Failures due to the grip safety?

[Glenn E. Meyer]

At a recent match, we had a new female competitor who was shooting an XD in 9mm. She did just fine. Good hits, no mistakes, etc. However, one stage was a horror for her. It was a fire from retention at a close in target. The gun would not run, and stove piped. Since we are nice folks, the SO let her repeat and it did it for about three tries until it worked. The gun ran for every other stage just fine.

It made me think that perhaps the grip safety wasn't being held appropriately. I thought maybe she wasn't strong enough but asked Kathy. Her view was that it was perhaps hand position and thumb position in a single handed grip with a smaller hand that didn't allow complete activation on the second shot movement of the gun. If I can quote her:


Re the retention position issue, I'd put money on the table for a problem with the flimsy little XD grip safety as she was shooting. Not necessarily a grip strength issue per se, but a result of a one-handed grip which (unless thumbs locked down) changes the geometry of how the hand fits the back of the grip. Esp likely if someone told her to keep her thumb up while shooting from retention, because with slender hands there's a higher likelihood of a deep palm pocket and with a one handed grip w the thumb up rather than down, that pocket would likely allow the grip safety to move.

I've also read of a case where an male officer (IIRC) was injured in the hand and had extreme difficulty with a 1911 grip safety.

There's always a debate of whether the 1911 was or wasn't designed with one and it might be for cavalry, blah, blah. When the XDs came out, I recall folks being all hot and bothered. Wow, it has a grip safety!!

Thus, in this long winded introduction - do folks know of cases or user characteristics that suggest the grip safety adds another problem in significant numbers or clear incidents? Personally, I never saw the use for it. SW had it in the J frames to prevent kids from using the guns but IIRC, it was found that little kids could easily defeat it.

[spinmove_]

The grip safety on the XD series works fundamentally different than the grip safety of a 1911. With the XD/XDm/XDs, unless you have the grip safety engaged, the slide will not run. The 1911 does not have that hindrance. It sounds like, for whatever reason, on that particular stage, that person was having issues getting a firm grasp and properly engaging the grip safety. Either that or some debris somehow got into the grip safety mechanics and messed it up that way.

[iveschris]

I transitioned from a 1911 to a Glock 21 for EDC. At the same time, I changed my grip and stance from a Chapman/Modified Weaver/Modern Technique to the Modern Isosceles/thumbs forward. The opportunity to take the LAV 1911 Operator's Course came up, so I spun back on on the 1911 and drove to VA. Two or three times during the two days of training, I had incidents of draw, index, engage, but no bang. These incidents brought about a tap/rack/bang immediate action response but also a disturbing "What's going on?" I asked Larry to look at the gun, he pronounced it good to go. I should have had him look at me.

Using a hybrid grip styles between old and new, I'd brought a bad behavior with me from the recent transition from Colt to Glock to Colt I'd shifted my firing hand grip to get high on the gun (to facilitate running the big Glock well) with the thumbs well forward on the frame, but this meant a haphazard engagement of the grip safety with a 1911.

It was indeed the Indian and not the bow.

When I'm having 1911 time nowadays, I dial up old school and use a thumb over thumb firing grip and foot-forward, sort of Modified Weaver/Chapman stance.

[JonInWA]

It's part of the history of the 1911. As I recall, the Cavalry branch insisted on it, to prevent accidental discharges while handling on horseback (I think the primary area of concern was during reloading magazines). There are "solutions" to it-ranging the gamut from the Texas Ranger utilization of a rawhide strip to lash it down, to a rubber Pachmeyr grip mounted backwards, to the Novak "Answer" which replaces it with a filler piece.

The only time I've personally run into difficulties with one on a 1911 was after a long stint with a double-column semi-auto; my hand' muscle memory was habituated to the wider grasp needed, and I failed to de-activate the grip safety on my Nighthawk Talon II when I used it in a match immediately following my use of the other pistol. I immediately realized my error, and corrected. Lesson learned: Intensive dry (and live) fire to re-familiarize and build the proper muscle memory needed when transitioning between weapon/platform types is crucial, and is now an integral part of my training/practice protocol.

