Malfunction drills - what are your standards?

[sadmin]

I'm curious as to how often and which drills you do that are related to malfunction. *I was putting my "drill" schedule together for this weekend and I started considering at what point in priority of training do I implement something like "3 little kittens" or the like. *At a recent class by a known instructor, we spent around 2 hours or so working malfunctions which implies their importance I suppose. *But to a civy, how applicable do you think they are? *

Just interested in how often you work them and to what par times you consider sufficient to be "back in the fight."*

[CGSteve]

The only thing that I am able to say is that for a "defense minded civilian, malfunction drills are equally important for a serviceman or law enforcement official. I say this because if you are actually "using" your weapon for its intended purpose and have a malfunction, then at that point it doesn't matter if you're wearing a uniform or not.

With certainty, the chance of one actually using the weapon is greater if you're active military deployed to an area with active hostilities and you are outside the wire, less likely if you are the majority of LE officials, and even less likely if you're not one of the above, but my emphasis was on "defense minded".

My agency given "carbine course" dedicated several hours a day in a week long course to malfunctions.

[Magic_Salad0892]

Something similar to ''3 Little Kittens'' IMHO is ideal, or having a friend load your mags and dick with dummy rounds, or have mags with ****ed up springs or followers is what I prefer.

I haven't really devised a ''par time'' that I like.

5 seconds?... I try for less.

[jenrick]

One question that becomes important is: Do you have a secondary weapon to transition to? If so how far out can you shoot in a combat situation (less then 15 yds for most folks in my experience)?

If you are a superb pistol shooter capable of engaging targets out to 65-75 yds in a combat situation, and you always have your secondary then malfunction drills aren't as important as transition drills. On the other hand if you don't always have your pistol handy, malfunction drills become a huge deal.

Three little kittens and other malfunction drills are excellent ways to train unknown type of malfunctions. I'd also recommend using magazines with bad feed lips for double feed practice, and dummy rounds for FTF IAD's. If you get a chance check out Kyle Lambs Rifle Malfunctions DVD, probably the best single point source of info on the topic currently.

-Jenrick

[Jim D]

IMHO, malfunction drills are blown WAY out of proportion.

If your gun stops with any frequency which makes you doubt it's suitability for combat, sell it and buy a new one.

I watch Police Dept's spend all kinds of time on the range having officers do one handed malfunction clearance drills at 5 yards on paper targets, while those same officers can't hardly hit those same target at 25 yards.

In order for any time standard to have meaning, that would mean that you would have to be
1) engaged in a gunfight.
2) have fired enough rounds to cause a stoppage, but not enough to take your opponent out.
3) be far enough away from your opponent (or behind sufficient cover) that you won't be burned down the moment your gun stops running.
4) be close enough that time is of the essence.
5) not have another weapon to transition to, or you are out of the useful range of that weapon.
6) have a problem with the gun that won't re-appear again immediately (broken extractor, etc.)

At the distances that most pistol fights occur within, going to a blade or empty hands is a hell of a lot more real world that standing a few yards away screwing around with a broken gun.

If it's your carbine that stopped running, who doesn't have a pistol to transition to?

Sorry for the rant, but I think a lot of people that hype up the importance of spending hours and hours on fixing broken guns often loose sight of the big picture here. It's natural for firearms trainers to want a firearms solution... but that doesn't mean it's the most appropriate (or highest percentage) solution.

Just because you're in a fight for your life and you have a gun, doesn't mean your gun is the only way to win that fight.

[jenrick]

In order for any time standard to have meaning, that would mean that you would have to be
1) engaged in a gunfight.
2) have fired enough rounds to cause a stoppage, but not enough to take your opponent out.

You've never had the joy of a first round failure to fire?

3) be far enough away from your opponent (or behind sufficient cover) that you won't be burned down the moment your gun stops running.
4) be close enough that time is of the essence.

I've never known a gun fight where time WASN'T of the essence.

5) not have another weapon to transition to, or you are out of the useful range of that weapon.
6) have a problem with the gun that won't re-appear again immediately (broken extractor, etc.)

For LE I agree that transition is usually better option, but a whole lot of MIL folks don't have that option.

At the distances that most pistol fights occur within, going to a blade or empty hands is a hell of a lot more real world that standing a few yards away screwing around with a broken gun.

Also who the heck said anything about screwing around with a broken gun at close range? Don't read into peoples post things that aren't there. Any good instructor will tell you to figure out your own distance to transition, clear a malf, or go with plan C. Spending all your time working transitions is just as bad as never working with your secondary, tertiary, etc at all. To be able to run the gun you have to be able to fix it if it breaks.

