should be happening.

It's very easy to pin the blame on user error, as Sig seems to be doing. In the case of inadvertent trigger activation for lack of a safety, it's easy to say if you don't touch the trigger, the gun won't go off. But if people started carrying DA/SA pistols in the SA mode all the time, I guarantee that ADs will occur, and is it really all the operator's fault?

quote:

Originally posted by kkina:

quote:

Originally posted by nhracecraft:

quote:

Originally posted by kkina:
The operator notices the no-bang, and holsters the weapon. At some point a random vibration allows the striker to clear the sear notch, and the round goes off, inside the holster.

If the 'operator' notices a malfunction, and then holsters the weapon, anything that occurs afterward is on them! ANY weapon that malfunctions should be cleared, and the cause of the malfunction determined...Period!

I can't agree, since the unsafe condition should never be occurring in the first place. Things happen in the real world, like when you're tangling with a perp. Also, the Vancouver documents discuss striker release after a dead trigger condition and the gun is subsequently shaken or the slide touched. None of this should be happening.

It's very easy to pin the blame on user error, as Sig seems to be doing. In the case of inadvertent trigger activation for lack of a safety, it's easy to say if you don't touch the trigger, the gun won't go off. But if people started carrying DA/SA pistols in the SA mode all the time, I guarantee that ADs will occur, and is it really all the operator's fault?

I've yet to hear of a situation where an LEO was 'tangling with a perp', and then holstered their weapon AFTER a 'dead trigger' occurrence, only to have an UD occur at some unspecified time later. Please provide a documented example of this...I'll wait!

That's just one example for simplicity sake, and not the bigger picture. If a gun can be put in an unsafe condition, then if enough of them are out there, sooner or later an accident will occur that shouldn't have been possible. My second paragraph discusses this.

quote:

Originally posted by kkina:
But if people started carrying DA/SA pistols in the SA mode all the time, I guarantee that ADs will occur, and is it really all the operator's fault?

Uhhh, Yes!

I think there's plenty of folks on here who would disagree.

quote:

Originally posted by Blackwater:
Have I been shilling for Glock in the thread?

Has anybody been doing so for SIG?

As a SIG P320 user, for due diligence I intend to elucidate any safety concerns.

I'm grateful to folks for sharing all and any reports/evidence, which can then be analysed. That may involve quoting directly from the actual reports/evidence shared, as I did above:

https://sigforum.com/eve/forum...500006515#8500006515

quote:

Originally posted by DirectDrive:
I recommend watching the Robert Burke video testimony of 5/30.
Mr. Burke addresses every theory and rumor concerning P320 safety.
Robert Burke is arguably the premier P320 gunsmith in the nation.
Many would not believe the number of P320's he has handled including Max Michel's P320's.

☝️ This.

Video: Robert Burke ("The SIG Armorer"), May 30, 2025.

I refer y'all to Bob. Maybe he's sufficiently qualified for ya, if you're still wondering about clickbait vids like Hawaiian shirt dude or just wondering how it might be mechanically possible for a current factory SIG P320 to discharge without operating the trigger.

If a current factory SIG P320 can be discharged without pulling the trigger, it would be reproducible with the affected pistol and should be reproducible between all pistols with the same SKU code.

So I'll be here waiting for that video.

Yes, that's the video I've been referring to.

Burke provides some fine, detailed analysis. However, he doesn't necessarily cover all possiblities. He does go into the issue of sear perch, but he describes the possibility of sear perch on the second stage of the firing cycle, i.e. when the slide is moving forward into battery. It is, as he correctly says, topologically impossible for it to happen by a considerable margin, if nothing else due to the engagement of the striker safety.

In the case of a dead trigger, however, the perch occurs on the trigger pull, i.e. the very begining of the cycle. By definition the striker safety is retracted, as my diagram indicates.

I don't know exactly what tolerances would have to be stacked for this to happen, but I think there are some clues, referring to the Sig employees reaming out holes. Enough holes of the wrong diameter or in the wrong place, and maybe the sear isn't coming down as far as it should.

Dead Trigger Syndrome would explain the events at Vancouver PD.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: kkina,

quote:

Originally posted by kkina:
Dead Trigger Syndrome would explain the events at Vancouver PD.

IMHO your diagram is very useful reference material, and your DT hypothesis is important enough to merit further evaluation.