Hey, it's part of the 1911/XD. I don't have and XD, but if I did, the above protocol would apply. And it's not as if there isn't a plethora of quality alternatives out there without a grip safety if it's an insurmountable barrier to performance.

Best, Jon

[Robinson]

Two or three times during the two days of training, I had incidents of draw, index, engage, but no bang. These incidents brought about a tap/rack/bang immediate action response but also a disturbing "What's going on?" I asked Larry to look at the gun, he pronounced it good to go. I should have had him look at me.

It was indeed the Indian and not the bow.


This sounds a little familiar. During the first pistol class I ever attended, I had an incident where I pressed the trigger on a 1911 and no bang happened. I immediately performed a tap-rack-bang and this time the bang happened. It dawned on me that I had not depressed the grip safety sufficiently and I felt pretty stupid.

I still usually have my left foot slightly forward, but I don't use Weaver any more. The above incident happened right about the same time I was making the transition away from it.

[Talionis]

At a recent match, we had a new female competitor who was shooting an XD in 9mm. She did just fine. Good hits, no mistakes, etc. However, one stage was a horror for her. It was a fire from retention at a close in target. The gun would not run, and stove piped. Since we are nice folks, the SO let her repeat and it did it for about three tries until it worked. The gun ran for every other stage just fine.

It made me think that perhaps the grip safety wasn't being held appropriately. I thought maybe she wasn't strong enough but asked Kathy. Her view was that it was perhaps hand position and thumb position in a single handed grip with a smaller hand that didn't allow complete activation on the second shot movement of the gun. If I can quote her:



I've also read of a case where an male officer (IIRC) was injured in the hand and had extreme difficulty with a 1911 grip safety.

There's always a debate of whether the 1911 was or wasn't designed with one and it might be for cavalry, blah, blah. When the XDs came out, I recall folks being all hot and bothered. Wow, it has a grip safety!!

Thus, in this long winded introduction - do folks know of cases or user characteristics that suggest the grip safety adds another problem in significant numbers or clear incidents? Personally, I never saw the use for it. SW had it in the J frames to prevent kids from using the guns but IIRC, it was found that little kids could easily defeat it.

The portion of your post that I bolded makes me think that it was indeed an issue of compromised grip, but not specifically in relation to the grip safety. When you say the gun wouldn't run, what do you mean exactly? The "stove pipe" comment seems to indicate that it would fire, but then have an FTE; which is very common when people start shooting from non-standard positions and with compromised grips. I've seen plenty of people start experiencing malfunction after malfunction if they move away from a standard two-handed firing grip. Why? They simply aren't gripping the gun hard enough, and the movement of the gun itself compromises the slide function.

Personally, I have had quite a few instances in matches where I didn't fully disengage the grip safety on a 1911 I was playing around with. Not always after a draw, but that was the most common instance. I have to grip a 1911 differently than my usual pistols in order to get the grip safety to reliably disengage, this experience includes 'sensitized' grip safeties, and both arched and flat mainspring housings. Interestingly, the 1911 it hasn't been an issue with (yet, at least) is with my 1918 Colt, probably because I haven't shot it under the pressure of a match yet.

[HCM]

Not at all a fan of the XD grip safety, particularly the fact it must be engaged to work e slide.

Re: the 1911. I've found not all 1911 grip safeties are created equal. Sensitized grip safeties help and I've found grips / grip size makes a difference as well. I have large hands so for myself the Les Baer 1911's, which are slightly larger than standard front to back provide the best reliability. Thicker grips including the pachmeyers with the wrap around front strap also help. Thin grips reduce reliability for me.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

Run to me means that it goes bang and continues to go bang as needed. Said gun went bang once and then stove piped on the second round. It did this three times in a row. I asked as the gun worked for about 90 other rounds that day. So what was causal? It was in a one handed retention position with a female shooter. This is not to disparage females but wondering if grip strength or as Katy suggested small hand position interacted with the grip safety. That is theory and I wanted to get views on that. Not gripping it strongly enough could be a user fault or an ergonomic problem of the gun with a one handed grip with certain users. I don't have a problem with my 1911 SW one handed and I'm not a physical giant.

