Kids and Trigger pull

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Glenn E. Meyer

New member
I'm going through a lot of literature at work as we are moving offices. I found this bit from a pediatric journal.

25% of 3 to 4 year olds
70% of 5 to 6 year olds
90% of 7 to 8 year olds

have the strength to pull 10 lb trigger - esp. if using two fingers.

I do recall some folks arguing that trigger pull can avoid a kid ND. I knew that was tested and ran across it today.

Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, 1995, 149, 1318 -22.

Naureckas, et al.
 
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EdInk

New member
IMHO it doesn't matter if a gun has a 3lb or 10lb trigger, child safety is the job of the parents.
 
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Glenn E. Meyer

New member
Yes, it is but we've seen it argued sometimes that a little one cannot rack or pull the trigger on the parent's Bullblaster 458. There's studies of racking out there also where little kids can do it.
 
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Glenn E. Meyer

New member
Just for added info - for adults - if you have your finger on the trigger - being startled, jostled or tripping can exert enough force to fire the standard DA trigger.
 
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Glenn Dee

New member
I've seen kids as young as three and four that can pull the heavy trigger of a revolver. However they tend to use their strongest fingers, their thumbs. Put a (unloaded of course) gun in both hands and pull the trigger with your thumbs. Impossible to do without pointing the gun at yourself.
 
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Aguila Blanca

Staff
There's a guy on the M1911.ORG forum right now claiming he bought a Kimber with a 70-pound (that's not a typo -- SEVENTY) trigger, that he got down to around 50 or 60 by tuning it up.

Sounds like the perfect kid-safe semi-auto. Match it up with a super-extra-heavy recoil spring, and no kid of any age will ever be able to shoot it.

(Nor anyone else, for that matter.)
 
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Aguila Blanca

Staff
I've seen kids as young as three and four that can pull the heavy trigger of a revolver. However they tend to use their strongest fingers, their thumbs. Put a (unloaded of course) gun in both hands and pull the trigger with your thumbs. Impossible to do without pointing the gun at yourself.
Click to expand...
Therein lies the problem, methinks ...
 
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leprechaun50

New member
There's a guy on the M1911.ORG forum right now claiming he bought a Kimber with a 70-pound (that's not a typo -- SEVENTY) trigger, that he got down to around 50 or 60 by tuning it up.
Click to expand...

Sorry but I have to throw the BS card on that tall tail.:D
 
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Rattlehead

New member
If the kid has his hand/finger on the trigger (assuming we arent talking about supervised shooting) then several things have already gone very wrong.
 
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kahrguy

New member
When my girls wanted to learn to shoot something bigger than a .22lr handgun I loaded some lite 110gr 38sp loads to 700fp and installed some wolff springs in a old CC revolver I had. Taurus 85 that I had polished the trigger group in years before. . The trigger pull was 4lbsDA and 2 lbs SA. They enjoyed that. Now both CC some years later.
 
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alex0535

New member
There was some incident that happened where this sheriffs wife was showing some relatives their firearms and they turned their backs to what I think was a 3-5 year old who picked up a loaded .44 magnum, pulled the trigger and killed the mom/wife.

It takes seconds for something tragic like this to happen.
 
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pax

New member
If the argument is, "I will just leave this deadly weapon lying around in hopes that the kids can't really press the trigger when they find it," you're already on the wrong track. Thanks for putting up the research!

pax
 
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MLeake

New member
Glenn, IIRC one of the more common ways by which smaller kids manage to pull triggers is with their thumbs - which often means the gun muzzles are pointed at the kids.

There are arguments in favor of safeties, etc, and I can see merit to some of them, but they should not be relied on in lieu of proper carry and storage.
 
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danez71

New member
If the argument is, "I will just leave this deadly weapon lying around in hopes that the kids can't really press the trigger when they find it," you're already on the wrong track. Thanks for putting up the research!

pax
Click to expand...


That same wrong track runs parallel to the other wrong track of "I put my gun up high because my 3-4 yr old cant climb".


:eek:
 
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KyJim

New member
I absolutely agree 100% that you cannot plan or rely on either a heavy trigger or a heavy recoil spring to prevent a tragedy. That said, having either does make some sense as a redundant, though unreliable, precaution. When the kids were young, I kept one loaded handgun locked up. It was either a DA revolver with a heavy trigger or a semi-auto without a round chambered and a 16-18 pound recoil spring. Why? Because mistakes can happen. It's the same reason for redundancy in our four basic rules of gun safety. A heavy trigger/recoil spring might or might not discourage a young one, but it sure doesn't hurt.
 
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trkkshotbry

New member
Eddie Eagle and the NRA kids and gun safety class

Your kid only has to remember 4 things, 3 actually as #4 will cover #3.
Eddie Eagle tells the kids that if they ever happen to find a gun, say for instance playing over at a friends house, they should;
1. STOP
2. DONT TOUCH
3. LEAVE THE AREA, ROOM, WHATEVER
4. IMMEDIATELY TELL A GROWN UP. Right now, not when the game is over or its your turn to go seek but before you do anything else, you go tell a grownup.

My five year old and I have gone over these steps until she knows them by heart forwards or backwards. Then just in case her natural curiosity might cause problems I've made it a point to bring her to the range with me a cpl times (with appropriately sized hearing and eye protection of course) and let her shoot my 22 rifle all she wanted.
At 30 feet she can keep them all in a 4 inch circle and that's not bad at all considering the l.o.p. is way to long, the distance from grip to trigger is way too long and she can't even hold the rifle up, it has to be rested on pads across the shooting bench.
At least she knows what guns are, what they do, what its like to shoot one and most importantly that they are absolutely NOT a toy. I don't even practice drawing or rapid fire when she's with me just in case it looks like fun and she gets the urge to try it some time without dads training first.
 
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