Slide lock back

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Permalink Reply by josh2415 on October 27, 2011 at 6:43pm

Personally, I think it (and any other XR9 slide lock back) is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist, AND would add un-needed complexity to an already elegant design.  BUT, if the market demands a lock back, this seems to be a logical suggestion.  Knowing Arne, he's probably already thought of it, and has sound reasoning for not incorporating it into the design.

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Permalink Reply by Ed on October 28, 2011 at 11:55am

Slide lock back to indicate that there are no more rounds in the magazine and then a manual slide release following fresh magazine insertion make sense for weapons that follow Browning's design and strip a round from a magazine when the slide is moving forward. However, this "feature" does add weight, mechanical complexity and cost to manufacture and is nonsensical for a weapon that strips a round from the magazine when the slide is moving rearward. What would be more useful is a tactile and visual indicator that there is a round in the chamber. The witness hole that is now featured on the XR9-S for determining whether there is a round in the chamber is only useful under well lit or daylight range conditions and is unsuitable for stressful situations in the dark. It is interesting that an online search of the string "loaded chamber indicator patents" results in showing interesting mechanisms such as the Walther patent for the indicator used in the P-38 pistol. Ruger also has a recent patent that you can see in their recent pistol designs (which some claim causes jams), but Ruger's recently introduced SR1911 only uses a witness hole like the XR9-S does.

Given all that, the Boberg XR9-S, Rohrbaugh pistols (which also does not lock back the slide when empty) and other manufacturers' revolvers do not have either manual safeties or tactile loaded chamber indicators. Also, since revolvers retain the spent cartridges, examination from the side only shows you that a cartridge is in the cylinder, but does not show you whether it is fired or unfired. How do you operate these weapons? Load the pistol or revolver and fire until no bang occurs after squeezing the trigger (empty) or count your rounds fired and pray that you did not miscount. Remove the magazine whether empty or containing one or a few rounds or pop the crane and extract the rounds, expended or not. Repeat as necessary or desired. Training to shoot a revolver under adverse conditions teaches you that while less compact and slightly heavier, six shot capacity is better than five shot when you are shooting but that five shot is better to carry if you do not reasonably expect to need to shoot (similar to why 7+1 capacity at 17 ounces empty can be better than 6+1 at 14 ounces), to bang the revolver with the crane open against your thigh while your thumb is pressing the extractor button to assist the ejection of the hot expended, expanded rounds, and that you need speed loaders to reduce fumbling and dropped rounds when reloading. Also, depending on the situation, reloading before you are empty is desirable if the opportunity to reload safely presents itself. If you are under fire and have insufficient cover, reloading may not be safe so you better have a back up gun. Training with the revolver also taught me to really appreciate semi-automatic pistols as they are much quicker to reload, they usually have larger round capacity and being flatter they are more concealable. Part of my own transition from revolver to pistol was a dislike of manual safeties and appreciation of smooth double action triggers for at least the first shot. The trade-off? Magazine spring compression of loaded magazines reducing reliability for magazines left loaded.

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Permalink Reply by BretShooter on October 28, 2011 at 12:06pm

"Magazine spring compression of loaded magazines reducing reliability for magazines left loaded."

 

This has been disproven.  # of Cycles of compression is what wears out a spring, not length of time compressed.

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Permalink Reply by Arne Boberg on October 28, 2011 at 12:22pm

I agree.  Fully-loaded storage over many months have not changed the set lengths of XR9-S magazine springs at all.  Cycling will reduce their load over time, but not as dramatically as other brands since our spring is under less stress (half the spring rate or less).

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Permalink Reply by Ed on October 28, 2011 at 1:17pm

I stand corrected. Thank you!

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Permalink Reply by Jethro on November 2, 2011 at 5:39pm

The comments on the sigforum write up got me thinking how tactically valuable it would be to have a "last round chambered" indicator (ie empty magazine) - something the xr9s' design could allow for. How much *cleaner and faster* to change the magazine with the final round in the chamber, and continue - a tactical reload that involves no slide racking. It's a whole new concept. Since the xr9s' design makes this easily feasible, it becomes yet another way it is innovative.  The flag could either stick up by the rearsight (as mentioned on sigforum by LDD) or even nudge the meat of the user's griphand with a "tactile" flag through the magwell (and why not both). Only drawback is that it forms a habit that wouldn't transfer to other pistols, and we revert to our muscular memory under stress. But since the boberg simply can't be made to lock back anyway, the empty mag flag info can only be a plus. I think it'd be cool feature, and that much more distinction for an already really stand out new design.