-Jenrick

[GTF425]

If it's your carbine that stopped running, who doesn't have a pistol to transition to?

A lot of people. Unfortunately, in my unit, unless you're an Officer, a 240 gunner, or a 1SG/CSM, you're not getting a pistol.

A major lesson learned from my last deployment was that not enough NCO's teach their soldiers how to clear the common malfunctions we face. SPORTS/POPS does not fix everything and in a no-shit gunfight, the two seconds you spend finger ****ing with your weapon trying to clear a malfunction you don't understand can get you or, worse even, one of your brothers shot in the face. I don't know how I would explain to someone's family how my inability to prepare their son got him killed.

Murphy is ALWAYS in effect and he's an asshole for sure. I've learned that the absolute worst we perform at the range is how we will perform in high-stress like combat. That's why I try to shoot as much as possible and train for as much as realistically possible. I don't know what I'm going to face, but I want to have a broad skillset to fall back on when things don't go my way. Clearing malfunctions is one of these that I believe can and does save lives.

[rickp]

You've never had the joy of a first round failure to fire?



I've never known a gun fight where time WASN'T of the essence.



For LE I agree that transition is usually better option, but a whole lot of MIL folks don't have that option.



Also who the heck said anything about screwing around with a broken gun at close range? Don't read into peoples post things that aren't there. Any good instructor will tell you to figure out your own distance to transition, clear a malf, or go with plan C. Spending all your time working transitions is just as bad as never working with your secondary, tertiary, etc at all. To be able to run the gun you have to be able to fix it if it breaks.

-Jenrick

Great points.

I love when people assume the circumstances of a fight!!! It really shows their mindset.

It doesn't matter what one thinks the likelihood of something happening or the circumstance under how it might happen, it still needs to be practiced and be practiced to the point of being very proficient at it. Unless all you do with the system is compete, you're practicing for a fight, do you really want to leave it to chance??

[Jim D]

You've never had the joy of a first round failure to fire?

Not really, no.

I've never known a gun fight where time WASN'T of the essence.

To me, fixing a stoppage is about as real world as the speed reload winning a gunfight... IE: super-rare. Of all the people I know, and all of the ones they know, there have been maybe 1 or 2 instances of this in hundreds of firefights (.mil mostly, some LE).

For LE I agree that transition is usually better option, but a whole lot of MIL folks don't have that option.

Right, instead you have a squad of dudes with machine guns covering each other...

Also who the heck said anything about screwing around with a broken gun at close range? Don't read into peoples post things that aren't there. Any good instructor will tell you to figure out your own distance to transition, clear a malf, or go with plan C. Spending all your time working transitions is just as bad as never working with your secondary, tertiary, etc at all. To be able to run the gun you have to be able to fix it if it breaks.

-Jenrick

I'm not trying to read into your post, I'm just speaking from experience. A lot of people think they're good at fixing their gun, so they'll "just do that." My point is, if you go to the range and practice hours of fixing stoppages, but you don't practice dropping the gun and charging the target, or muzzle striking it with an empty/jammed up gun, or drawing a blade and stabbing your target... what do you think your default response is going to be? My bet is going to be task fixation on the gun.

Here is an example of this happening (GRAPHIC VIDEO): http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=fd7_1284690688

My little rant was just to emphasis the danger of constantly framing the problem as a firearms one, and always looking for a firearms solution.

In all the training I've attended, watched, read about, etc... VERY little attention has been spent on the idea that you need to abandon that gun, step up your level of violence, and go to your next best weapon.

This is why I really value training that emphasizes transitions and integrations of blade, empty hand, carbine, pistol, etc.

[Jim D]

Great points.

I love when people assume the circumstances of a fight!!! It really shows their mindset.

By spending hours on fixing their gun, and next to no time transitioning to other weapons, closing the range, etc... that presumes that fixing your gun is your best solution. Tell me about a real world situation, that you know the details of, where a secord or three spent reloading or fixing a gun made the difference in someone's survival. I can think of Paul's (RetreatHell) firefight, but that's about it.

It doesn't matter what one thinks the likelihood of something happening or the circumstance under how it might happen, it still needs to be practiced and be practiced to the point of being very proficient at it. Unless all you do with the system is compete, you're practicing for a fight, do you really want to leave it to chance??

The likelyhood matters in determining what amount of time we spend working each specific skill and response. If if didn't, none of us would practice more with a pistol inside of 10 yards than we do at 25 yards.

We tailor our training time spent to what is of the most perceived benefit to our real world survival. We train for the most likely situations we can be expected to face.

Tell me how fixing a broken gun is LARGELY the most appropriate response? Tell me how in the majority of situations where fixing the gun IS the most appropriate response, that a few seconds is absolutely critical.