Reliability and Recoil

A very important quality of a good self-defense handgun is its reliability. Despite the rhetoric employed by the anti-gun crowd, a firearm is simply a tool. It is no better, nor no worse than the individual employing it. In the case of a self-defense handgun, it is a life-saving tool. Therefore, by definition it is a tool which must function properly each and every time it is used. If you are confronted by a life-threatening attack (on you, or another individual such as a friend or family member) and your firearm malfunctions it could easily result in your death or serious injury, or the death or serious injury of those whom you wish to protect. In a very real sense, you are laying down a wager on your life. I don’t know about you, but under such circumstances, when I make that bet, reliability is damned important to me.

Now, it is true that there are a large number of very reliable handguns being sold by reputable firearms dealers today. Manufacturers like Colt, CZ, FN (Browning), Glock, Heckler & Koch, Kahr, Kimber, Ruger, SIG, Smith & Wesson, Springfield Armory, Steyr, Taurus, and Walther (to name but a few) all produce highly reliable firearms. I could try to list them all, but it’s a lengthy list and that is not why I am writing this piece.

There are many other places you can go to research the reliability of a particular make and model of handgun. Good sources of information include reputable firearms dealers, articles by leading gun authors, self-defense and firearms instructors teaching in your area, and the members of local gun clubs. They can all give you an opinion, and undoubtedly will if asked. However, they cannot do your thinking for you. Seek a number of opinions by asking about a particular handgun. If you simply throw out the question I started this blog with, you will get a predictable result. Lots of opinions and precious little in the way of specific facts.

But, it is important to remember that this is a manufactured piece of equipment. And what other piece of equipment do you rely upon that is manufactured? Your car. And what do we know about cars? We know that even the best manufacturer turns out the occasional lemon. So, this is why it is imperative that you test your self-defense handgun before betting your life on it.

You cannot rely upon the general reputation of the Glock pistols for reliability, you need to know that the Glock you have selected is reliable. This means going out with the handgun and burning up several hundred rounds of practice ammunition and a minimum of fifty rounds of your chosen self-defense ammunition before you bet your life on that handgun. Are you going to be willing to accept anything less than 100% malfunction free performance? I won’t. But you have to decide for yourself. Its your life you’re betting, not mine.

If you do experience a malfunction, then you must figure out what the problem is and correct it or take it to a reputable gunsmith (and I don’t mean your brother-in-law Ted, who managed to take his Wingmaster apart to remove the magazine plug and was able to put it back together without a bunch of “extra” parts) and have the gunsmith look it over. Some manufacturers actually recommend a break-in period before placing the handgun in critical service. Malfunctions that occur during a break-in period on a new gun are not necessarily cause for alarm, but you need to be sure that you are experiencing malfunction free use before relying on the gun to save your life, or that of your family members.

There can be any number of reasons for malfunctions., I will save that subject for a future discussion. Now I want to talk about recoil.

The concept of recoil is a very subjective issue. Quite seriously, the deer hunter who just scored a trophy buck might respond to a question by admitting, “I never felt the gun go off.” Likewise, individuals involved in an exchange of gunfire, or drawing and firing to save their lives from an onrushing attacker, may later have no appreciable memory of either the report from their handgun, or the recoil of the gun going off. Adrenaline has interesting effects on sensory excusion.

The most important issue in examining recoil is not the force being applied rearward at the point the projectile leaves the barrel. It is the tendency of the muzzle of the handgun to rise upward at the point the projectile leaves the barrel. This is often referred to as “muzzle flip”. This is important since with a proper stance, you are using your entire body to absorb the rearward force of recoil. However, how well you control the vertical rise of the muzzle is going to be dependent on how well you can grip your handgun. Controlling muzzle flip is vital to the placement of multiple shots on target. Why is this vital? Because, despite what you see in the movies, the average meth-head, with no teeth and weighing 120 lbs. soaking wet, charging you with a knife, is not going to go down with one shot. This is undoubtedly bad news if you have been led to believe (as many trusting souls have – by the media and other idiots with no experience with the issue) that with one well-placed shot, you can disarm your attacker without causing him any serious harm.

(More on that issue at another time)

And that muzzle flip is going to depend upon not only your stance and your grip, but also to a high degree upon the caliber and the design of your handgun. Its no secret that the more powerful a handgun cartridge is, the more recoil it will produce. But it is also true that the perception of recoil can vary depending upon the design of the cartridge. High velocity cartridges such as the .357 magnum and .40 S&W can be described as having a sharp recoil. Lower velocity rounds like the .38 Special and .45 ACP are usually experienced as a “push”. Many people (including a large number of female self-defense students I have worked with) are surprised to find that the recoil of the .45 auto cartridge in a full frame 1911 is easier to handle than that of the .40 S & W, despite the fact that the .45 is a larger, more powerful cartridge.

However, the handgun the cartridge is fired from also plays a big part in this calculation. The heavier the handgun, the more it will absorb the cartridge’s recoil. Handgun manufacturers commonly make the same gun in a variety of frame materials, and this will affect, to a great degree, how much they weigh. Guns are available in steel, aluminum alloy and polymer plastic frames. The alloy and polymer-framed guns are lighter and easier to conceal and carry, but they are more difficult to shoot (accurately). Longer barrels also help to reduce recoil and muzzle flip by adding greater weight and moving the gun’s center of gravity further forward. But again, longer barrels make the gun harder to carry in a concealed fashion.

Another often overlooked factor affecting recoil is the “bore axis” of the handgun.This is the measurement of the vertical distance between the top of the shooter’s hand and the imaginary centerline of the barrel running from the chamber to the muzzle. Guns with a higher bore axis measurement have more muzzle flip than a handgun with a low bore axis measurement. But at the same time, the handguns with a low bore axis also will have a more pronounced direct backward recoil into the web of your hand. Because of their design, revolvers have a higher bore axis that some semi-automatic pistols. Glock pistols are an example of a semi-auto that is known for their low bore axis due to their design. Semi-automatic pistols also have less recoil than revolvers because some of the recoil energy is used to cycle the slide. Effectively, the slide functions as a shock absorber.

So, by way of example, a .38 special cartridge, fired from a snub-nosed lightweight alloy frame revolver with a high bore axis will have a much more punishing recoil than a .45 fired from a long barreled, steel framed, semi-automatic. If you don’t believe me, go to a range where you can rent both models. It will not take many rounds for you to understand the concept.

Next we are going to talk about self-defense ammunition. In connection with the concepts of stopping power and also reliability and practicality.