| |
Why do I ask? Well, a topic
recently came up on the Wire that leads me to think that
some folks haven’t considered “lock time.” And what is
lock time? It’s the amount of time that it takes for
your hammer to fall once the sear has been tripped. For
practical purposes, and even though it’s not part of the
current definition, we’ll also include the time that it
takes for your primer to go off, the powder to ignite,
sufficient pressure to build, and finally, the bullet
exiting the muzzle of the gun. That’s a lot of stuff
that happens in a very short time!
So why is lock time important?
Well, for starters, if your hammer falls really slowly
it might very well not generate enough force to set off
the primers every time. Do your guns go bang every
time? If not, you might just have a lock time issue.
The solution might be as simple as replacing your
mainspring with a heavier one. It might also involve
smoothing of moving parts if there is enough friction to
slow down the hammer.
Have you ever missed a shot and had
no idea where it went? I see this problem a lot in my
shooting school. Here’s just one example of many. I had
a student who swore up and down that he had a sight
picture for each shot, yet he was missing targets and
had no idea why. So I watched him shoot a bank of 5
targets. He positively indexed on each one (indicating
that he had a sight picture), but he missed 2 of the 5
shots between targets. I asked him if I could
handle his gun, and he handed it to me. The feel of the
gun was outstanding, but as I suspected, the mainspring
was too light. I handed him my gun and had him try that
sweep again and he hit each target.
His problem was 3-fold. First off,
he wasn’t following through on each shot. So he was
moving the gun between the time when he pulled the
trigger and when the bullet exited the barrel. He moved
it far enough to pull a shot off an 18 inch wide target
at 7 yards. This lack of follow through was compounded
by a mainspring that was just heavy enough to set off
the primers, resulting in a very slow lock time. In
addition, his ammo was very light and the lack of
feedback from recoil exacerbated an existing problem
(he’s since stepped up to a heavier load). Knowing him
as I do, I knew that improving his follow through
wouldn’t fix the problem. It had to be mechanical. He
replaced the mainsprings with heavier and the problem
went away.
This is a classic example of slow
lock time. And it’s not just fast shooters that can
have these symptoms, everyone can. It takes a long time
for the hammer to fall in the guns that we use. There is
no benefit to be gained from very light springs. If you
are a competitive shooter it will slow you down. If you
are trying to clean matches, it very much increases the
odds that you’ll miss a target either due to failure to
fire or from slow lock time.
|
|
