Serious IL questions and opinions.....

We don't live in a high-crime area and I have no real reason to carry but I do have a Pennsylvania License to Carry Concealed Weapons as it one of two ways you can legally carry a handgun while hunting in the Keystone State and they can be helpful for collectors, which the reason for having it that is stated on mine. But I'm not crazy about the locks, either, and while I own about a dozen S&W revolvers, none have locks and I don't see myself buying one that does.

Having said all that, I see the biggest problem regarding firearms in the home to be responsible storage. I live near Harrisburg, the state capitol, and we have had two preventable shootings involving kids during the last couple of years.

I the first case, a 10 year-old was playing with his aunt's 40S&W in the presence of his older cousin, who was supposed to be watching him but had a bunch of friends over for who-knows-what activity. The cousin, who knew enough about guns to be dangerous, made the gun "safe" by removing the loaded magazine. The 10 year-old promptly put the round in the chamber into his forehead.

The aunt bought the gun "on the street" from someone who got it from its rightful owner's girlfriend who stole it from the owner during a lover's spat. The local newspapers were filled with articles about what a shame it is that there are so many guns "out there." Never mind that it was stolen goods (the owner and the girlfriend kissed and made up right about when that kid was blowing his brains out, so it was never reported stolen), that some unlicensed street "dealer" bought and sold a handgun or that the aunt obtained it illegally. It was the gun's fault, can't you people see that?

In the second case, a three year-old walked through his family's living room past his father and two of his friends carrying his father's loaded 9mm and proceeded to the kitchen, where he shot his mother. She survived but again, it was the gun's fault.

Obviously, the guns in question were not stored in a responsible manner. I see the anti-gun outfits' next move to be pushing for legislation to prosecute gun owners when their gun is stolen from an "irresponsible" storage medium. And you know, I'm not really against that idea. It's just dumb to keep a loaded firearm under a mattress, in a nightstand or in a closet or other insecure place when there are children in the house. And even though our kids are grown and on their own, there still isn't a gun in my nightstand because as soundly as I sleep, a perp would be using it on me before I even knew he/she was in the house.

I write for Shotgun Sports Magazine and made this subject the topic of a column a year or so ago. If we gun owners as a group don't take the initiative to keep our guns stored responsibly, we as a group will suffer the consequences. One container that any judge and jury accepts as being as responsible a storage device as exists is a safe. The very word suggests that the gun owner did all he could to keep his firearms out of the hands of others.

Ed
 
I dont have an integrated lock in my S&W semi auto, a 5906 , but I did have one on my Taurus handgun and made frequent use of it. I also keep the magazine of my 5906 under my control when I am away from the weapon.

Here is why. When I joined this forum I stayed with a friend in the military on base with his wife.The two had spirited discussions about disagreements ranging from the lady friends my pal was seeing off duty to what stuff he was buying for said female work aquaintance and so forth.Then his wife hit on me, which is a different can of worms that did NOT improve the tense atmosphere.

The living environment was fairly turbulent , which I didn't know about prior to moving in. When I left the house the handgun I didn't carry was locked in a case with the internal lock engaged and the key on my person. The last thing I needed to face was coming home to my friend or his wife being severely injured or dead from a weapon I left in the house,and the Air Force Security Police putting me in cuffs on charges.

Moving in a safe for two handguns would have been expensive and impossible to hide.

Buying a lockable safe that's carryable would work, except being carryable it could be easily carried out of my room.

Keeping the weapons in my car exposes them to theft.

In my particular case having an internal lock on my Taurus saved me a lot of grief.I understand the political nature of why gun owners do not like the locks, but sometimes those annoying features can come in handy.

For example,using my 5906's magazine disconnect is a great way to safe the gun for unexpected trips to prohibited zones. Leaving a loaded gun in a car in front of a post office or other prohibited zone is a chance for a crook to bust in and grab your weapon, whereas if they do that with a 5906 or other mag disconnect equipped weapon they get a loaded paperweight. Sure, the crook can order a new magazine but that will take time, which allows me to go to the authorities to report the weapon before its used in a crime...which is also prevented by keeping the mag on my person.

This runs counter to a lot of gun owner's beliefs, but sometimes integrated safety features come in handy.
 
I really don't mind a lock on a weapon....don't have any with locks, but the Taurus system was the best when I had one with an IL on it. Out-of-sight-out-of-mind.

I would not mind the Smith lock if it were not so flimsy. If you have never gutted one it's a 5-piece Rube Goldberg contraption that is totally way over engineered. There just has to be a better way to install a solid lock on a beautiful gun.
 