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Permalink Reply by PATRAT on November 3, 2011 at 5:16pm

It may be possible to have the mag automatically eject itself when empty, speeding up a reload ala the garand en-bloc clip.

 

It would go over horribly with naysayers though.

 

 

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Permalink Reply by alternety on November 4, 2011 at 1:49am

Auto mag ejection: what a horrible idea. Really.

How many times would you be cleaning off the sand and other things on the range, backyard, or available field (when you find the mag). And then there is the pounding out of the dents and fixing of scratches from the rocks or concrete.

The M1 "clip" is a throw away.

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Permalink Reply by PTrinh on November 5, 2011 at 12:33am

I second that auto mag ejection is a horrible idea.  Seems like the only way to remedy this issue is some sort of ammo counter/mag empty indicator.  Do such things exist?  I mean in the heat of battle you are probably not going to pay attention to round count or even a fictional ammo display, or even use the slide release. Seems like people are just over-thinking this a little too bit. But nonetheless, if I were to tackle this "problem" I would just place some kind of indicator (mechanical or electrical) that would easily notify the shooter that the mag is empty and there's one round in the chamber.  Maybe a low-intensity light would come on at the front sight post (yellow for only one in the chamber, and red for completely empty), or a bulge would pop out against the grip... I think it's more of a convenience for recreational shooters to not rack the slide every time they empty a mag. But adding such things will only make the weapon more complex and increase failure rate.  Maybe make it an add-on option for those willing to pay for it later down the road. Of course an electrical option would require a laser to piggy-back off the battery and would only turn on when the weapon is being gripped.  Which can be tied to the laser again.  Grip the weapon and it does two things - laser comes on and round count indicator comes on.  Fictional ideas, but hey, maybe in the future...

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Permalink Reply by Jose A. Montalvo on November 5, 2011 at 11:04am

I think that the design is fine as it is, and the little flag would be a good idea only if it did not overly complicate the action and/or degrade performance. Too many of those devices are blamed for mags not dropping free, or triggers not being as smooth as they should be...

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Permalink Reply by alternety on November 5, 2011 at 1:12pm

Reading many posts about slide lock open on empty around this forum and on others, I have the feeling that a lot of people simply do not understand the way Arne's babe works. Maybe I don't, but I think I do.

If the bolt locked open on an empty magazine, you would have two choices after inserting a new mag:

1 - Close the bolt and then perform a full slide cycle manually. Then it will go bang. One completely unnecessary action in a self defense situation is not desirable.

2 - Manually insert a round in the chamber, and release the slide. I am not even sure how well this actually works with the little clamp that wants to be on the bullet when it chambers. In combat?

The bolt does not strip a round from the magazine on closing. Look at the slow motion animation on this site. There is no way for the bolt to push a round from the magazine forward into the chamber. It must strip the round on the rearward cycle to get the round aligned for insertion in the magazine. The round in the magazine is not parallel to the barrel like every other gun.

Locking open on the second last round could work. But I would never buy a gun that did not let me seamlessly fire my last round. You know, the one you need for yourself as the zombies start to eat your flesh.

Indicator of one round remaining yes. Indicator of empty, not so useful (it did not go bang and you are using high quality personal defense ammo). LRHO, does not work for this design. Stop discussing it like it is possible (and useful). If you see a post pushing for LRHO, add a post explaining the situation. It is being considered a negative out there (and a little bit here).

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Permalink Reply by John Brady on November 5, 2011 at 3:40pm

Not sure if practical or even possible but it would be interesting to have the hammer hold open and or maybe even the trigger to go unsprung or hold back in its "pulled" position.  This would give both a visual and a tactical indication of empty.  Just thinking.  Actually would be a good idea in conventional semi's as well as I have seen and even pulled the trigger myself on a empty semi even with the slide back.  A "dead" or "stuck" trigger would be a solid signal.  Having a "dead" trigger on an unloaded gun would also give the ability to pick up the weapon and know if it is empty or loaded just from the trigger feel. 

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