Sig’s website says the P320 Carry model is available with Manual Safety, but I can’t find the SKU or find it for sale anywhere. Thanks for any help/input.

Perhaps I am missing something, but it appears that the way to get a Carry with manual safety is to buy a Compact with the safety and then the Carry grip module ($40) cut for the safety.

Welcome to the forum, BTW.

sigfreuwnd - Thanks for the response.
I agree that's a possibility, but SIG says the Carry is available with a MS.
Also, if I buy the Compact with MS and convert it, I would have to also purchase the 17 round magazines, which is why I would like to find the Carry model with MS vs. just buying the Compact model (2 more rounds capacity).
Maybe I'll just give SIG a call.

quote:

Originally posted by aredding:
Maybe I'll just give SIG a call.

If you do, please let us know what you find out.

I recently recommended a Carry P320 with manual safety to a friend as something to consider for concealed carry, and now I am thinking of the same.

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:
I recently recommended a Carry P320 with manual safety to a friend as something to consider for concealed carry, and now I am thinking of the same.

As a long time advocate for DAK actions in the Classic series of Sig pistols and your concerns about training with the DA/SA decocker vs the DAK, I am surprised that you recommend a manual safety (different training) with the Sig striker-fired p320 Carry. Does the different action require a manual safety for concealed carry?

If you are looking for a P320 carry with a manual safety the M18 fits that description. They even come with a milled slide if you ever plan on going with an optic.

quote:

Originally posted by haul_n_horses2:
I am surprised that you recommend a manual safety (different training) with the Sig striker-fired p320 Carry. Does the different action require a manual safety for concealed carry?

I still (and will probably always) believe that a Classic SIG with DAK trigger is the ideal handgun for concealed carry—assuming, of course, that the user becomes proficient with the trigger and doesn’t belong to the “Just throw the first double action shot away” crowd.

The DAK trigger gives me what can only be described as feedback during the trigger pull, and therefore I shoot the guns very well from first shot to last. The long DA stroke also makes the guns extremely tolerant of mishandling (e.g., touching the trigger unintentionally) and hasty carry maneuvers. (The longer trigger reset does make shooting the gun at speed a little slower than I can fire my P320s; my split times with a DAK P226, for example, are on average a whopping 0.05-0.07 second slower. )

For a variety of reasons, though, I can no longer in good conscience recommend DAK pistols to young shooters who are looking for a good self-defense weapon to carry them through the next few decades. First and foremost is because SIG no longer makes the guns available as new and parts and other support are waning quickly. (The same situation is clearly down the road for DA/SA Classic line pistols as well, but that’s another topic.)

Striker fired pistols are the wave of the future, and becoming familiar and proficient with one is almost the same as becoming competent with any. There is little reason for a one-gun new shooter to take up a dying system.

The problem with guns like Glocks, P320s, and countless imitators, though, is that they are less forgiving of handling mistakes, and that’s why when/if I switch to a P320 for concealed carry it will have to have a manual safety. Is there a drawback to adding that feature that I have literally never used on handguns in my life? Sure, but if I make the switch, I will become proficient with it just as I am proficient with guns that don’t have them. I haven’t firmly decided to switch to a P320 myself for primary self-defense, but I shoot them very well and as worsening arthritis affects my dexterity and strength as I age, my beloved DAKs are slowly losing their luster.

As for the recommendation to my friend, an additional factor is that he’s in the Army and is about to enter fields that will require him to be proficient with handguns. The M17 and M18 have manual safeties, so it wouldn’t hurt for him to have a personal weapon with the same feature.

Thank you for a very well reasoned explanation!

sigfreund - I appreciate your reasoning. I have hunted for decades, but am absolutely new to handguns. I am wanting a manual safety for many reasons, and feel that if I (and my family) learn with one, it won't be a problem. Also, I think down the road they could become more prevalent/mandatory.

Spoke with SIG.
As of right now, the P320 Carry Model is NOT available with Manual Safety.
Unfortunately, the M18 model isn't available in black either.
So unless I want the Coyote color (which I don't), my options are to buy a Compact with Manual Safety and change the grip model and magazines, or buy the Compact, leave as-is, and deal with 2 rounds less capacity.
SIG Rep did say that they should have more external safety features available at some point in 2020, but the Rep didn't have further details.

