View Full Version : Striker vs. Hammer - design merits
I've seen plenty of threads on the practical differences between carrying a hammer fired vs. a striker fired handgun (most seem to revolve around reholstering safety esp. when carrying AIWB). I get that there's another layer of safety associated with the ability to put your thumb on the hammer to have an additional tactile "alarm" that something is stuck in your trigger when you're reholstering. That's not what I'm asking about.
My question is more from an engineering or design perspective. Why would one choose to design around a particular ignition method?
What are the relative merits of a striker or a hammer? Weaknesses? I think it's fair to say that there are modern designs that are very good of both flavors - why did the engineers choose one vs. the other?
Do the choices and tradeoffs made at the engineering and design level have an effect on why we choose one pistol instead of another? Could it even if we're not aware of it?
Happy New Year, y'all.
bob (sort of a design geek)
John_Wayne777
01-01-11, 11:07
What are the relative merits of a striker
Generally fewer moving parts are required, the parts necessary to make it work are simpler and easier to produce, it allows for a lower bore axis (although this is lost on most shooters), etc. The things that make a striker-fired design easier to produce generally make it easier to service as well.
or a hammer?
A number of companies have a history of producing successful hammer-fired handguns and haven't really produced many successful striker-fired weapons. Sig, for example, has never made a striker-fired pistol to the best of my recollection. H&K has made several, but none were as commercially successful as their USP line of handguns.
Weaknesses? I think it's fair to say that there are modern designs that are very good of both flavors - why did the engineers choose one vs. the other?
Firearms engineers are often attempting to respond to market forces. Many underestimate what a game changer the Glock has been in the world of handguns. The Glock manages to be that blend of a reliable, durable handgun at a very attractive price. The Glock is designed specifically to be produced at a very low cost. It requires a minimum of machine time on CNC machines. The frame for a Beretta 92, by comparison, starts out as a 2 pound chunk of aluminum (IIRC) that must be machined extensively to end up with the frame we would recognize. Machining a slide and barrel for a Glock handgun, molding the polymer parts and stamping out the small steel parts used likely takes less overall machine time than making that single part for a Beretta 92.
These efficiencies in production gave Glock a serious competitive advantage in the market. Because Glocks were cheaper, seemed to work really well, and were sold through some smart marketing practices by Glock Inc. (like offering sweetheart deals on trade-ins from PD's) Glock gained in market share.
The end result of all of that is that now the handgun market is under the heavy influence of the Glock effect. The expectations people have about handguns have changed rather dramatically because of it. The smart companies who are releasing new handguns are going to potential customers and getting their feedback to help guide decisions on what to make. The S&W M&P is a good example of that process.
Smith wanted to take back some ground they lost to Glock. They hired smart people like Ernie Langdon and talked to people about what they would change about the Glock, then through an imperfect process turned the input of the smart people and customers into a handgun.
The engineers at Smith & Wesson went with a polymer-framed, striker-fired handgun because that's a relatively inexpensive way to make a handgun that still works reasonably well. That allowed them to sell a gun at a competitive price point and use some of the Glock marketing playbook without losing their shirts in the process.
Do the choices and tradeoffs made at the engineering and design level have an effect on why we choose one pistol instead of another?
It depends on who you refer to with "we". Most people are not buying handguns for the engineering. For the majority of the people purchasing handguns pricepoint is king. They are looking at perceived value for money. The engineering decisions made by a company can have a significant impact on the pricepoint and so that does play a role in the decision, but it's generally invisible to the average person buying a handgun.
A certain percentage of the market unquestionably purchases X handgun vs. Y handgun because of a specific feature of the weapon or because they are more familiar with the operating system. as more people cut their teeth on Glocks, it comes to define what they expect the trigger pull, reset, controls, etc. are supposed to be like on a handgun. These folks are, I would argue, a relatively small percentage of the individual buyer's market. Agency purchasers may take more of it into consideration due to concerns about maintenance and keeping a bunch of issue weapons up and running reliably for X number of officers/agents.
