As a fan of the double action auto, you may think that I am against single action guns. Since one of the benefits of the DA auto is how safe it is to live with, day in and day out, you might assume that the single action auto is just the opposite. Not the case.
I am a big fan of the single action auto, and carried one for large parts of my career. In my case it was a 1911, but there are a few others out there these days, with various forms of the 2011 being the most popular. Single action guns are often picked by mid tier and higher level shooters, who like to talk about how well the gun shoots or how good the trigger is.
I am a huge fan of the thumb safety found on 1911 type guns. I think it is a big benefit when fighting over your gun, and it is the main reason I carried a 1911 for as long as I did. On top of that, the grip shape of a 1911 fits many hands well and makes it easy to orient the gun.
Going to a 2011 negates those last two points for many people, as the bigger rounder grip makes orienting the gun slightly more difficult, as well as making the thumb safety less ergonomic. In my case, I can use the safety just fine with bare hands, but with gloves, the gun becomes too big for me. That criticism really only applies to the legacy sized 2011’s. Some of the newer versions use normal 9mm sized double stack magazines and they are a much better fit in most cases.
People want to complain about the difficulty in decocking a traditional double action pistol, but in my experience, people are terrible at manipulating the safety on single action guns. Many don’t understand when it should come off and many don’t put it back on when they should. In classes with civilians as well as operators, open enrollment and high level closed government classes with elite level guys, some shooters fail to take their safety off when they want to shoot. I don’t see that nearly as often with M4’s and can only assume it is because the pistol has to be acquired at speed, where the carbine is already in your master grip. That is a very important point when talking about weapons manipulations. Decocking a double action comes after the action, not before, and so the draw and grip do not affect it.
Thankfully, the above has never been an issue for me, as I learned to do it correctly from the beginning. It is not hard, you just have to be patient and do the work correctly. Sound familiar?
The real issue with single action guns for me, is that they have proven to be less reliable than my favored double action guns. All guns can and do fail, even my HKs. It just happens way less than any Browning style pistol I have ever seen. To be clear, I’m not really talking about my own guns, or those of the actual experts who choose single action guns. I’m talking about the rest of the shooting population who is either issued a 2011 or who chooses one. My experience is that their guns will go down much more often than if they had a good 9mm double action pistol. Given the tiny differences in shootability between any of the modern guns, extra reliability seems like a smart choice.
I just got the Inglis clone of the BHP MK III, mostly because I never had one back when I started carrying in the 80s (I went with 1911s) but always thought they were cool. I’ve been mostly carrying TDA autos or revolvers for the last ten years, and it was fun just having that clean single-action trigger. I put 500 rounds through it this week to break it in, with no issues after the first magazine. I can see carrying it, once I get my thumb to remember to work the safety.