However, a trainer buddy, who certainly has the experience and strength, mentioned to me as I explored the issue that the XD safety interfered with him in a high end training experience. So he dropped the gun from most usage.

If the slide is inhibited in moving, that could catch an empty. How does this sound? You hold one hand, you have small hands and the recoil shifts the safety as the slide is moving and the empty is caught?

[HopetonBrown]

Don't want to sound like I blame everything on limp wristing, but a bang then a stovepipe while shooting with one hand seems fairly common amongst semi autos, grip safety or not, to be a strong grip issue.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

Could be. Just asking around.

[StraitR]

If you do not depress the grip safety on an XD, the pistol will not fire even if the trigger is pulled nor can the slide be cycled. If the shooters grip failed to depress the GS, the gun would simply not fire. As such, I cannot fathom how the GS could induce a stovepipe. That said, anything is possible.

Could be a matter of grip strength, technique, or a combination of both. Could even be that the pistol seemingly functioned fine for the other 90 rounds, but in actuality it's right on the edge of failure due to strength, technique, or even a maintenance issue. Can't say for sure via an internet diagnosis, but she's certainly not the first person to ever experience malfunctions shooting from retention.

If someone spent five minutes with her to nail down the technique, plus hit the pistol with some extra "just because" drops of lube, I'd be willing to bet she could run that drill without fail moving forward.

Strength is always a factor, and one if it's biggest advantages is masking less that stellar technique. Really strong people can mash the crap out of a trigger with less effect on accuracy than those with less strength. Also, it usually only takes a minute to teach someone that appears physically incapable to lock the slide back on a semi auto by showing them a better technique.

[JonInWA]

While it's not necessarily a "bad" gun per se, and I have seen numerous shooters shoot them quite credibly in IDPA matches, I don't think that you'll find many on this forum particularly singing their praises or recommending them. They tend to have several strikes against them; 1, the grip safety, as enumerated in the thread; 2, that they have not distinguished themselves in any major LEO trials, and 3, that their detailed disassembly is a magnitude greater than, say, Glocks (arguably their primary niche competitor), and 4, from here to Croatia is a tad of a hike for parts support...

That said, since others may well ask questions/seek advice, they certainly are worthy of discussion. And they do have some nice features that definitely appeal to hobbyists.

Best, Jon

[HCM]

Glenn,

How is this lady's build? I ask because we have a few females at work who need to cant the gun outboard when shooting from retention because they either get hit by the slide or are afraid of getting hit by the slide. That could compromise grip and explain why the gun only malfunctioned from retention.

[GOTURBACK]

My thought is that shooting from close retention the slide could have been contacting her body/clothing restricting it from fully cycling subsequent to firing the initial round which could definitely induce a stovepipe.

[Zhurdan]

The only pistol that "fit" my wife's hands was an XD so that's what she wanted. Had a very similar issue with her first gun. Thin hands seemed to be the culprit because when she really got down on it, even with one hand, it worked fine. The problem was when she was focusing on other aspects, she'd lose the grip. Shes a relatively new shooter and that, I think is what caused her problem.

[BJXDS]

Not trying to start an argument, but the XDS slide will run without the grip safety depressed, but I do not think the same is true of the XD line.

In any case I have heard of a case where dried mud prevented the grip safety on an XDS from being fully depressed and it would not fire. I had to try real hard to make a gun with a grip safety fail to fire by holding it in some weird positions but it could be done.

