Okay to dry fire Beretta M9

[VNAMVET70]

NRA Shooting Illustrated article "Mastering the Beretta M9" by Paul Markel wrote: "Dry fire is simply training without ammunition. I can not stress enough the importance of dry-fire practice."

 

I have seen this statement in two different articles: "Can you dry fire a Beretta M9? Answer: Dry fire is okay. Military M9's are probably dry fired more than they are with ammo in them."

 

The Department of the US Army, Navy and Air Force, Commandments, Marine Corps and Coast Guard TM Operators Manual for 9mm M9  July 1985 states on page 3-32 and 3-33 SAFETY/FUNCTION CHECK  WARNING Make sure pistol is clear/unloaded.  "Place safety in fire position. Squeeze trigger to check double action. Hammer should cock and fall." No where in the manual does it say not to dry fire.

 

Beretta USA CORP,  92 FS Instructions for operation

DRY FIRING "DUMMY ROUNDS"

"If you want to practice aim and trigger pull, insert a FIRED cartridge case or "DUMMY" cartridge in the chamber to cushion the fall of the firing pin and eliminate the chance of firing pin breakage.

Hammer fall in connection with the normal use of the manual-safety-decocking lever DOES NOT cause fire pin breakage.

Note: "DUMMY" cartridges with spring loaded "Primer" are excellent but expensive. 

          "DUMMY" cartridges with solid heads are good for loading/unloading and dry firing practice.

          "DUMMY" cartridges with empty primer pockets are good for loading/unloading practice but DOES NOT protect the firing pin when dry firing,

 

Question, Is it really okay to dry fire a Beretta M9 ? I have an early M9 made in ACKK, Maryland, USA , with two dot sights  

 

[Pickax]

No expert at all, but I would defer to Beretta instructions and load dummy rounds with fired primers.

[VNAMVET70]

Pickax, That would be to err on the side of caution. That is what my twin would do to play it safe.....never knowing if it was truly necessary. He is scared of his own shadow. I want to know whether I have a box of "DUMMY" cartridges or not. As I mentioned, The Beretta 92fs manual quote about loading "DUMMY" cartridges to dry fire with, did not come from the 1985 US Army gov't M9 manual, which referenced dry firing as part of a safety inspection of the pistol.  Also the "NRA Shooting"  author is extremely adamant about dry firing the Beretta M9 in order to master trigger pull . Since you said you are "no expert at all", I still remain a skeptic.

[mohawkALSE]

It is fine to dry fire them.  We dry fired them over and over before going to the live fire portion of the M9 SAFS course hosted by the CMP and the US Army Marksmanship Unit.  The AMU guys dry fired the hell out of the M9s in the safety portion of the course.   Many people who also teach pistol courses also say it is invaluable to do training with dry firing.   The only stuff I wouldn't say to dry fire would be something that is rim fire.  Ive seen damage done to the barrel/chamber area of 22 rimfire weapons that had been dry fired.

[VNAMVET70]

mohawk. What you conveyed carries a lot of weight. Thanks

[Sarge55]

Dry firing as with the M16 series rifle is part of the function check procedure of the weapon.

[EmperorWangDong]

No matter the firearm I always recommend snap caps. 9mm should be about the most common out there and for a few dollars should put your mind at ease. I dry fire NOTHING personally.

[whiskydown]

I have dry fired my Glock 34 thousands of times, in addition to firing thousands of rounds a year in USPSA competition, and I'm still running original parts. In my competition world I have never heard anyone say anything about avoiding dry fire with an M9 or 92 model.

 

Dry firing is a popular tool for learning and maintain marksmanship and gun movement fundamentals,  with the added perk of conserving ammo. Most world class competitors dry fire 100 times or more for every live round they shoot.

 

I have at least two books written just on the topic of dry fire by Ben Stoeger. 

[donaldnol]

has anyone been warn about hitting the butt on the ground with a loaded and cocked AR-15 or M-16 ?

[VNAMVET70]

Whiskeydown: Thank you for your comments. Just ordered Ben Stoeger's book "Dry-Fire Training." Couple weeks ago, when dry-firing noticed "trigger jerk". Think I overcame it by bending my legs and arms, and increasing my grip 20%. Trying to make stance, grip, position of trigger finger, and targeting a quick go to automatic reaction. In Basic Training we were taught if you got to think about it might be too late. 

[whiskydown]

Trigger jerk is a misleading term the shooting community is just starting to move away from.

 

Most of the time it is the rest of your dominant hand fingers tightening on the grip as you press the trigger. A sympathetic muscle reaction.

 

Hold your hand up, extend all your fingers and thumb. Now try to close JUST your trigger finger quickly and you will see it is almost impossible to keep your other extended fingers from trying to close. This is sympathetic muscle movement.

