So… I was pondering this over, and had no inclination to attempt my experiment to prove my hypothesis.
But if I had a semi-automatic pistol, and someone held their hand around the barrel, to grip the slide, and could conceivably keep the slide from moving when I shot it. What would happen?
My guess is that the pistol would still fire, since the pin is still striking the primer, but since the slide couldn’t cycle it would just misfeed and I’d have to clear it.
Obviously, I don’t really want to do this, I’m just curious if my guess is correct.
It would probably misfeed/not properly eject if held very tightly, it will also probably tear up the hand pretty badly. There is ALOT of force driving that slide back.
I assumed it wouldn’t feed. I suppose I meant, would anything else bad happen?
And no, I wouldn’t want to meet the person who could. I would be giving them everything I ever owned that I even thought was valuable to keep them from hurting me.
Basically the round would fire, the slide wouldn’t move, and the cartridge case wouldn’t eject, and nor would a new round be fed into the chamber. Racking the slide would accomplish both.
Nothing bad would happen that I can imagine- all the slide does is act as the reciprocating part that allows ejection and reloading.
IANAG (gunsmith)
But, I’m not so sure that it would be all that powerful (strong?) of a movement.
This is a real WAG, but to my mind, the spring in a semi-automatic handgun is strong enough to only allow the slide to move enough to eject the spent round and chamber a fresh one.
In other words, the majority of the force from the powder igniting is imparted on the projectile.
Granted, there’s still a lot of force required to actuate the slide.
I just don’t think it’s as much as some of the other posters seem to have implied.
I’m pretty sure that there is a gunsmith that posts on the SDMB, but I can’t recall who it is. Anybody else remember their name?
Also, like GusNSpot & Archaic_Entity said, I wouldn’t want to be on the wrong ‘side’ of anyone that could (or especially, would) try that.
Well, as far as I can recall, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.
Of course we know that recoil is a part of the reaction, but I had always assumed that the slide mechanism and ejection of the shell played a part in controlling the reaction of the bullet’s firing.
If the force driving the slide back was too much the gun would quickly hammer itself to pieces. If the spring had to absorb that much force it would be so stiff it would be very difficult to pull back. So I don’t think it would be impossible to stop the gun from cycling by holding the slide. Might hurt.
I am not a gunsmith or a person that knows much about physics but that’s my reasoning.
The slide on a short recoil operated pistol is locked to the barrel. (In the Browning-style arrangement this locking is effected with a large locking lug, but other arrangements include separate locking wedges, roller locking, swinging links, and a few other uncommon arrangements.) Once the bullet exits the barrel, the recoil forces the slide and barrel backward. After a short amount of travel, the barrel unlocks from the slide, permitting the slide to translate all the way back, recocking the hammer or striker and then feeding a new round from the magazine into the chamber. So the slide sees essentially the same momentum as the bullet, albeit because the slide is much heavier than the bullet the velocity of the slide is correspondingly lower. The forces on the slide at the end of travel are significant, and many older firearms are noted for frame cracking when using modern high pressure ammunition, particularly unreinforced 1911-type frames with .45 ACP +P and 10 Auto ammo and some of the older aluminum framed pistols such as the S&W 4XX series (2nd Generation) pistols. To alleviate this, some pistols are offered with recoil buffers or they are available as aftermarket components.
Firmly grasping the slide would likely result in misfunction of the slide, resulting in a failure-to-eject or failure-to-feed failure, but would not prevent the gun from firing the round in the chamber and could be cleared by a tap-rack-bang drill. It would, as others have said, probably tear up the hand of the person grasping the gun (due to the front site snagging the hand), and because the grasper would probably be forward of the muzzle would probably also result in significant powder burns even if the bullet missed the defender. Other types of actions, such as straight blowback or gas operated would not be affected by this and would likely not be affected by grasping the slide.
I once rented a .380 acp (?) at the range. Thats a pretty little gun, and I have big hands. Anyhoo, I had a weird grip, the slide smacked into my thumb, left a gash, and failed to load the next round. I surmise placing ones hand over the slide would result in a similar wound and malfunction.