Perhaps I'm mistaken but I thought that there weren't supposed to be any more IL threads on this portion of the forum?

This issue HAS been beaten to death. The antis will never change and the others just don't give a rip. I'm in the latter category. Don
 
While I respect the opinion of all here I really do not understand the strong dislike for the lock. For me, if it saves one life I have no problem with it. I was taught to respect and how to handle a firearm at a very young age but I also know how I was at a young age. I would not trust ME at a young age to not do something dumb and possibly hurt myself or someone else. The lock is fine with me, just my two cents.
Be safe, Frank.
 
No disrespect Photoman, I value your opinion greatly. Is there a thread here that might begin to quantify actual problems with the locks. IIRC, I've seen one thread or an entry in someone else thread that said they had a failure of some sort.

Or is this a case of "well my second cousin twice removed once heard of a guy that was related to another guy that hear about someone else that had some sort of problem".

Maybe I'll start a poll.


First, thank you for that great J frame spring test!

Second, I found many legitimate cases of IL failure, at least enough examples for me that I came to the conclusion to not trust the device. Many have been documented on here on the Forum.

I guess it all comes down to a personal, statistical calculus to determine if the low probability of failure is worth the risk. Given that I have the ability to easily acquire a gun without the lock, that's what I do. I'm lucky in that I don't want any models that are only available with the IL (although I have owned some in the past). I do still own one Model 642 with the IL but the parts were long ago removed.
 
I think we will keep talking about this until we do get shut-down.....which is alight by me.

Tyrod's poll thread results indicate a 7-percent IL failure/problem rate so far. May I ask....if you had a gun that misfired 7 times out of 100...would you trust it. NO...you would be on here screaming about FTF issues.
 
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I think we will keep talking about this until we do get shut-down.....which is alight by me.

Tyrod's poll thread results indicate a 7-percent IL failure/problem rate so far. May I ask....if you had a gun that misfired 7 times out of 100...would you trust it. NO...you would be on here screaming about FTF issues.

I will just say that while I trust my Model 36, I will never trust my 637 ever again even if I ripped its guts out.

I'm curious for those few of us that have had it really fail, how many feel as I do?

Also, while I have no doubt that the real percentage is very low when you look at the volume of guns made compared to ILS failure, the fact that it fails at all is just poor design. The pitch fork on the spring with the flag right next to the hammer is an oil mixing lint and dust magnet. The spring is in the direction of the guns recoil. The keys all seem to be the exact same key copied thousands of times over.

And the worst part is that there have to be a dozen different designs that would be invisible or close to it. I always liked the idea of using the screw in the cylinder release latch as the lock. I was told that's a dumb idea since any slotted driver would unlock it. And a key copied the umteenth time isn't darn near the same? Push the latch forward and the hammer and trigger don't work. The cylinder would be able to swing open, but so what? I'm just throwing the idea out as a possible that wouldn't be so invasive and not require the spring, the frame size change on the K frame, and you wouldn't have all the wart in the side talk, and I'm pretty sure the argument of where the firing pin should be would still be the king troll thread.

The MIM is an obvious win for them so I can see why the whining will never defeat that one. I will still wish they could make it look better, but whatever.

So the question in my mind is why the dogged stay with the too many parts solution that throws the look so bad and keeps threads like these going a decade later still? Why? :confused:
 
I would also say that I've talked to a S&W engineer I know about the IL issue. From his perspective, there are far more IL issues on the internet than actually happen.

The poll also appears to be bogus, there is NO way that there is a 10% IL lock failure rate as the poll suggested when I first used it. If S&W had that kind of failure rate, they'd been subject to massive law suits and that hasn't happened. Sigh. Don
 
I would also say that I've talked to a S&W engineer I know about the IL issue. From his perspective, there are far more IL issues on the internet than actually happen.

The poll also appears to be bogus, there is NO way that there is a 10% IL lock failure rate as the poll suggested when I first used it. If S&W had that kind of failure rate, they'd been subject to massive law suits and that hasn't happened. Sigh. Don


I don't know that we will ever know the real number of failures. My guess is the actual number is very small.
 
Personally I will not tolerate or have ANY lock on ANY gun.
I have only one S&W that was made with the lock. I might buy more, but if I do the first thing I will do is remove the lock. I want my guns to fire when necessary, I cannot have any type of lock failures.

If I am worried about my gun being handled by unauthorized people, adults or children then I secure the gun, from their ability to touch it...

