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dry firing a glock

rangerange Member Posts: 554 ✭✭✭
edited March 2016 in Ask the Experts
is it true u could dry fire a glock and it wont harm it

Comments

  • nmyersnmyers Member Posts: 16,875 ✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    It's a required part of the disassembly process, so I would think that occasional dry firing isn't harmful. But, I wouldn't practice dry firing excessively, just for general principle.

    Neal
  • rufe-snowrufe-snow Member Posts: 18,649 ✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    Agree with Neal! Many moons ago, I broke the firing pin on a 45 ACP BDA. Dry firing it.


    Use these, if you plan to do a substantial amount of dry firing.




    k2-_7cfec338-573d-4140-898d-388ef7449684.v1.jpg
  • tsr1965tsr1965 Member Posts: 8,682 ✭✭
    edited November -1
    quote:Originally posted by rufe-snow
    Agree with Neal! Many moons ago, I broke the firing pin on a 45 ACP BDA. Dry firing it.


    Use these, if you plan to do a substantial amount of dry firing.




    k2-_7cfec338-573d-4140-898d-388ef7449684.v1.jpg






    +1, for both Neal, and Rufe

    EDIT 1

    quote:Originally posted by truthful
    No matter what an "expert" says, or even what a manufacturer says, whenever any gun is dry fired with nothing in the chamber to absorb the hit, the energy of the firing mechanism has to go somewhere. In every case, some part (or parts) is going to slam against some other part (or parts). Energy of motion is going to abruptly stop. It may be a portion of a firing pin, or a hammer, or some other device. Repeated dry firing can easily lead to fracturing, rounding, excess wear, etc.
    The damage may not appear immediately or be catastrophic during the dry firing. It may show up later when when the gun is needed for more serious work.

    Play it safe. Never dry fire anything!!


    EDIT 1

    No matter what ANYONE says, a firearm, is a mechanical device/machine, and not indefinitely not prone to fail at sometime. The primer, and/or snap cap act as a slight cushion, but merely prolong breakage, not prevent it.
  • truthfultruthful Member Posts: 1,975 ✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    No matter what an "expert" says, or even what a manufacturer says, whenever any gun is dry fired with nothing in the chamber to absorb the hit, the energy of the firing mechanism has to go somewhere. In every case, some part (or parts) is going to slam against some other part (or parts). Energy of motion is going to abruptly stop. It may be a portion of a firing pin, or a hammer, or some other device. Repeated dry firing can easily lead to fracturing, rounding, excess wear, etc.
    The damage may not appear immediately or be catastrophic during the dry firing. It may show up later when when the gun is needed for more serious work.

    Play it safe. Never dry fire anything!!
  • bpostbpost Member Posts: 32,664 ✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    quote:Originally posted by truthful
    No matter what an "expert" says, or even what a manufacturer says, whenever any gun is dry fired with nothing in the chamber to absorb the hit, the energy of the firing mechanism has to go somewhere. In every case, some part (or parts) is going to slam against some other part (or parts). Energy of motion is going to abruptly stop. It may be a portion of a firing pin, or a hammer, or some other device. Repeated dry firing can easily lead to fracturing, rounding, excess wear, etc.
    The damage may not appear immediately or be catastrophic during the dry firing. It may show up later when when the gun is needed for more serious work.

    Play it safe. Never dry fire anything!!

    If you follow Brian Zins method of training you will dry fire your 45 ACP may thousands of times during a match season. I have noted no harm to my MADORE wad gun from dry firing it thousands of times.
  • burpfireburpfire Member Posts: 1,158 ✭✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    I dry fire all my guns when I play with them. Some of them . All different calibers. Never a problem with any of them. Today's metals are far superior to what was used yrs ago. Do you really think your going to hurt a glock or any other high quality modern gun by dry firing it? Now a Jennings or high point. No. On older guns no. If it really bothers you, get snap caps.
  • beantownshootahbeantownshootah Member Posts: 12,776 ✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    Edit: Glock itself says on its website that its OK to dry fire its pistols. Echoing the advice given above and below, Glock says that if you want to dry fire a LOT you should use a snap cap.

    quote:https://us.glock.com/customer-service/faq
    FAQ: Can I dry fire my Glock pistol?