The clerk at the range had a metal hook for a hand so I didn’t whine too much. :smack:
What, IYO, made the guy ‘dumb’? :dubious:
It looked to me, like he knew what he was talking about.
Enough so, that he safely demonstrated that yes, you can grab the slide of a semi-automatic hand gun and keep it from cycling, when fired.
And that the firing of the gun doesn’t impart enough energy in operating the slide to injure you.
Unless of course, you put your hand in front of the barrel where the bullet can strike you. :smack:
Oh, and thanks for posting the vid, IMHO, it unequivocally answered the OP’s question.
Some, um, organizations in the US Military have an occasional need for quiet weapons. Some .22 cal autopistols lend themselves to this. Once you’ve nearly eliminated the report of the weapon, there’s still the sound of the slide operating and the sound of the ejected case hitting something. So sometimes a slide lock is added to the pistol. With this engaged, the slide does not cycle when the pistol is fired, and the only sounds it makes is the “ping” of the firing pin striking the base of the round and the reduced report. To reload, one unlocks the slide and manually cycles the slide.
You assume correctly depending on caliber and design. Some cartridges have enough power torip the metal through your hand and function and some short stroke probably will as well.
Now ---------- do not necessarily try this at home with a live weapons but -------- you can stop some semi-autos from firing at all by jamming the slide back on the frame of the gun; forcing the slide back as the shooter is holding it. It basically locks/blocks the hammer. One of those “last ditch” moves they taught in police training once upon a day.
I don’t know if a person could keep their grip on a slide, it would probably be ripped out of their hand, but whatever force they exert on the slide will probably slow it down enough to cause feed issues. The spent round may not eject completely, or the spring may push the slide forward faster than normal and the next bullet may not be in place yet, causing it to jam by being pushed onto the wrong spot or at the wrong angle.
I was just playing around with words, I swear. I didn’t know my comment was loaded. Then all of a sudden - BLAM! - an insult pops off. I guess I forgot to set the sensitivity.
I was also taught that same technique back in the early 70’s. That was for the most part done with a mil-spec 1911 and the slide moved back 1/2 inch very easily in that pistol platform. I never teach that technique today as it will not work at all on many many simi-auto pistols as the recoil springs are to strong, and guide rods of various designs will prevent you from being able to preform that old maneuver.
The Train Stranger explained everything else, however, what we used to believe was shown so well with the high speed camera’s when the History channel’s reality series Top Shot.
On that show the high speed camera would allow me to play back the frame by frame sequence of a gun being fired. What i would see was at ignition, gas would be seen exiting the barrel and then no gas as this is when the bullet seals the barrel, then the bullet exiting in 5-6 inch distances per frame(do not hold me to any exact distance please), but the interesting thing would be to watch the gun and the background while the frames were advanced. The gun would not move and the slide stayed fully in battery until the bullet was aprox. 2-3 feet downrange and the gas pushing the bullet being a narrow shaft until over a foot distant would then start to open up and only then did the slide start a rearward movement, then as the slide was approaching full rearward motion, the gun would start the recoil action.
Of course i have a DVR to be able to play that sequence back and frame by frame.
I am not a GS, but I am a handgun instructor.
I have a 1911 Springfield V-16 that is set up in .45 Super. The recoil spring is the only thing i have to change in this handgun to change from .45 Auto (17lbs recoil spring) TO .45 Super (23 lbs recoil spring) If i shot a .45 auto cartridge in this gun when it is sprung for Super, and I did that last Friday just because i wanted to see how far back the slide would move and of course the slide did not eject the cartridge case.
I did not view the above video link as i wasn’t able to above, but i would not be at all apprehensive to grab a slide before the gun is fired as i do know that i cannot easily push a slide out of battery on most guns and if i were injured in what i believe would be very minimal if i gripped the slide as tight as one should it would be Ton’s better to stop any subsequent shots that could be fired had i not taken action.
Hell we practiced dis-arming subjects with revolvers also and cocked revolvers, where we would do our best to get a finger under the hammer to prevent the gun from firing knowing full well that we were going to leak red stuff in so doing!