My question is more from an engineering or design perspective. Why would one choose to design around a particular ignition method?
Based on sample size of two of each, my hammer-fired ones deal with hard primers better. So, maybe a bit wider margin of reliability when using substandard ammo?
Based on sample size of two of each, my hammer-fired ones deal with hard primers better. So, maybe a bit wider margin of reliability when using substandard ammo?
Glock makes some great handguns, but it can be a bit frustrating when your striker-fired Glock is having a few misfires due to hard primers with military surplus ammo that just happens to run fine through a hammer-fired SIG or HK USP.
The Choice of handguns can often be at least partially based on some intangible emotional factors and successful marketing. It's not always the best gun that wins.
What John Wayne wrote is one of the best things I've ever read in relation to the existence of the Glock pistols and what's helped them to enjoy the success rate they have.
So much better and more thought out than the average "PD's buy 'em because they're cheap" responses you see on so many forums or parroted by gun shop commandos.
Pretty much everything has an evolution to it. Weapons are certainly no exception and I believe the striker fired weapons are a product of that. I'm satisfied with the performance I've gotten out of my Glocks and the one M&P that I owned.
I can remember when I got into LE the Sig P220, 226, and 229 were the top carried guns in holsters. Followed closely by Beretta 92's and then Ruger P series weapons for Officers that couldn't afford the others.
Now you'd be hard pressed to find anything that's not polymer/ striker fired related. Glock #1 here. Then you find 1911's and a few Smith M&P's. There's still a small handful of Sig's P series guns in my area but not a lot.
But that said and price point aside if the Glock's offerings weren't holding up or working they'd have never held the inroads they made into LE/Mil/Fed circles or gotten that far in the first place. I mean, you don't see a lot of striker fired High points in 6004's here.
CumbiaDude
01-01-11, 17:27
Glock makes some great handguns, but it can be a bit frustrating when your striker-fired Glock is having a few misfires due to hard primers with military surplus ammo that just happens to run fine through a hammer-fired SIG or HK USP.+1 to this. I have a Glock 19. My dad has a S&W 910 (or whatever it is). Hammer-fired. We had some old Israeli surplus 9mm ammo that would probably misfire 10-20% (it was free, so what the hell). I stopped shooting it in my Glock early on, simply because it was annoying to deal with. Was a lot easier for him to just recock the hammer and hit it again to deal with.
Generally fewer moving parts are required, the parts necessary to make it work are simpler and easier to produce, it allows for a lower bore axis (although this is lost on most shooters), etc. The things that make a striker-fired design easier to produce generally make it easier to service as well.
A number of companies have a history of producing successful hammer-fired handguns and haven't really produced many successful striker-fired weapons. Sig, for example, has never made a striker-fired pistol to the best of my recollection. H&K has made several, but none were as commercially successful as their USP line of handguns.
Firearms engineers are often attempting to respond to market forces. Many underestimate what a game changer the Glock has been in the world of handguns. The Glock manages to be that blend of a reliable, durable handgun at a very attractive price. The Glock is designed specifically to be produced at a very low cost. It requires a minimum of machine time on CNC machines. The frame for a Beretta 92, by comparison, starts out as a 2 pound chunk of aluminum (IIRC) that must be machined extensively to end up with the frame we would recognize. Machining a slide and barrel for a Glock handgun, molding the polymer parts and stamping out the small steel parts used likely takes less overall machine time than making that single part for a Beretta 92.
These efficiencies in production gave Glock a serious competitive advantage in the market. Because Glocks were cheaper, seemed to work really well, and were sold through some smart marketing practices by Glock Inc. (like offering sweetheart deals on trade-ins from PD's) Glock gained in market share.
The end result of all of that is that now the handgun market is under the heavy influence of the Glock effect. The expectations people have about handguns have changed rather dramatically because of it. The smart companies who are releasing new handguns are going to potential customers and getting their feedback to help guide decisions on what to make. The S&W M&P is a good example of that process.
