19 July 19

Triggers for Serious Guns:

Trigger “pull-weight” on revolvers is usually between nine and fourteen pounds when fired via the trigger-cocking mode. As a general rule, the smaller the revolver, the heavier the trigger pull.

Who have small hands and/or low hand-strength thus often find revolvers, particularly snubbies, incompatible with any kind of accuracy, sometimes completely unusable for any serious purpose.

By contrast, most modern, striker-fired, autoloading pistols come from the factory with a trigger pull-weight of six to seven pounds, and trigger travel is much shorter than that on a revolver.

Some are as light as five pounds. Five pounds is the minimum recommended for a pistol carried for personal defense.

Compact, single-column autoloaders tend to have triggers a pound heaver than their double-column cousins.
This is because manufacturers know these small pistols are often carried unsecured (trigger unprotected) in the bottom of handbags, rather than protected (trigger and trigger-guard encapsulated) inside a suitable holster.

Carrying loaded pistols “unsecured” is not recommended. Accordingly, pistols carried in handbags need to be protected within holsters incorporated into the handbag itself, and in handbags specifically designed for this purpose.

The best are made by GTM, guntotenmamas.com

Trigger pull-weights are always a compromise:

>Too light, and you’re flirting with UDs, particularly when you’re confronting felons at gunpoint, but have not yet made the decision to fire.

>Too heavy, and when you do decide to fire you’ll be slow and inaccurate, or you’ll be unable to fire at all!

Six to seven pounds represents a reasonable compromise for most people carrying and using handguns for serious purposes, depending upon individual hand-strength, and level of training.

Six/seven pounds is thus the current “standard” among most handgun manufacturers.

With military autoloading rifles, pressed into service as patrol rifles or for personal defense, pull-weights on most factory triggers is five to six pounds.

Once again, less than five pounds is not recommended, for the same reasons as cited above!

However on military autoloading rifles, there are several trigger “variations.” Some are available from the factory, and some are “after-market” installations.

None are recommended!

>“Progressive triggers” fire a single shot when pulled sightly to the rear, and fire full-auto when pulled all the way to the rear. The full-auto feature is not built-into the manual safety, as it is with most other military rifles.

Most military autoloading rifles capable of full-auto fire have a “selector-lever” with three positions, “safe,” “semi-auto,” and “full-auto”

Of course, rifles that fire full-auto (“select-fire”) are NFA weapons and thus restricted by ATF.

It is my opinion that full-auto is the last thing you want on any serious defensive rifle!

Learning to fire precisely-aimed, rapid, individual, incapacitating shots at threat(s) from expedient positions, and at likely defensive ranges, is the key to personal victory!

These are precisely the skills we learn and exercise in our DTI Urban Rifle Courses!

Rifles, fired full-auto from the shoulder or underarm, are difficult to control, and the practice squanders ammunition as well as being fairly an invitation to unintentional injury and property damage.

Full-auto fire has scant place in domestic policing, nor personal defense!

The AUG is an example of a rifle with a progressive trigger (military version only). As noted above, it has no separate “selector” lever.

Of course, the “civilian version” of the AUG has no full-auto capability, so the progressive trigger is a moot point in these guns.

Progressive triggers never caught-on, even within military organizations. It sounds like a good idea, but the learning-curve proved too steep for most armies! Only the AUG and a few other rifles featured it.

Progressive triggers are not found on the vast majority of modern military rifles.

>“Binary triggers” fire a single shot as the trigger is pressed to the rear, and another, single shot as it is released to go back forward.

No manufacturer (that I know of) installs these on factory guns, but they are available as an after-market installation.

I consider binary triggers little more than an accident waiting to happen, and I don’t recommend them for any legitimate purpose!

When you fire a shot, but do not want to fire a second shot, you have to hold the trigger all the way to the rear as you try to push the manual safety lever to the “safe” position. This maneuver is a veritable invitation to a UD!

>”Press/release triggers” Similar to a binary trigger, but with a press/release trigger, pressing the trigger to the rear does nothing. Then, when you subsequently ride the trigger forward, the rifle fires.

Press/release triggers have never enjoyed significant popularity, except among participants in certain obscure competitions.

On serious rifles, they’re again an after-market addition and represent a persistent hazard (much like binary triggers, and for the same reasons), and are thus not recommended!

>”Bump-stocks” don’t actually modify the trigger at all. A bump-stock, harnessing the rifle’s natural recoil, causes your trigger finger to contact the trigger multiple times in rapid succession, simulating full-auto fire.

Now illegal, bump-stocks were always regarded with disdain by Operators. In my opinion, they serve no legitimate purpose and virtually invite UDs!

They were never recommended, even when legal to possess.

>”Trigger-actuators” are devices that clamp-on to a rifle and insert an artificial “finger” within the trigger guard.

The shooter then turns a crank, which causes the trigger to be struck in rapid succession by the “finger,”

These devices are designed to “simulate” full-auto fire, mostly for the entertainment of kiddies.

Once again, trigger-actuators are dangerous and serve no legitimate purpose!

Becoming a competent Operator requires personal devotion as well as serious, regular training and practice, with legitimate guns and accessories.

After-market junk mentioned above has no appeal, at least to the knowing!

“You have attained maturity.

Display it for us, if you please!”

MaryJanice Davidson

/John