RFI: the reasoning behind the DAO service pistol "wave" of the late 80s/ear90s

I`m working on a piece for a blog that's an overview of handgun action types, and I would be most grateful for anyone who has first hand experience on the "why" of the transition of some LE organizations to DAO around this time.

My recollection from reading gun rags at the time is that it happened in response to the idea that the adoption of semiautos had massively increased the number of civilian deaths to LE letting a round loose when they didn't mean to, and it was mostly pushed in more left-leaning areas.

But I have no first hand experience on the topic, and memory is a tricky thing. I would like to have some more solid info than my hazy recollections of reading Mas 30 years back.

Thanks in advance!

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Originally Posted by Baldanders

I`m working on a piece for a blog that's an overview of handgun action types, and I would be most grateful for anyone who has first hand experience on the "why" of the transition of some LE organizations to DAO around this time.

My recollection from reading gun rags at the time is that it happened in response to the idea that the adoption of semiautos had massively increased the number of civilian deaths to LE letting a round loose when they didn't mean to, and it was mostly pushed in more left-leaning areas.

But I have no first hand experience on the topic, and memory is a tricky thing. I would like to have some more solid info than my hazy recollections of reading Mas 30 years back.

Thanks in advance!

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Most of the departments who went to DAO autos had previously converted their DA revolvers to DAO. The reasons were generally: reduce NDs, reduce or eliminate false allegations that justified shootings were NDs with cocked revolvers, training doctrines in place in those times.

Up through the 1980s law enforcement duty handguns were DA or DAO revolvers. Most agencies relied on the DA pull to mitigate the effects of “trigger checking” under stress and actually taught gun on target / finger on trigger or staging the trigger during presentation to accommodate for the longer heavier trigger pull.

The progressive agencies went to TDA guns in the 80s. The chiefs who made the transition selections in the 90s were all “raised” with cops having DA or DAO revolvers and basically wanted 12-15 shot “revolvers” that were faster to reload.

The other part of the DAO equation was training, specifically time and money. DAO Autos had a trigger pull that was familiar to cops used to shooting DA revolvers. Like DA revolvers they only had one trigger pull instead of two different pulls like TDA autos.

Now, while the proper way to shoot a TDA gun is to think of it as having one type of trigger pull since the trigger breaks in the same spot DA or SA, police administrators are not gun people and don’t look at things that way. Regardless, it usually takes more training time to reach a particular level of proficiency with a TDA gun then with a single trigger pull gun such as a DAO, DAK, LEM, or striker fired pistol.

The key thing to remember here is that most cops are not gun people, they carry a gun as a necessary tool of the job and many only shoot or train when they are getting paid to do so. The biggest cost in any transition or law-enforcement firearms training program is not the new guns, the new holster’s, or even the ammo it is the cost of man hours.
Man hours for the instructors and officers on the range and often man hours for the people working overtime to cover while those officers are in training.

With training time being limited and expensive, a weapons system that requires 20% more training time to achieve the minimum required proficiency will be looked on on favorably unless you’re in an agency which considers accuracy and winning gun fights a priority. Those type of departments are the exception not the rule, Especially among large agencies which tend to operate on the “no officer left behind” / lowest common denominator model of training.

I don't have time to go digging today, but I reckon if you want to rabbit hole this topic, which has been discussed at great length in previous years, finding the LEM threads will get you started. There are some good docs posted as well as discussion from many additional people who were there, but aren't participating much here nowadays.

Two additional thoughts. First, many of the left-leaning major urban areas concerned about negligent discharges converted their revolvers to DAO long before they considered autos.

This leads into the second thought. One of those left leaning urban areas who converted their revolvers to DAO was Miami. When Miami went looking for a DAO Auto they found that there was a new gun from Austria the was a semi cocked striker action. The maker cakes it a “safe” action but ATF said that since the trigger pull finished cocking they striker before releasing it, it was officially described as a DAO action. I’ll give you three guesses as to what that gun was ...

As I recall Miami and DC Metro were the first big depts to adopt the Glock because it was “DAO.”

My former department went with TDA SigSauer 226's when we transitioned to semiautomatic pistols while the much larger county police (along with the sheriff's office and fire marshal investigators) went to the DAO Beretta Centurians. I still recall the announcements in police and firearms magazines that the county was the first agency to adopt this model. Oddly enough, I didn't see any annoubcements when they experienced locking block failures. They transitioned to DAO Brigadiers for several years until locking block failures led to a transition to Glock 40's.

I recall speaking with a member of the committee that made the original recommendation and asking about the DAO decision. Gary was a gun guy and remarked that he was terrified of the aftermath of a shootout when the "kids" would emerge from behind their cruisers with cocked pistols. I can't speak to how much training and tactical concerns like Gary's were weighted compared to liability concerns.

I will note that not too long before the semiautomatic transition, we were treated to an hour lecture at in-service training by a firearms instructor about how terrible semiautomatic pistols were and how foolish it would be to transition to them. Listening to his drivel cemented my view that the pistol is a better option as a service weapon. Rumor has it that said instructor soon took a retirement job with a well-known revolver manufacturer called SigSauer.

I don't understand the use of the term left-leaning when referring to departments that converted revolvers to double actin only or to those those departments seeking a pistol that when issued might bring about fewer negligent discharges. To me that sounds sensible.

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Originally Posted by OlongJohnson

I don't have time to go digging today, but I reckon if you want to rabbit hole this topic, which has been discussed at great length in previous years, finding the LEM threads will get you started. There are some good docs posted as well as discussion from many additional people who were there, but aren't participating much here nowadays.

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Some of those threads were part of my early reading lurking around here, but I'm lazy. ;) I'm aiming at the recent purchaser or recent enthusiast, so that may be a bit too "inside baseball" for my target audience. I intend the followi-up to be "why I went all in on DAO" (realism about my limitations, in short) and I may pull a bit from that material, but I might get tempted to start plagiarizing Dagga heavily, which wouldn't be too classy. (There a special place in Hell for such behavior, IMO.)

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Originally Posted by willie

I don't understand the use of the term left-leaning when referring to departments that converted revolvers to double actin only or to those those departments seeking a pistol that when issued might bring about fewer negligent discharges. To me that sounds sensible.

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Sorry, I was unclear--I was talking about left-leaning places that had city/municipal policies that micromanaged their LE on equipment and the like.

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Originally Posted by HCM

Two additional thoughts. First, many of the left-leaning major urban areas concerned about negligent discharges converted their revolvers to DAO long before they considered autos.

This leads into the second thought. One of those left leaning urban areas who converted their revolvers to DAO was Miami. When Miami went looking for a DAO Auto they found that there was a new gun from Austria the was a semi cocked striker action. The maker cakes it a “safe” action but ATF said that since the trigger pull finished cocking they striker before releasing it, it was officially described as a DAO action. I’ll give you three guesses as to what that gun was ...

As I recall Miami and DC Metro were the first big depts to adopt the Glock because it was “DAO.”

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Y`know I was going to mention the former DAO status of the Glock while talking about striker-fired actions, because I remember when it was sometimes described that way, but I completely forgot about the rest, so I will be paraphrasing your post, thanks!

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Originally Posted by Baldanders

Y`know I was going to mention the former DAO status of the Glock while talking about striker-fired actions, because I remember when it was sometimes described that way, but I completely forgot about the rest, so I will be paraphrasing your post, thanks!

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ATF still considers the Glock a DAO action. It is a preloaded DAO like the DAK and the LEM it just has a striker instead of a hammer