Why is it bad to dry-fire a gun?

Question

I've been doing trigger jobs on guns for years (30+). When I tell my buds to dry fire one and feel the difference, many question if it is OK. It has been mentioned frequently in periodicals that the mechanism can be damaged, but I have never been able to detect any truth to it. What gives?

Answer 1

The older guns and primarily revolvers had a tendency to work the firing pin loose at the hammer. Back when the hammer held the firing pin. Todays revolvers don't have that problem. In the older rifles that had a hammer set firing pin the soft pin that held the firing pin in the hammer would sheer off and you would lose or damage the firing pin. Floating pin assemblies on hammered rifles( like winchesters and sharps) would sometimes sheer the tip of the firing pin or the pin would jam in the forward position literally wedging itself into it's own frame. We don't have these problems today with the end of the use of brass springs. On rim fire guns especially revolvers and some bolt action rifles you can get a pinging effect inside the breech or on the revolver cylinder damaging them. The firing pin is also blunted and ultimately shortened causing misfire. The only real dry fire damage today is on rim fire revolvers most other guns have that extra space to keep the firing pin from striking steel. That extra 1/1000 of an inch makes a big difference.
I have an old 1878 Swift 8 guage punt gun that you cant fire without fear of a back fire. it has been dry fired so much the pin punctures the cap. The hand tooled firing pin is chipped and sharp.

Answer 2

This goes back a long way ! The only time this is an issue is when using a single shot rifle. Still to this day they are known for breaking firing pins when dry fired. One company has gotten past it with a design like no other. Ruger's No.1 rifles while still a single shot rifle uses a far less degree of approach on the firing pin.

Ok let me see if I can explain, on a flaaling block or a swinging block breach on a single shot rifle the firing pin hits the primer at a slight angle. The reason for this is because the breach can not simply drop straight down when ****** because of a swinging lever. The ruger No.1 decreases this with a new design. Anyway, The angular dirrection that the pin hits the primer is not a problem when the primer is there, the contact slows the pin down at a somewhat progressive rate. However, when dry fired the pin contacts its resting point at full force and because its not a striaght on hit, the force is transfered to the bottom side of the firing pin. This is the weakest part and the result is a broke pin.

Break open rifles do not have this problem. Today people have heard it so much they transfer it to every gun. When this was started there was no autoloaders or striaght angle firing pins on a breach action rifle. Thus, "dont dry fire it" only applies in a few guns today. I hope this helped.

Answer 3

Dry Firing A Gun

Answer 4

Like anything we only know the sayings of what not to do and not the reason behind them.

On 22 caliber if you increase the strike by allowing the firing pin to protrude farther or the firing pin was miss fit and you dry fire it the firing pin will strike the edge of the chamber and cause a bur pushed into the opening and therefore the rounds no longer chambered.

On older fixed firing pin firearms if the fit was off or the material was harden to much and brittle they could break by dry firing.


When I took an amours course from Beretta the instructor told us that one of the causes of breaking a firing pin from dry firing a firearm is the Beech effect. Basiclly what that means is that when you dry fire the gun and the firing pin hits nothing it falls that fraction of a inch againest the side of the firing pin hole and in some cases if done enough can cause the firing pin to fracture at that point.

My husband and I have been gunsmithing for over 16 years and have worked at the local indoor shooting ranges that rent firearms and have not seen the Beech effect on any current style firearms. We dry fired all the different brands of firearms after we worked on them too.

If the firing pin is going to break it will do so while firing as well as by dry firing. It doesn't hurt the firearm. So dry fire all you want.

Think about the force being put on the firearm when you fire it.
None of which is present when you dry fire it.

Answer 5

some of the cheaper guns out there have shown some peening of parts from overly excessive dry firing.
for instance a hawes single action six shooter that crystalized and broke out a round section around the floating firing pin.
this was due to the lesser quality metal
for whatever reasons i still do not believe any gun should be dry fired more that the few times it takes to feel the trigger.
might be a legend but i will live with it
snap caps or spent cases are an alternative

Answer 6

RE:
Why is it bad to dry-fire a gun?
I've been doing trigger jobs on guns for years (30+). When I tell my buds to dry fire one and feel the difference, many question if it is OK. It has been mentioned frequently in periodicals that the mechanism can be damaged, but I have never been able to detect any truth to it. What gives?

Answer 7

I have had the same experiences you have, after fine tuning triggers I have dry fired many times trying to get them just right with no apparent damage to the mechanism or firing pin on multiple rifles. Maybe it was a bigger problem 50 years ago before machining tolerences got so precise and has been handed down over the years without much questioning.

Answer 8

Bound's hubby here:

In small bore (rimfire) matches, dry firing is as common as shooting. The practice among many competitors is to leave a spent shell in the chamber when dry firing to absorb the hit of the firing pin to minimize the impact of the striker with the bolt body, minimizing firing pin chrystalization.

My recently departed gunsmith, who smithed for over 60 years, would not let you leave his shop without dry firing rifles and pistols he either worked on or sold (no, he was not generating work for himself). I think the resistance to dry firing is that people in gun department stores are afraid of either seeing people squeezing the trigger or hearing guns go "click" when they know little of other's safety habits. I think dry firing today falls more into inappropiate social etiquette (like farting in public) than risk of damage to the firearm.

Answer 9

One problem could be stress on the metal but unless you plan on dry firing the gun a few million times there should be no problem

Answer 10

Maybe it messes up the return spring when you dry fire. I mean if it isn't hitting a cap than it has to go a little further so it may be stretching the return spring.