[flounder22]

Not that there is any reason to do so but will it hurt to dry fire my new M85?

 

[NYPD]

Not at all. It's actually a good thing for you and your firearm. Lets you get the "feel" of the trigger and what position your finger should be in and how much pressure you need for that hammer to drop. Also good for the gun in that dry firing will smooth out any microscopic burrs that are left over in the machining process. The more you fire the smoother your trigger pull "should" become.

 

[MrTuffPaws]

I agree. Even though the manual says not to, I used to dry fire my 627 all the time. I did buy snap caps though just for loading practices and use them almost exclusively now.

 

[flounder22]

Thanks guys.

 

[JimL]

Not that there is any reason to do so but will it hurt to dry fire my new M85?

Many autos have mechanisms that can be theoretically damaged by dry firing. These are much different from revolver firing mechanisms for the most part, by far. Not too many revolvers have anything much different than the old time ones.

JimL

 

[flounder22]

Thank you JimL

 

[Jahfakin]

from what I was told, dry firing can be bad (said so in the manual). I'm not sure how or why. But the guys at the range said to use snap caps or empty shells, instead of dry firing. I mostly use them, When I'm practicing with my speed loaders.

 

[NYPD]

from what I was told, dry firing can be bad (said so in the manual). I'm not sure how or why. But the guys at the range said to use snap caps or empty shells, instead of dry firing. I mostly use them, When I'm practicing with my speed loaders.

The original post referenced an M85, which is a revolver. With a semi-auto pistol I would recommend snap caps but a revolver can be dry fired with no problems.

 

[flounder22]

Thanks NYPD, thats my understanding also.

 

[Jahfakin]

The original post referenced an M85, which is a revolver. With a semi-auto pistol I would recommend snap caps but a revolver can be dry fired with no problems.

I also own a M85....in the manual (page 5 of the PDF below), they said "Dry firing is bad for this firearm". They did not specify exactly what is "bad" about doing it. So I'm still confused. manual says one thing, and everyone else says another.

http://www.taurususa.com/pdf/revolver_manual.pdf

 

[NYPD]

That is the firearm safety section on page 5 above where it states, "Safety First". Dry firing a revolver is not mechanically "bad" for it. Taurus is putting that in there as a liability issue from what I can see. Dry firing a revolver could be very bad if the cylinder wasn't actually "dry"---make sense?

 

[gvaldeg1]

I also own a M85....in the manual (page 5 of the PDF below), they said "Dry firing is bad for this firearm". They did not specify exactly what is "bad" about doing it. So I'm still confused. manual says one thing, and everyone else says another.

I'd like to put in my 2 cents without either agreeing or disagreeing with the people in here for whom I have a great deal of respect. Just as a matter of elucidation, very many of the old revolvers have the firing pin as an integral part of the hammer. Your M85 does not. It has an ignition train that includes a transfer bar, firing pin, firing pin spring and misc retaining parts in addition to the hammer. This is much closer to the mechanisms of automatics and is the reason why Taurus doesn't recommend dry firing. It is true, as NYPD pointed out, that dry firing will smooth out minor roughness and imperfections in trigger mechanisms. With modern, properly heat treated quality alloys you can usually snap away to your hearts content with either revolvers or automatics (automatics just have a few more parts in the ignition train). However, there is a failure mechanism called impact fatigue failure than can cause alloys to fail from repeated impacts. (Titanium alloys are less susceptible that steel to this type of failure but Taurus uses steel alloys in the ignition trains of all of its guns even the "Titanium" ones.) The upshot of all this is that primers or snap caps lessen the impact of hammer or striker fall dramatically and essentially eliminate impact fatigue failure. However, impact fatigue failure (usually of the firing pin which is a cheap part) is rare in modern quality guns (either revolvers or automatics). I have never heard of a Taurus that had a failure from dry firing. On the other side of the coin, I used to have a 9mm Firestar (Star) and the gunsmiths told me that they broke firing pins often from dry firing (poor alloy or poor heat treatment).

 

[flounder22]

Thanks everyone. So perhaps using empty casings would be ok or must I buy some snap caps?