Smith wanted to take back some ground they lost to Glock. They hired smart people like Ernie Langdon and talked to people about what they would change about the Glock, then through an imperfect process turned the input of the smart people and customers into a handgun.
The engineers at Smith & Wesson went with a polymer-framed, striker-fired handgun because that's a relatively inexpensive way to make a handgun that still works reasonably well. That allowed them to sell a gun at a competitive price point and use some of the Glock marketing playbook without losing their shirts in the process.
That's great info. Polymer makes sense - I have contacts in the metals industry so I know a thing or two about how metal pistols are made - and I have some forgings that would have been made into Smith and Wesson pistols had they made it as far as the machine shop. It didn't occur to me that it would be less expensive to produce a striker fired pistol - but it makes sense to me.
It depends on who you refer to with "we". Most people are not buying handguns for the engineering. For the majority of the people purchasing handguns pricepoint is king. They are looking at perceived value for money. The engineering decisions made by a company can have a significant impact on the pricepoint and so that does play a role in the decision, but it's generally invisible to the average person buying a handgun.
A certain percentage of the market unquestionably purchases X handgun vs. Y handgun because of a specific feature of the weapon or because they are more familiar with the operating system. as more people cut their teeth on Glocks, it comes to define what they expect the trigger pull, reset, controls, etc. are supposed to be like on a handgun. These folks are, I would argue, a relatively small percentage of the individual buyer's market. Agency purchasers may take more of it into consideration due to concerns about maintenance and keeping a bunch of issue weapons up and running reliably for X number of officers/agents.
It's the invisible stuff that I'm talking about. That intangible, "I just shoot it better" or whatever - reset, etc. that can come with one design choice or another. The end user may never know why they like something unless they decide to become a student of the design and engineering processes that go into a product, but they'll recognize the resultant qualities when they use it. It's like art - I can't tell you what I like, but I know it when I shoot it.
bob
Glock makes some great handguns, but it can be a bit frustrating when your striker-fired Glock is having a few misfires due to hard primers with military surplus ammo that just happens to run fine through a hammer-fired SIG or HK USP.
The Choice of handguns can often be at least partially based on some intangible emotional factors and successful marketing. It's not always the best gun that wins.
The other side of that coin is the ease of operating the slide. The Browning Hi-Power I had with it's stock setup would pop hard primers with no problem - but my wife couldn't operate the slide since the springs were so stiff. My Glock 19, however, she can operate just fine - so I don't use surplus ammo in it.
The browning is gone, the Glock remains, since the more likely use case is her shooting it (than me requiring the pistol to operate with surplus ammo).
bob
I came back in because I'd forgotten I had a comment I wanted to make on the hard primers and surplus ammo. When I did I just found this third report from Cumbiadude on his experiences.
I virtually never deal with surplus 9mm so I've never had opportunity to experience what these other posters have. Good and valuable information to have.
What I did experience is in relation to my own hand loads. When I set up my Dillon Super 1050 I was (and still am) running the ammo through my Glock 9mm's. I shot thousands of rounds of this ammo through my pistols without ever a hitch. Then one day I pulled my P226R out of the safe and was shooting it alongside a buddy that still carries a 226R on duty. I was surprised to get continuous misfires out of it. All of the rounds would discharge when I fired them again on a followup.
Obviously curious I started examining the rounds more closely I had with me and discovered that the primers were just very slightly high in their pockets. I'd never noticed it before upon examining them during the initial set up process on the 1050. I got my G26 out of the car and ran the ammo perfectly in it for the rest of the day.
So in that particular instance the Glock was able to eat up the imperfect loads perfectly where my beloved old Sig took two tries every failure before activating them.
But I appreciate the information on the surplus ammo with harder primers. Because some primers marketed for reloading are harder than others.
