this post was submitted on 07 Aug 2024
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The Sig P320, a $700 pistol from a "quality" brand that was adopted as the new military standard issue pistol, would fire if dropped at the wring angle. They didn't want to have the trigger-safety mechanism that Glock and others use that includes a spring-loaded trigger lock that prevents the trigger from being pulled without something actually inside the trigger guard to pull it.
So if you dropped it at the wrong angle, it had enough inertia that when the gun hit the ground the trigger would keep moving and pull itself.
This was discovered in military trials, so they fixed the flaw (with a lighter trigger that wouldn't have as much inertia combined with a heavier trigger pull) for the military, but not for the Civilian model.
A viral YouTube video came out showing how it could be reliably fired by dropping it (the video used blanks so they weren't actually shooting wildly), and they still denied it was a problem until all the gun dealers refused to sell the gun.
They did a recall, but there's still probably a million affected guns out there.
Other guns will do that as well. It isn't necessarily resolved by a trigger safety. Some guns, as shown on a popular guntube channel, will fire if dropped from chest height because the drop and angle causes the firing pin to move with sufficient force to fire the round.
A firing pin shouldn't be free-floating in a way that will allow it to strike a primer without the trigger being pulled in any modern pistol.
Shouldn't isn't doesn't.
The $4,300 Stacatto XC 2011 for instance, dropped from chest height, fired a round immediately without the hammer dropping. So did several others, and that was just one round of testing.
Most didn't, but for the most part they were only dropped once or twice and it was a fairly informal test. Literally just someone dropping the pistols from the height of being told "drop your weapon."
The P320, however, despite being dropped about a dozen times (and from much higher heights and different angles since the test was inspired by the discussions about that model going off) never discharged from being dropped.
A 2011, despite the name, isn't really a modern firearm. It's essentially a 9mm version of a 115 year-old design and too many boutique race gun companies cut corners for guns that aren't designed to anything but range queens.
As popular and fun as the 1911 is at the range, it has no place as a modern defensive firearm, and people who carry It are idiots. They're super heavy, low capacity, jam, rust, have a trigger pull so short and light they can't be safely handled while cocked without engaging a safety that's just a hammer block (leaving the pin floating), are a pain to clean, and more.
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It was one example. My point is, it happens. This is literally a response to you initially pointing it out that it happens in the "modern" P320, and I'm sure you've got an unnecessarily long and complicated opinion about each make and model. 👍
The P320 still requires the trigger to be pulled to remove the stop that prevents the firing pin from touching the primer.
The problem with the 320, the Taurus G1, most 911s, and others is the trigger being pulled. It's why most of the industry has adopted trigger safeties like the one pictured that don't allow the trigger to move without something inside the trigger guard releasing the trigger.
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