Re. the Vancouver PD incident, while the available evidence does not rule out DT syndrome, personally I'd tend to lean towards the documented issues with that holster type, "on the balance of probabilities" in terms of legal burden of proof. Partly because I'd be surprised if DT had occurred but was then omitted in the two memos including the testimony of Ofc. Hill:

https://youtu.be/yxD2dLPagDw?si=sJnlJuIS_T19w55k

I'll also be interested to see where the takedown lever/takedown safety lever line of inquiry leads.

^Fair enough, sir.

quote:

Originally posted by DirectDrive:
Most P320 ND's that I'm aware of involved a holster.

However, there was one where a P320 was wrapped in a towel and placed in a gym bag.
Another was not holstered and placed in a purse not designed for concealed carry.

That’s poor gun handling. They’d have probably gotten away with it with a revolver or a Glock. I might just have to test that with my M&P shield. It has a hinged trigger instead of a dingus. I bet I could get it to fire wrapped in a towel in a bag; unloaded of course.

The two incidents above support the point that if a gun has a light trigger that doesn’t require a lot of movement to fire, things can happen.

It occurs to me the whole drop safe thing supports this as well. The P320 passed the standard drop tests in the first place. It was found that it would go off if dropped at the right angle from a higher point. Amazingly enough, this happened because the trigger moved.

I believe there’s video of an incident where one officer’s keys drop into another officer’s holster and that officer’s gun is fired when the keys pull the trigger. How crazy is that? Nobody was sitting around the board room wondering: ya know what we really need to test?

I think Para is right. Despite the dingus being primarily a drop safe measure, it prevents the trigger from being moved from incidental contact with its sides when say, wrapped in a towel or being holstered in a poorly fitted holster.

quote:

Originally posted by kkina:
I've seen Robert Burke's video. However, if I'm not mistaken, he did all of his testing on a fully seated sear, not on a gun with a dead trigger. The trigger goes back, the trigger bar moves forward, but not quite enough to fully release the sear. The striker is now perched on the primary sear (red circle). Also, the safety lever is well clear of the striker, as it is designed to at this point in the firing cycle (blue circle).


P320 by kpkina, on Flickr

The operator notices the no-bang, and holsters the weapon. At some point a random vibration allows the striker to clear the sear notch, and the round goes off, inside the holster.

Theoretically this concept makes sense, however I can't figure out how that condition occurs in the first place. How does one get a dead trigger without dropping the sear? I have thousands and thousands of rounds through my own P320s at this point, and have been around probably fifty thousand more being fired through other people's guns, and I've never seen that happen. I've seen light strikes and a few other malfunctions, but the striker always drops when the trigger is pulled. Not saying it couldn't happen, as it sounds like it happened to Vancouver PD...I'd just like to know the details of how.

^Good question, and I don't have the answer. There'd have to be a significant amount of play in the entire trigger assembly, a lot of stacking error. I know that tolerance stacking can do pretty wild things, and apparently Sig has had issues drilling holes.

At this point actual hands-on inspection is probably necessary to see if this might be possible, particularly on guns suspected of having UDs. Maybe someone will look into this, I don't know.

I hope that we get some input on whether lifting the slide can release the striker. It would support the Dead Trigger theory, even if the striker safety stops full travel as it's designed to.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: kkina,

I think 16 pages of discussion on a SIG forum is enough evidence to suggest at the very least there is a perception of a possible issue, and in the connected world we live in that in and of itself can be disastrous.

The facts are, as I have seen them, as follows.
-there are most certainly cases where the AD/ND was due to a holster problem or foreign object involved. Would a dingus mitigate this or at the very least provide a tiny extra margin of safety? I believe so. Ultimately though these are user or holster provider failures.

-There are instances where the gun has an AD/ND when it is being carried loaded without a holster in an inappropriate manner. This is illustrated by the cop at the gym who threw a loaded gun in her bag. This is likely 100% negligence even if some amount of pistols do have a mechanical flaw, what this officer did is just as likely to trigger a firing of any striker fired handgun and shouldn’t be done with ANY handgun.

-There are however, several documented instances of these guns truly going off with no interaction from the user while properly holstered and in fairly low stress situations. Getting out of cars, walking etc. This leads me to believe there is absolutely the possibility of a mechanical defect that either is the result of some kind of QC or tolerance stacking issue or through a longer term wear type thing, or both. This is enough of a problem to warrant figuring it out and addressing.