I think who ever came up with the lock design, and who ever made it standard production should be burned alive at the stake.

I consider it one of the worst "gun" decisions ever made.

I am all for gun safety.

If a person needs to lock up a gun, and does not, or cannot afford some type of safe, then an inexpensive external locking device will work, without compromising the reliability of the gun, all IMHO of course.
 
Measuring the effectiveness of an internal firearms lock is statistically difficult to the point of being impossible, as the problem is similar to criminal vs citizen encounters where brandishing a weapon ends the attack and no police report is filed, thus denying researchers a metric to track.

I dont know whether or not my Taurus IL prevented the unauthorized use of the weapon, as anyone who tampered with it wont be in a hurry to announce to me they were screwing with my firearm.We know the failure rates, more or less, when the gun doesn't fire or malfunctions....but there is no way the owner will be aware of instances where kids, friends of kids, and unauthorized people in general tamper with a locked firearm unless the miscreant is caught red handed with his finger on the trigger.

As a kid , I got real good at listening for footsteps and the sound of my parent's car when I was up to no good.By the time Mom got upstairs to see what happened I typically covered up whatever mischeif I was up to. As such, with IL we only hear one side of the story and its typically negative.The times an IL saved a life will by comparison never see the light of discussion.
 
As a bleeding heart liberal I used to laugh at the idea that "guns don't kill people, people kill people".

I now understand that:

Safe people with safe guns don't kill people.
Safe people with unsafe guns can kill people.
Unsafe people with safe guns can kill people.
Unsafe people with unsafe guns need to be locked up before they hurt somebody!
Be safe, and enjoy your sport!
 
For TCC, I would say that virtually any quality firearm that is unsafe has been made so by fools modifying something they know little about. Don
 
I own one revolver with a lock. It's a model 60-15. So far I havent had any problems with it. I have fired full house 357 mag loads through it and I have engaged and disengaged the lock with no problems so far. Since I am your average citizen, law abiding, with a love of shooting and hunting I do not often run into the variety of situations that a law enforcement officer or CCW permit holder does. However since the kids are grown and we have had a garage burglary and an attempted front door breakin, I keep loaded weapons in hidden, accessible places in the house. I have not run into a situation where the internal lock has been useful. In my life a locked gun is as useless as an unloaded gun.
 
My situation mimics yours Fletch. I don't live in gang-land, but the trash is moving out into the more rural areas. I have already stopped a doped-up would-be burglar at my front door and thwarted a burglary across the street at my neighbors house, who was burglarized last year.

If I had a gun with a lock on it...it would never be locked and I keep all of them loaded and one is always within reach no matter where I am in the house. Only ones at home are me and the wife and we both have carry permits and we both carry no-locks.
 
If you check the cylinder for full rotation every time you load the gun, you will not accidentally leave the gun locked.
I have been shooting and carrying a revolver for self defense for 30 years, and I have to admit I am unfamiliar with the full rotation test when loading. Could you please explain how this is done?
Very carefully, with great regard for muzzle direction and little concern about a turn line. With the gun fully loaded and cylinder closed, pull the hammer back far enough to allow you to rotate the cylinder, and do so at least 360 degrees. This check for high primers, crud under the extractor, and other causes of failure of the cylinder to rotate.

It's a little trickier on a Centennial, which is one of the advantages of a bobbed-hammer Chief. The other is that it is easier to holster the Chief safely, by holding the hammer down while doing so.
 
My point has always been; I don't care if it has a lock or not, I buy based on quality and price. The used S&Ws are cheaper and at least as good quality as the new ones. So all mine are the used variety. I'd buy one with the IL if I could find a less expensive used one - it just has not happened yet.

The bigger issue IMHO with S&W is their move away from the 2" and 3" K frames. I really wish they'd bring those back. Especially the 66 2.5".
 
I own a number of j frames and most were purchased in prelock days. I do have a 340M&P recent purchase with no IL and I just bought a 438 with the IL. I prefer no lock but would not hesitate to purchase one I liked if it had the lock, and I have no plans to disable the one on the 438.
 
If a gun isn't holstered on my person, it's locked in my safe. I have never engaged a firearm's internal lock. I never leave firearms unattended, and I would sooner take a moment to secure the revolver in my safe than engage its internal lock.

This mirrors my philosophy.

If the weapon is with-in reach, it's loaded.
If not, it's unloaded & in the safe.

Is the IL good? or bad? There are too many no-lock,, pre-lock weapons available to ever think of buying one w/IL..


My $00.0002

:cool:
 
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