With that said I have no real hard test data but FWIW the grip safety is a potential point of failure so with so many quality firearms with out one, why take the chance?

[Zhurdan]

Not trying to start an argument, but the XDS slide will run without the grip safety depressed, but I do not think the same is true of the XD line.

In any case I have heard of a case where dried mud prevented the grip safety on an XDS from being fully depressed and it would not fire. I had to try real hard to make a gun with a grip safety fail to fire by holding it in some weird positions but it could be done.

With that said I have no real hard test data but FWIW the grip safety is a potential point of failure so with so many quality firearms with out one, why take the chance?

If referring to my post, I think she was partially engaging the safety, some of the time, but when she focused on her grip the gun ran fine. We no longer own that gun. She opted for a revolver due to lack of grip strength, her choice. Works like a champ and now she shoots more. Bonus!

[Tamara]

Run to me means that it goes bang and continues to go bang as needed. Said gun went bang once and then stove piped on the second round. It did this three times in a row. I asked as the gun worked for about 90 other rounds that day. So what was causal? It was in a one handed retention position with a female shooter. This is not to disparage females but wondering if grip strength or as Katy suggested small hand position interacted with the grip safety.

The malfunction as described cannot have anything to do with the grip safety.

The malfunction as described is, however, a classic "limp wrist" malfunction.

[ReverendMeat]

The grip safety on the XD prevents the sear from moving until disengaged. As such, the gun simply wouldn't fire. While it also prevents the slide from moving rearward more than a centimeter or so, since the gun fired and the slide moved rearward far enough to fully extract the empty case, the grip safety was clearly disengaged. There's much more likely explanations for the failures to eject.

[Tamara]

In re: the cavalry thing...

Bear in mind that cavalry pistols were retained by lanyards. A private could go from riding and shooting one minute to trying to control a wounded horse or even drawing a sword. Suddenly letting go of a cocked single-action pistol where it would then be free to bang around, dangling on the end of its lanyard, presenting a danger to the rider, the horse, and his squadronmates, seemed like a bad idea, unless the very act of letting go of it activated a safety. Hence the grip safety.

It is interesting that the last purpose-designed cavalry pistol, the Polish wz. 35, which was heavily influenced by the 1911, dispensed with the thumb safety, but retained the grip safety. It also added a decocker. Apparently, if Pvt. Jablonski had time to holster, he could decock the gun, but if he had to drop it and let it dangle, the grip safety was there to prevent loud noises.

[Drang]

In re: the cavalry thing...

Bear in mind that cavalry pistols were retained by lanyards. A private could go from riding and shooting one minute to trying to control a wounded horse or even drawing a sword. Suddenly letting go of a cocked single-action pistol where it would then be free to bang around, dangling on the end of its lanyard, presenting a danger to the rider, the horse, and his squadronmates, seemed like a bad idea, unless the very act of letting go of it activated a safety. Hence the grip safety.

It is interesting that the last purpose-designed cavalry pistol, the Polish wz. 35, which was heavily influenced by the 1911, dispensed with the thumb safety, but retained the grip safety. It also added a decocker. Apparently, if Pvt. Jablonski had time to holster, he could decock the gun, but if he had to drop it and let it dangle, the grip safety was there to prevent loud noises.

s*i*g*h
I love it when go all History Geek.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

Thanks for all the discussion as I was just speculating. The person involved was a standard sized about 5' 5" young woman. Since the SO was working with her and he seems a good sort, I wasn't sticking my nose into the scrum (male friend) to see what was up on the micro level. My experiences with horses preclude the need for a grip safety as I won't get on the damn things.

[45dotACP]

Yeah, grip safety malfunctions are not the kind that mess with extraction. I've had a grip safety not fully engage for me at a match a grand total of once but that match was hellish to me for other reasons.

As for XDs...well I've seen them run and I've seen them shit on the bed...but no more so than Glocks with the latest greatest ultralight, anti pre travel, over travel, antigravity trigger kit.

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