-When folks speak of Glock leg etc. they also have to put into perspective that Glocks were going into holsters of folks largely used to heavy DA/SA, DA only or revolvers. There was a learning curve at play and that leaning curve is largely a thing of the past. You simply don’t hear of Glock issues like this much anymore.

-A rigid, properly fitted holster should be considered an essential “safety” for a striker fired firearm, whether on your person or not.

The reality is there is likely an issue at play no matter how remote the likelihood is for it to rear its head. Even the occasional P365 has shown a defect where it can have a trigger pull without a bang but then an impact or shaking will cause the striker to drop/fire. (Rare but there are videos).

SIG is currently helmed by Ron Cohen who all but destroyed Kimber’s reputation through cost cutting, cheapening and lack of QC. He has done the same at SIG IMO and I think ultimately this will come down to a poor parts/QC/Tolerance stacking issue that is hard to reproduce but is indeed an issue.

Now whether individuals like or have complete faith in their 320 or not doesn’t bother me a bit. Hell, even if you are just playing the odds chances are you will probably be fine. That said I personally wouldn’t own one and I won’t recommend them to anybody asking my opinion. There are simply too many other great guns out there without the potential baggage.

Also…so I guess things still haven’t “ended”.

^ Well said.

For me the biggest tell that there is a mechanical flaw is the US Marine, who was carrying for hours with the M18 and safety on.

We know the thumb safety only blocks the trigger and not the sear. Another head scratching moment for Sig’s design.

quote:

When folks speak of Glock leg etc. they also have to put into perspective that Glocks were going into holsters of folks largely used to heavy DA/SA, DA only or revolvers. There was a learning curve at play and that leaning curve is largely a thing of the past. You simply don’t hear of Glock issues like this much anymore.

Keep in mind that many agencies who transitioned to the P320 were Sig shops before, so they were likely coming from DA/SA or DAK guns. So there is a very real possibility that some of this is Glock leg all over again, just a few years behind. Fortuitous outcomes reinforce bad decision making...if you got away with bad trigger discipline for years because of your 12lb DA trigger, you learned nothing, and it's only a matter of time until doing the same thing with your new striker gun bites you in the ass. Maybe literally.

quote:

I think 16 pages of discussion on a SIG forum is enough evidence to suggest at the very least there is a perception of a possible issue, and in the connected world we live in that in and of itself can be disastrous.

I absolutely agree, but I also don't care. Perception is meaningless without facts. I'm not trying to sell guns for Sig, and I frankly don't care about their bottom line. Facts are what matter. If there is a problem, I'd like for it to be identified so that I can make sure the conditions that allow it aren't present in my/our guns, and implement a fix if they are. I've given up on getting that information from Sig...but if there's one good thing about their horrible mismanagement of this whole issue, it's that there are a whole bunch of people looking into it now, and if there is a problem the odds are drastically improving that eventually somebody's going to figure it out.

quote:

Keep in mind that many agencies who transitioned to the P320 were Sig shops before, so they were likely coming from DA/SA or DAK guns. So there is a very real possibility that some of this is Glock leg all over again, just a few years behind.

That’s fair.

As far as the perception I was speaking more from SIG’s standpoint. There is no doubt they are losing sales because of this and while I am not sure what they can do it behooves them to do something. I almost feel like renaming the gun might be on the table at some point.

Like other folks I’d just like to know what is going on definitively.

quote:

Originally posted by Blackwater:
^ Well said.

For me the biggest tell that there is a mechanical flaw is the US Marine, who was carrying for hours with the M18 and safety on.

We know the thumb safety only blocks the trigger and not the sear. Another head scratching moment for Sig’s design.

I disagree, we're all just guessing from afar and concocting unlikely real-world scenarios.
The head scratcher is why are there no forensic examination results of the pistol and holster made public ?

quote:

Originally posted by DirectDrive:

quote:

Originally posted by Blackwater:
^ Well said.

For me the biggest tell that there is a mechanical flaw is the US Marine, who was carrying for hours with the M18 and safety on.

We know the thumb safety only blocks the trigger and not the sear. Another head scratching moment for Sig’s design.

I disagree, we're all just guessing from afar and concocting unlikely real-world scenarios.
The head scratcher is why are there no forensic examination results of the pistol and holster made public ?

Ok.
The military is not going to air their laundry to the world.
When some LEO or civilian bleeds out from a UD then you’ll probably get your forensic wish.

The closet thing to a comprehensive analysis, is likely in one of the law suits that have been sealed because Sig settled. That is the real world.