 

We have dumb monkey hands, made for grasping with all fingers.

 

This sympathetic muscle reaction causes the muzzle to dip low and to the side opposite your dominant hand typically.

 

The best cure I've found is relaxing the dominant hand to have very light pressure on the gun and using your support hand to do most of the clamping on the gun.

 

To do this effectively you need to get as much of the support hand palm on the grip as possible, get the hand high on the gun and thumb pointed towards the target, possibly even resting on the slide, which you won't even notice your thumb is riding on.

 

My grip goal for holding the gun is 80% work done by the support hand and 20% work done by the dominant hand so I can achieve fine trigger control. 

 

 

1 hour ago, donaldnol said:

has anyone been warn about hitting the butt on the ground with a loaded and cocked AR-15 or M-16 ?

 

If your rifle discharges from that event, then I would be looking at the fire control group for worn parts.

 

It is very common for an AR15 with the bolt carrier locked to the rear to go into battery when the butt is struck on the ground or other firm surface because the bolt bounces off of the bolt hold open lever, which is spring loaded to move out of the way of the bolt. But even in that event the rifle would not fire because the hammer and trigger sear surfaces are held engaged under spring pressure.

 

Additionally, the firing pin, which is free floating, does not have enough mass to ignite the primer from a bounce. If it did then it would discharge the round each time one is chambered.

[donaldnol]

2 hours ago, whiskydown said:

Trigger jerk is a misleading term the shooting community is just starting to move away from.

 

Most of the time it is the rest of your dominant hand fingers tightening on the grip as you press the trigger. A sympathetic muscle reaction.

 

Hold your hand up, extend all your fingers and thumb. Now try to close JUST your trigger finger quickly and you will see it is almost impossible to keep your other extended fingers from trying to close. This is sympathetic muscle movement.

 

We have dumb monkey hands, made for grasping with all fingers.

 

This sympathetic muscle reaction causes the muzzle to dip low and to the side opposite your dominant hand typically.

 

The best cure I've found is relaxing the dominant hand to have very light pressure on the gun and using your support hand to do most of the clamping on the gun.

 

To do this effectively you need to get as much of the support hand palm on the grip as possible, get the hand high on the gun and thumb pointed towards the target, possibly even resting on the slide, which you won't even notice your thumb is riding on.

 

My grip goal for holding the gun is 80% work done by the support hand and 20% work done by the dominant hand so I can achieve fine trigger control. 

 

 

 

If your rifle discharges from that event, then I would be looking at the fire control group for worn parts.

 

It is very common for an AR15 with the bolt carrier locked to the rear to go into battery when the butt is struck on the ground or other firm surface because the bolt bounces off of the bolt hold open lever, which is spring loaded to move out of the way of the bolt. But even in that event the rifle would not fire because the hammer and trigger sear surfaces are held engaged under spring pressure.

 

Additionally, the firing pin, which is free floating, does not have enough mass to ignite the primer from a bounce. If it did then it would discharge the round each time one is chambered.

i guess nobody has read up on the dangers of firing pin discharge on AR-15s you see i have. i thought that it was impossible that that could happen. but it did in field opperations my brother and i have a few AR-15s when loaded and safety in off position ready for fire if you hit the butt of your rifle hard on the ground it will discharge. but for safety reasons we demonstrated this without ammo

[whiskydown]

I have a bunch of 5.56 blanks so I will have to test this myself.

[Rhscott]

4 hours ago, donaldnol said:

i guess nobody has read up on the dangers of firing pin discharge on AR-15s you see i have. i thought that it was impossible that that could happen. but it did in field opperations my brother and i have a few AR-15s when loaded and safety in off position ready for fire if you hit the butt of your rifle hard on the ground it will discharge. but for safety reasons we demonstrated this without ammo

 

Well, stop doing that as it is damn stupid to do if it makes your rifle fire.  Sounds like a FCG parts issue.

[USMC_COLLECTOR]

Dry firing is ok for center-fire pistols. Anything rim fired will damage the firing pin and the inside of your barrel.

[mohawkALSE]

7 hours ago, donaldnol said:

i guess nobody has read up on the dangers of firing pin discharge on AR-15s you see i have. i thought that it was impossible that that could happen. but it did in field opperations my brother and i have a few AR-15s when loaded and safety in off position ready for fire if you hit the butt of your rifle hard on the ground it will discharge. but for safety reasons we demonstrated this without ammo

Were these builds or lower end ARs?  Id assume its not any mil spec factory build weapon.   This is the first Ive heard of that happening.