CumbiaDude
01-01-11, 18:37
So in that particular instance the Glock was able to eat up the imperfect loads perfectly where my beloved old Sig took two tries every failure before activating them.I had the opposite problem :D
Reloaded ammo was slightly shorter than the minimum. Jammed pretty regularly in my Glock (and was hard to get out, I'd have to hold the slide tight and slam my hand against the grip to get it out). Ran perfectly in my dad's S&W.
I got my Glock cuz it's "the AK of handguns", but it's been having teething problems. I think I got it all fixed now, though.
[This is all kind of off-topic, none of his has to do with striker vs hammer, but at least it's informative? lol]
RAM Engineer
01-01-11, 20:30
In addition to the lower bore axis, I also like the consistent trigger pull and lack of decockers/operating levers on most striker fired guns.
I'm eagerly awaiting the stateside appearance of the FNS pistol. I hope it "fixes" everything I disliked about the FNP & FNX series guns. If HK would make a G19 sized striker fired P30, I'd be in heaven.
In addition to the lower bore axis, I also like the consistent trigger pull and lack of decockers/operating levers on most striker fired guns.
I'm eagerly awaiting the stateside appearance of the FNS pistol. I hope it "fixes" everything I disliked about the FNP & FNX series guns. If HK would make a G19 sized striker fired P30, I'd be in heaven.
In about a year you will have that chance to be in heaven.
If HK would make a G19 sized striker fired P30, I'd be in heaven.
Is that what you really mean, or do you mean if they applied their thinking to a G19 sized pistol, you'd be on it?
Taking an existing design and converting it would, I believe, kill some of the benefits inherent with a striker fired design. The P30 has a higher bore axis than a G19 - would that stay? How about the trigger? I've heard rumors (on the internet, so I don't really believe it) that they're building a striker fired P30 - which I really don't get. It's part of why I posed the question in the first place.
Something with the bore axis and trigger consistency of a Glock, the size of G19, with the ergos and "overbuilt" qualities of the P30 would be pretty cool. Merge the best features of each pistol, right?
bob
What specific surplus ammo has been problematic for glock shooters?
I ask because in the past two years I have put probably no less than half a can of M882 downrange with a G19 and G26. American made 9mm NATO has only caused one problem for my G26 and it was a single failure to feed that I could not replicate or explain.
For me, I prefer the consistent short pull of striker fired pistols, namely Glock. Dont mind the DA/SA transition on my P229, but it is just a little slower, but that's a training issue really. The largest difference for me at least, is during reholstering where I can cover my thumb over the hammer after decocking on my Sig to ensure a safe reholster (1911-differs of course, but I don't own one any longer). I am tenative about the reholster a lot more with my Glock, especially since now I carry AIWB. YMMV.
RAM Engineer
01-01-11, 23:26
Something with the bore axis and trigger consistency of a Glock, the size of G19, with the ergos and "overbuilt" qualities of the P30 would be pretty cool. Merge the best features of each pistol, right?
Exactly.
Something with the bore axis and trigger consistency of a Glock, the size of G19, with the ergos and "overbuilt" qualities of the P30 would be pretty cool. Merge the best features of each pistol, right?
bob
This is what I was hoping for with the FN's new FNS. I wanted an exposed hammer also for safety in reholstering, but alas, one can't have everything.
Is it true that striker systems have a faster lock time than hammer? Might be a small point, but relevant to the conversation.
Something with the bore axis and trigger consistency of a Glock, the size of G19, with the ergos and "overbuilt" qualities of the P30 would be pretty cool. Merge the best features of each pistol, right?
bob
I have to ask, what "overbuilt qualities of the p30" is the Glock 19 lacking?
I was thinking about this very subject a week or two ago, noticing how funny it was that rifle and pistols switched operating mechanisms. Early 20th century; hammer fired pistols, striker rifles. Now the opposite.
I have to ask, what "overbuilt qualities of the p30" is the Glock 19 lacking?
Honestly, I'm just referring to what I've heard. I don't have a P30, but I've heard and read that they're overengineered and overbuilt. I personally carry a G19 - there's no trust issue with me on the pistol.
bob
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