Good video. I was taught that early on when reholstering.
Didn't know about firing off a round while your thumb was on the back of the slide though. Good information.

I'd have not believed that unless he did a demonstration in the video!

Several years back, a younger, dumber (if that's possible) version of my took my wife to learn to shoot, and one of the guns I had her shoot was my 1911. She shot one off with her thumb partially out of position, and I thought she'd broken it there for a while. I felt terrible, and she STILL doesn't trust me to teach her anything about a gun.

I was taught that early on in life.

Well, I learned something today. Never knew that bit about the gun being unable to cycle if you keep constant pressure. Thank you sir!

Early on in my LE career I attended a "Shooting for Survival" class hosted by a large SO department.

First drill I shot with my 4006 DA/SA I decocked covered the hammer and went back to the holster. The instructor stopped the class pulled me forward of the line and had the students circle around me and told me to redo the drill. After the drill he proceeded to tell the entire class to never place your thumb on the back of the slide cause you'll lose your thumb. He looked me in the eye and said, "man you're asking for a bloody mess" and then put everyone back on the line.

Thats the only thing I remember from that class, it was a long 2 days. Thats when Surefire was desperate for instructors I guess.

^^^
With a hammered gun, you would still have that result, right? The hammer is going to push your thumb back enough to allow the barrel to unlock, I would expect.

I do it though. My belief is I would feel the hammer pulling back before it fell on the firing pin. I'll take my chances.

quote:

Originally posted by chongosuerte:
^^^
With a hammered gun, you would still have that result, right? The hammer is going to push your thumb back enough to allow the barrel to unlock, I would expect.

I do it though. My belief is I would feel the hammer pulling back before it fell on the firing pin. I'll take my chances.

I think we are on the same page... hammer down. The gun is decocked on a SA/DA gun thumb over the hammer. On a S/A gun such as a 1911, I have the thumb place positive pressure up on the thumb safety and trigger finger along the frame (safety spot). Hope that makes sense.

quote:

Originally posted by chongosuerte:
Well, I learned something today. Never knew that bit about the gun being unable to cycle if you keep constant pressure. Thank you sir!

I suspect if the thumb is blocking the slide, but back a little further, it may develope a little bit of speed. That might smart a tad.

quote:

Originally posted by Fenris:

quote:

Originally posted by chongosuerte:
Well, I learned something today. Never knew that bit about the gun being unable to cycle if you keep constant pressure. Thank you sir!

I suspect if the thumb is blocking the slide, but back a little further, it may develope a little bit of speed. That might smart a tad.

That is covered in the video.

quote:

Originally posted by chongosuerte:
^^^
With a hammered gun, you would still have that result, right? The hammer is going to push your thumb back enough to allow the barrel to unlock, I would expect.

I do it though. My belief is I would feel the hammer pulling back before it fell on the firing pin. I'll take my chances.

On a hammered pistol you should feel the hammer moving when you are holstering and stop what you are doing before the pistol goes off.

quote:

Originally posted by wolffy88:
On a hammered pistol you should feel the hammer moving when you are holstering and stop what you are doing before the pistol goes off.

With a beavertail, you can put your thumb between the hammer and the tail. Then you couldn't pull the trigger if you tried. If you tried really hard, you would break the trigger and the gun still wouldn't fire.

Hammer-Thumb-Beavertail - The ultimate safe holstering system.

For giggles sometime, decock your DA/SA pistol, put your thumb behind the trigger like you were going to holster and instead point in and try to pull the trigger while holding pressure on the hammer. If your pistol is anything like my P228, it just isn't happening. The leverage favors the thumb a lot more then the trigger finger in that situation.

I can testify that the P320 doesn't need a lot of pressure to keep it from unlocking. While working on speeding things up from the holster, I suffered a brainfart and had my thumb on back of the slide (appropriate for holstering, not so much for shooting). Got the hit, but the action didn't cycle. Realized what I had done, brought the pistol back into my workspace, racked the empty out, and went back to work with no issues.

quote:

Originally posted by Fenris:

quote:

Originally posted by wolffy88:
On a hammered pistol you should feel the hammer moving when you are holstering and stop what you are doing before the pistol goes off.

With a beavertail, you can put your thumb between the hammer and the tail. Then you couldn't pull the trigger if you tried. If you tried really hard, you would break the trigger and the gun still wouldn't fire.

Hammer-Thumb-Beavertail - The ultimate safe holstering ECO system.

We don't stress thumb on slide during bolstering at my agency but it's good practice especially with da type guns.

However, we do teach what we call "contact shots" which is like what Jerry did. Years ago we had a Deputy wrestling with a scroatbag for the gun. Scroatbag was winning. Deputy's partner arrivedabd prrdsed his gun to scroats neck and pulled the trigger. Nothing. He stepped back, tapped/racked, and again pressed the gun to the neck. Nothing.

Two more cycles of this ended when he shut the guy in the gut from 3 feet. You see, when you press the muzzle of a gun it takes it out of battery and it won't fire.

So now we teach a few methods of pressing your gun against a person while holding the slur firm to ensure it goes off. Most people are highly skeptical until one of us demos.

quote:

Originally posted by thumperfbc:
So now we teach a few methods of pressing your gun against a person while holding the slur firm to ensure it goes off. Most people are highly skeptical until one of us demos.

Care to share?

Thanks for the instruction, Jerry. That was fascinating.

I've always been in the habit of putting my thumb on the back of the slide during holstering, to feel for any unintentional slide or trigger movement, but I didn't know constant pressure would keep it from unlocking.

Why would you teach an officer to press the muzzle against an attacker? Why not just pop him from an inch away so the slide isn't pressed out of battery.

If you're thinking it's a last ditch fight for life close contact scenario, why teach them a technique to "fix" the gun so it works after making the mistake of pressing it a against /something? Why not just teach them how to back off a 1/4 inch while pressing the trigger? Seems like less work to me.

Not being snarky, genuinely curios.

Forgive me, but in my case, no.

I've already had to undergo surgery to make my dominant hand thumb work after my 60 mph into a stopped car motorcycle accident. The accident broke the connective tissue in my thumb and left it mostly useless.

I'm not going there again.

I'll figure out an alternative way to do this.

Jerry,

That video is excellent. It is informative, brief, clear, and to the point. Thanks for sharing.

James