[donaldnol]

these would be colt AR-15s from the 70s no forward assist [i had it wrong anyway] it's not the butt end of the rifle rather the muzzle of the weapon if dropped or bump it will fire. and it did during the test that i put it threw, but later on i've sense change the parts out.

[dmar836]

I have never tried that test with a build or with a purchased firearm. Don't think I'll start.

[Rhscott]

[The Rooster]

I would guess that dry firing an AR 15 would cause no damage. Judging by the many times we practiced in the infantry by placing a penny up near the flash suppressor and squeezing off a dry shot trying to not knock the penny off.

In reality this kind of practice is all fine and good but in my opinion its a waste of time and

does not equate to going to the range and actually shooting.

Pistol or a rifle, actually firing it over and over cant be replaced by dry firing.

Each firearm additionally has its own quirks in operation, sighting and how it functions in general.

You only find those attributes out by firing live ammo.

Each weapon has a "trick" to it, thats unique to each weapon.

Like for instance a browing hi power I have... the most important thing to remember when firing it is that you have to aim it

slightly down and to the left of where you want the bullet to strike. Otherwise each shot goes hi and to the right of my aim point.

I could tap the sight sideways to pull it to the left but I could never do a thing about the elevation. So I just aim down and to the left.

Thats just for that particular fire arm. You only find that kind of thing out by shooting it.

I shot Sharpshooter with the M16A1 for years until one day I found the trick. It was... a feeling... a feeling that my sight picture was correct and it felt good and I would squeeze off the shot and I would get a hit. These were pop up human size targets that would pop up and drop at different ranges.

After I discovered the feeling... from then on I shot expert. Always qualified expert after that.

Range time... no replacement. And I had a good solid zero on my 16 that never changed. I could ALWAYS DIAL IT IN NO MATTER WHAT 16 i USED

 

 

[mohawkALSE]

5 hours ago, The Rooster said:

I would guess that dry firing an AR 15 would cause no damage. Judging by the many times we practiced in the infantry by placing a penny up near the flash suppressor and squeezing off a dry shot trying to not knock the penny off.

In reality this kind of practice is all fine and good but in my opinion its a waste of time and

does not equate to going to the range and actually shooting.

Pistol or a rifle, actually firing it over and over cant be replaced by dry firing.

Each firearm additionally has its own quirks in operation, sighting and how it functions in general.

You only find those attributes out by firing live ammo.

Each weapon has a "trick" to it, thats unique to each weapon.

Like for instance a browing hi power I have... the most important thing to remember when firing it is that you have to aim it

slightly down and to the left of where you want the bullet to strike. Otherwise each shot goes hi and to the right of my aim point.

I could tap the sight sideways to pull it to the left but I could never do a thing about the elevation. So I just aim down and to the left.

Thats just for that particular fire arm. You only find that kind of thing out by shooting it.

I shot Sharpshooter with the M16A1 for years until one day I found the trick. It was... a feeling... a feeling that my sight picture was correct and it felt good and I would squeeze off the shot and I would get a hit. These were pop up human size targets that would pop up and drop at different ranges.

After I discovered the feeling... from then on I shot expert. Always qualified expert after that.

Range time... no replacement. And I had a good solid zero on my 16 that never changed. I could ALWAYS DIAL IT IN NO MATTER WHAT 16 i USED

 

 

Range time on uncle sugars dime though is easier than out of pocket costs of ammo these days some would probably say.

[The Rooster]

24 minutes ago, mohawkALSE said:

Range time on uncle sugars dime though is easier than out of pocket costs of ammo these days some would probably say.

 Yup, It was one of the perks of service for sure.

Dry firing gives you no practice on reacquiring a good sight picture.

Even if it costs...... there's no substitute for range time to get familiar with your weapon of choice..

Just my opinion.

[dmar836]

But does the HP fire if slammed, barrel first, into a brick wall?

[mohawkALSE]

1 hour ago, The Rooster said:

 Yup, It was one of the perks of service for sure.

Dry firing gives you no practice on reacquiring a good sight picture.

Even if it costs...... there's no substitute for range time to get familiar with your weapon of choice..

Just my opinion.

I feel like there is some benefit to dry firing but I agree the most beneficial is actual live fire at the range.

[deadlinedwrench]

On 5/4/2022 at 6:32 PM, mohawkALSE said:

I feel like there is some benefit to dry firing but I agree the most beneficial is actual live fire at the range.

Each training technique has its uses. Yes, live fire at a range will allow you to grow more accustomed to the weapon, but dry firing helps you see why your group isn't where you want it. You can practice fundamentals and create muscle memory, then apply to live fire while expending less ammo. I dont always know for fact why my last shot was off, if dry firing, i can. Just my 2cents