I think for now I will go with the Compact and start from there.

Thanks for the help sigfreund.

You are welcome, and thanks to you for the update from SIG.

The following is just an observation, nothing more, but we should remember that at one time handguns had one of three mechanisms to make them more tolerant of poor handling and less likely to discharge when the user didn’t intend that to happen. The oldest method was to require thumb cocking the hammer first in order to make it possible to fire the gun. That method is no longer used in guns seriously intended for self-defense purposes.

The next mechanism was the double action trigger that requires a long, heavy trigger stroke to first compress the mainspring and then release the hammer. That method persists to this day in most revolvers, but also in guns like Classic line SIGs. The pull weight and length of the stroke makes it relatively tolerant of poor handling, and therefore a good mechanism for concealed carry handguns.

The third mechanism that also goes back more than a century is the manual “firing inhibitor” (that one member here calls it), or safety. The problem with manual safeties of the sort the 1911 uses is that they are a less robust mechanism than something like a double action trigger, and they can interfere with firing the gun because they require a separate, conscious step to disengage. Disengaging a manual safety isn’t usually a problem or a delay for a skilled shooter, but I have seen extremely skilled and experienced shooters of such guns either forget or fail to disengage the safeties properly. Jeff Cooper, the Grand Old Man of 1911 pistols, was a fan of “conditions,” and he coined the term “Condition 1” to refer to refer to a pistol that had a round chambered with hammer cocked and thumb safety engaged. Other “conditions” referred to other states such as uncocked hammer and empty chamber.

“Condition Zero” evolved from the other conditions and means the gun has a round chambered and the safety is disengaged; i.e., the gun will fire by doing nothing more than pulling the trigger. Condition Zero has traditionally also always been considered by 1911 shooters as being an inherently unsafe way to carry the gun because if the trigger was pressed to the rear even slightly, the gun would fire.

So where does that bring us today? Glock claims with some validity that their guns have double action (only) triggers. Pulling the trigger compresses the firing pin (striker) spring slightly before the firing pin is released to fire the gun. That makes it technically a DA gun—but only slightly. The fact that only light pressure and short trigger movement is required to fire a Glock or a P320 or similar guns means that every day they are handled it’s in that dreaded Condition Zero (or perhaps Condition One-Tenth) that would be considered unsafe if the gun were a 1911.

The pundits will of course tell us that there are ninety-eleven gazillion Glocks carried every day without more than a few of them shooting their owners unintentionally, and that’s true. But if we are the one owner shot, that’s a huge “So, what?” Being shot only occasionally isn’t much better than being shot frequently, and that’s why I am interested in P320s with manual safeties.

Huh, they must have recently discontinued that model, as I purchased one last year and combined it with an X-Frame. Love it.

https://sigforum.com/eve/forums...830096754#1830096754

Purchased a P320 Carry w/safety via local LE distributor, and picked up an X-Frame locally via private sale and cut the safety notch myself. On any given day it can shoot as or even more accurately in my hands than my VP9 or my 1911. And that's with the stock SIG Lite sights...which I don't really like, but don't want to remove as the pistol is so perfectly dialed in at this point.

And I agree completely with sigfreund regarding carrying a striker fired pistol without some kind of "firing inhibitor". A striker-fired P320 without a manual safety (or trigger blade a la Glock) is akin to carrying a Condition Zero 1911. Both are "single action" at that point. That will not do for carry, for me.

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:

As for the recommendation to my friend, an additional factor is that he’s in the Army and is about to enter fields that will require him to be proficient with handguns. The M17 and M18 have manual safeties, so it wouldn’t hurt for him to have a personal weapon with the same feature.

I applied the same logic when I chose to deal with the PITA of getting ahold of MS or Mass-compliant P320s instead of just buying the non-MS version. I wanted the sensation of that grip in my hand to mean "manual safety," just like picking up a 1911.

Handling note: myself and a few other shooters have found that riding the thumb safety, as some teach for the 1911, locks the web of your hand all the way up on the grip and helps enhance control.

Every time I shoot one without a manual safety now, I'm hunting for that leverage point.