Dry Firing consequences

[Renegade Roper]

Okay I read the previous posts about whether or not to use snap caps or not and this post is NOT about that. It is about the reason people think you need to use them or not. Nowhere in the post did it say what would happen and why IF you dry fire w/o snap caps. I was just wondering why something would break if it isn't hitting anything and what would break (or people think will break) in both the rifle and pistols. As an aside I got some .22LR 1873 revolvers to practice with and they clearly say on the box DO NOT DRYFIRE or you will void the warranty. Why is the firing pin going to break if it doesn't hit anything? It would seem that if you repeatedly hit something you would eventually break it, not the other way around. We also shoot the 73 rifles w/action jobs and since reading the previous post I have been dryfiring w/o the dummy ammo which is much easier than trying to find 10 little shells that find mysterious holes to disappear into. IF something were to break what would it be and why (again if you aren't hitting something why would it break, and I am not referring to me NOT hitting the targets, that is a whole nother story). Thx. RR

[Colorado Coffinmaker]

OK ....... here goes. It's part physics and part metallurgy. Once in motion, an object wants to stay in motion. It this case it's the firing pin. The firing pin in handgun or rifle is a movable part, separate from the hammer. Once in motion, it wants to stay in motion. When the hammer stops, the firing pin wants to continue. A Rifle firing pin in a reproduction toggle link has nothing to stop it's forward travel except the larger head at the end. Dry firing will batter the head of the firing pin until it breaks at the junction of the small diameter part. The head also batters the bottom of it's bore until it peens the seat. The Firing Pin Extension Rod batters the bottom of it's seat until it also peens it, causing the firing pin to stick. Sticky firing pins are not good.

 

With SA type handguns, the tapered part of the firing pin will beat on the backside of the Recoil Shield at the firing pin hole until it peens the firing pin hole and raises a burr on the cartridge side, causing the cases to jam. After you remove the burr a couple of times, the hole is large enough for the primer to flow back into the hole, jamming the rotation of the cylinder. The firing pin is retained by a soft cross pin which the firing pin will eventually sheer, then popping out of the hammer. A Ruger will eventually break the transfer bar.

 

Some of the above are fairly cheap to fix and some get expensive. For your rifle, just file one edge off your snap cap so it doesn't extract and eject. Enjoy.

 

If you don't use snap caps, eventually you get to visit me, or someone lake me, and you probably won't like the bill.

 

Coffinmaker

[Subdeacon Joe]

In the case of rimfire cartridges, the firing pin will likely be hitting on steel. With a cartridge, the soft brass does slow the firing pin and also keeps it from striking the edged of the chamber.

 

Centerfire is a different story. Some have said that the older style fixed firing pins might fatigue and crack because the energy isn't transferred to anything. Some say the same for the newer floating firing pins. Or that the recess they rest in will deepen somewhat because they get driven farther forward than they were meant to if there is no cartridge.

 

I was taught that you don't repeatedly dry-fire rimfires, but an occasional one is OK but you can do a lot of dry-fire with centerfire guns.

[Marlin Buckhorn,SASS 51727]

CC told what happens to center fire guns, as far as not dry firing .22s. The firing pin hits the edge of the chamber and will eventually wreck the cylinder of your revolvers or the chamber of your rifle.

 

Marlin

[Marauder SASS #13056]

Just to add a little. You post mentions the key.

The firing pin is hitting nothing - when it expects to be hitting a nice soft primer to slow it down.

 

Since it doesn't get slowed down by that nice relatively soft primer, it has to hit a rather hard piece of steel somewhere else.

 

Try it yourself. Put up a nice punching bag in front of a piece of steel. Then punch the bag. Then remove the bag and punch the metal nice and hard. You can report back your results - just don't use your writing hand though.

[Gunner Gatlin, SASS 10274L]

as mentioned above...metal and metal slamming against each other is no good when dry-firing. Like a Colt SAA were the hammer directly hits the frame.

 

An exception are Ruger single actions (the 'modern' ones) which can be dry fired because they have a frame mounted firing pin with a spring - that helps 'slow' down the impact of the hammer, on the the transfer bar, on the frame.

 

GG ~