Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Google Podcasts | RSS
Do Glocks have a safety? Should they? Should your concealed handgun have a safety?
Glocks have internal safeties but no external or manual safety. Are internal safeties on a handgun you carry for self-defense enough?
Should you have a manual safety on your concealed carry handgun?
The answer, like most things in our world is “it depends”.
I’m looking at a new carry gun. I’ve carried a Smith & Wesson M&P9 for almost six years now (without a safety) and like the gun. I just shoot the Sig guns better. And the new Sig 365 is much smaller.
I was at a local gun store today and they had the one I wanted. A Gray P365XL with manual safety. The question I’m asking myself and the point of this entire post is “do I want the safety?” My answer is yes, I like the manual safeties on all guns.
The next question is will it slow me down when the elephant is charging? For me, no. As long as the safety is big enough for me to rest my thumb on top of it.
I was playing with the safety and the counter salesman asked me what I thought. I told him straight up, I am trying to decide safety or no safety. He started to speak about safety and how it could slow you down and more gun store commando talk. I guess I glared at him and he left me alone without another word. After working with the gun for a couple of minutes, yes the safety is big enough for me.
The safety isn’t about the gun being “unsafe” or too slow to “get into action” or anything like that. Manual safety is an administrative precaution for me. It gives me one more thing to help me not have a negligent discharge.
I worked for an armored car company for about seven years and carried a 1911. Most of that time was in California where it was legal for the guard to carry the gun in hand. I did a bunch working around Los Angeles.
The greatest thing about the 1911 was my ability to shove it into the tactical holster I carried without fear of it getting caught on something and going off. A 1911, if used correctly, is the safest gun to holster by far.
To correctly holster a 1911, first put the manual safety on. Then break your grip (activating the grip safety) and finally, put your thumb over the hammer. Now you have multiple safeties to keep the gun from firing if you get it caught on something going back to the holster. I miss that.
With my Smith, I’m always super careful, just like you should be with any gun including a Glock because one of the frequent negligent discharges is when you holster the gun and it gets caught on something and the trigger is activated by whatever it was caught on. The gun doesn’t know it wasn’t your finger and the gun discharges.
I want to go back to the safety as one more added step of security to keep my from shooting myself.
On the faster vs. slower. No it is not. I’ve tested myself a million times with it.
Where people have problems is they train in efficiently or not enough when switching platforms.
Listen to the Podcast to find out about how to train yourself and the biggest mistakes made when training with a safety.
- Hear me on Self Defense Gun Stories Here
- Upcoming Courses
- Click here for the current course list.
- Got Ammo? Need it? Got to Lucky Gunner. When I need ammo, it’s where I go. Check it out. Great prices and a really easy site to use.
- ShootersClubMembers.com
- Get Better
- Over 80 How-To Videos about shooting and self-defense
- Discounts on courses and holsters
- Special interviews you can’t get anywhere else
- Sign Up Here!
Thanks for Listening, don’t forget to check out Shooter’s Club and Lucky Gunner for ammo.
Stay Safe,
Ben
Liked the podcast, but there was one point I wanted to make on the discussion on the Shield safety. I like Shields ok (I have the 45 and the 9), BUT…I carry left-handed a lot of the time (I’m ambi/cross dominant – left handed, right eye dom, and learned to shoot right handed as well as left), and those safeties are next to useless for carrying left handed. It’s fine if I carry right, of course, but even then, with training, I still have trouble hitting it every time. Now, with 1911’s (and my Sig 1911-style 9mm), I can shoot left handed, even if it’s not ambi because of the down action and size of the safety. But these Shields are my nemesis. Why, in the blue hell, did S&W not make them ambi, like they did with the M&P? Why did they not use the size ambis like with the EZ?? Accuracy, too…on the 45 I can drive nails, but the 9 I can’t hit worth a crap with it because of the trigger. It’s actually at the mothership now to make sure it’s just me and not the gun, and will probably sell both these when this mess is over. I’m just a lot better with Glocks, and am used to them, so. But anyway, just throwing in my 2 cent’s worth for fun (before Biden takes it, lol).
I totally agree, what in the name of all that is holly was Smith thinking. I should have mentioned in the podcast that I will only carry a handgun with ambi safeties on it. My Shield has no safety to match the bigger Smith I have, but I don’t like it as much as I could. It just works. Like when I carried Glocks. Ambi safeties are the way on handguns and most rifles. If you had other carry guns, now would be the time to sell those Smiths at the higher prices and wait out the crazy storm. The single stacks will stay around for a while. I think they will go after “hi-cap” mags first and then other things.