Sig P365 extended thumb safety

[sgt127]

Very interesting thought. Would you care to share your reasoning here?

I can only speak for myself. I carried a 1911 for 20 years as a duty gun. My thumb was on top of the safety, finger off trigger, if the gun was out of the holster in use. Searching a building. Covering a suspect.

When it was time to fire, the safety went off, and the trigger was pressed.

I wanted the safety on if I tripped. Fell. Somebody fought me for my gun. If they got it away from me, it would likely buy me time while they tried to figure out how to make it shoot.

So, the safety had to be easily manipulated from a full firing grip.

Since my thumb stayed on the safety, while covering someone, or shooting, I always knew, tactility, if the safety was up, on. Or off, down.

 

[Hokkmike]

I can only speak for myself. I carried a 1911 for 20 years as a duty gun. My thumb was on top of the safety, finger off trigger, if the gun was out of the holster in use. Searching a building. Covering a suspect.

When it was time to fire, the safety went off, and the trigger was pressed.

I wanted the safety on if I tripped. Fell. Somebody fought me for my gun. If they got it away from me, it would likely buy me time while they tried to figure out how to make it shoot.

So, the safety had to be easily manipulated from a full firing grip.

Since my thumb stayed on the safety, while covering someone, or shooting, I always knew, tactility, if the safety was up, on. Or off, down.

That makes good sense and thank you for your dangerous work. Once the safe was disengaged then did you still feel the need to physically touch?

 

[sgt127]

That makes good sense and thank you for your dangerous work. Once the safe was disengaged then did you still feel the need to physically touch?

Thank you, I never told them but, I’d have done it for free!

Yep. My thumb was always on the safety. On or off. Even when I put the gun in the lock box, in the jail, my thumb stayed on the safety until I laid it down so nothing could bump it off until my hand was off of it.

I shot a 1911 thumb high. My thumb was actually pushing down on the safety. Helped a little with recoil.

I remember a few Officers that flipped the safety off as soon as they drew.

One was searching an attic, fell through the ceiling and, while inadvertently clenching his hands, trying to grab something on the way down, sailed an Ironman past his head.

Another tripped in a foot chase and fired one into the ground when he hit the ground.

One can have an awful lot of trigger finger discipline but, hands clenching is a hard thing to avoid when startled and, you really don’t wanna drop your gun.

 

[Alllen Bundy]

...switches must be manipulable from a full firing grip. ........but if I can't manipulate it without breaking grip, the gun fails.

Everyone's hands are different. With a P365 the thumb joint at my hand locks onto the left side of the pistol grip. My actual thumb itself physically cannot provide any support. I don't need to actually break my grip in order to disengage the safety. I'm essentially using the middle thumb joint to move the safety lever downward to disengage it. However, engaging the safety while I'm gripping the pistol tightly is much more difficult. This is where it might be helpful to me to have a safety lever that protrudes further outward.

And yes, the P365 and P365XL grips are really too small for my XL size hands. But all concealed carry pistols designs are going to be a compromise for my hands, so I adapt the best that I can.

I'm thinking of extending my safety lever about 1/8"further outward. I plan to leave the lever length as is. Since I will eventually remove the right side safety lever to better fit my pocket holster I'm going to experiment extending the right side lever. When I'm satisfied with the right side lever I will extend the left side the same way and then cut off the right side lever. I checked and my holster setup can easily handle an additional 1/8" of lever protrusion.

 

[edwardware]

Very interesting thought. Would you care to share your reasoning here?

If the switch, safety or other, is shaped so it can't be manipulated from a full firing grip, then you have to interrupt your draw to turn it off (too early, very slow) or break your grip after established to turn it off (very slow). Once it's off, you can't switch it back on without breaking grip. Both are unacceptable compromises necessitated by stupid design.

Imagine if the gear shift in your car (slushbox transmission) required reaching over to the passenger side, both hands off the wheel, to shift out of park. You wouldn't buy that, and the idiot designer telling you that you don't really need to be able to shift while holding the wheel would be met with derision.

ETA: Basically everything that @sgt127 said!

 

[Alllen Bundy]

Self defense attorney Andrew Branca said that he does NOT use a manual safety on is P365XL because he can't reliably disengage it. Granted, this won't be everyone's experience because everyone's hands are different. What works for me may not work for you. But I looked at the way that I handle my P365 and P365XL and would have to agree that I may not always be able to reliably actuate the the minimally sized manual safety lever. Granted, I can't fault Sig as one of their design goals was to make the P365 as concealable and snag free as possible, hence the minimally sized controls on the pistol.

sgt127 and another guy on "Sig Talk" extended their manual safety levers to suit their preferences. They have got me to thinking that I may need to extend my safety lever slightly. I've already extended the magazine release button to suit my thumb.

Call me a Fudd if you like, but I prefer my firearms NOT call attention to myself. So I've been pondering how to how to blacken the extension that I plan to silver solder to the manual safety lever. But before I can extend the manual safety lever I needed to buy another one, as I don't like to take a pistol out of service while I'm modifying it.

So while Mr. Fudd is looking for a dealer with the manual safety lever in stock he sees manual safety levers in nickel, rose/copper, red bronze, gold, blue, rainbow, and black colors. But I'm still going for a black or dark grey color.

How to Blacken Stainless Steel, Black Oxide Patina - by SUR FIN Chemical - Apr 25, 2016

 

[sgt127]

So I've been pondering how to how to blacken the extension

If you use carbon steel, you could just blue it.

I also think a coat of black car touch up paint would last quite awhile.

 

[Alllen Bundy]

I've been wondering about how high of a puddle of solder that I could lay on the peak edge of the lever. If I only remove the nitride coating on the peak of the lever, the nitride layer would probably prevent the solder from flowing down the sides of the lever. I've still got the old right side lever that I cut off to experiment upon.

FYI, according the the USPS tracking information, the manual safety lever that I ordered from The Sig Guy in New Hampshire was supposed to arrive here in Minneapolis, Minnesota on Saturday. But it somehow made it's way to Florida and it will be arriving late.

 

[sgt127]

I’m not sure how much it would puddle. When that silver solder flowed, it was like water.

I think I’d rather add some kind of shelf and then remove what you don’t want.

But, good luck!

 

[Alllen Bundy]

The big question is whether or not the flux can remove the nitride surface and allow the solder to wet the stainless steel surface. When solder cannot wet the metal surface it tends to ball up into a sphere and not spread.