    It is ok to dry fire your Glock pistol, but in situations where the pistol will be subjected to continuous sessions of dry firing, the use of a snap cap or dummy round is recommended.

    =============



    quote:Originally posted by truthful
    No matter what an "expert" says, or even what a manufacturer says, whenever any gun is dry fired with nothing in the chamber to absorb the hit, the energy of the firing mechanism has to go somewhere. In every case, some part (or parts) is going to slam against some other part (or parts). Energy of motion is going to abruptly stop. It may be a portion of a firing pin, or a hammer, or some other device. Repeated dry firing can easily lead to fracturing, rounding, excess wear, etc.
    The damage may not appear immediately or be catastrophic during the dry firing. It may show up later when when the gun is needed for more serious work.

    Play it safe. Never dry fire anything!!

    I disagree, and largely because this statement contradicts my experience and that of the large gun makers.

    Most gun manufacturers say explicitly that limited dry fire is OK. Its written into the Smith and Wesson gun manual, for example. I think the manufacturers who put out guns by the millions, with decades of cumulative experience in doing so (in Smith's case over a century), and seeing the results of guns in the field, and submitted for repair, have a pretty strong institutional sense of what's OK and not OK.

    If Smith and Wesson tells you its OK to dry fire its CENTERFIRE pistols, its OK to do so. . .and again that's based on them seeing thousands of individual examples of guns that have been repeatedly dry fired!

    Next, there are plenty of individuals with tons of personal experience with this. Dry fire practice is pretty common, and there are plenty of individual guns that hold up to it just fine. It all comes down to WHAT exact gun you're talking about and its individual design.

    Yes, the energy from the dry fire has to go "somewhere", but that doesn't mean its going to harm the gun. Guns are DESIGNED to take repeated internal impacts. And since gun designers aren't complete idiots, they know that guns get dry fired as part of NORMAL operation. Pretty much every modern centerfire gun is DESIGNED to handle this, and many (though not all) modern rimfires are too.

    Specifically, if the kinetic energy from the moving firing pin is spread out over a large surface area and/or reabsorbed by a return spring, nothing will be injured. Many guns have wide flanges over the base of the firing pin, and these strike a corresponding wide area on the guns frame if no ammo is present, spreading out the impact.

    To answer the original question, yes, you can occasionally dry fire your Glock without harming the gun. If you intend to do so many HUNDREDS or THOUSANDS of times, its a good idea to get a cheap and readily available snap cap to help minimize wear and tear on the gun. That's just common sense.

    quote:TSR1965: No matter what ANYONE says, a firearm, is a mechanical device/machine, and not indefinitely not prone to fail at sometime. The primer, and/or snap cap act as a slight cushion, but merely prolong breakage, not prevent it.
    Well, to be clear, firing pins are made of hardened steel, and snap caps are made of plastic and softer metal with springs inside that act as a cushion. No, nothing lasts forever, but you may well wear out the snap cap before you wear out the gun!

    Yes, if you jump up and down on your BED long enough, eventually you'll wear a hole through the mattress and end up on the floor, but as a matter of practice, you're probably not going to.

    So sure, if you dry fire your Glock enough times, EVENTUALLY something will wear out, no question about it. It might be the firing pin, but it might be something else. Maybe the trigger mechanism, maybe the striker spring, etc. I think this is understood. . .all machines will eventually wear out and fail with normal use.

    But the point is, Glocks have been designed to accept dry firing as a normal part of their operation. You're not going to wear one out or break anything with a normal limited amount of dry firing.

    There are guns where a SMALL amount of dry firing *WILL* wear out the gun or break something (CZ52 is one of them, many rimfires are others), but Glock isn't one of these.
  • v35v35 Member Posts: 12,710 ✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    A lot of dry firing will break the the tip off Baby Browning firing pins.
    While I've never seen it happen on G.I 1911s, I've seen civilian 1911 copies break firing pin retaining plates.
    For dry firing Colt SAA's, fit a snug fitting piece of rubber in the hammer cutout above the firing pin hole.
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