Dryfire Tools!

Over at Tango Juliet (he just won a Blog award too), he talks about  Dryfire and its role as a training tool. I agree with his statements. He mentions the Laserlyte gismo as a tool to enhance the experience. I have used them for some time during training. I have used the muzzle loaded devices in the past:

They are OK for what they are, but they have some issues. If you get this one, it uses an expanding rubber insert to attach to the barrel. The extension of the overall length of the handgun may make your holster inoperative. 

The other really big thing is the fact that if it has batteries in it, the unit is "on". All the time. You must remove the batteries when you are done.

Another important consideration is the fact that you could inadvertently load a live round in the chamber with this device. 

Remember the 4 rules and examine your surroundings. 

This looks ok for what it is:

Take a look on the other side of this door however:

I'm sure my neighbor would not want a hole in his house or him anymore than I want one in mine! NO LIVE AMMO ANYWHERE NEAR THE AREA! 

As TJ says there are many mats or other bullet stopping devices cheap enough and readily available.

Another way to train with a laser is to use a pistol equipped with a targeting laser.

Here is a 1911 with a Crimson Trace Laser on it. 

Yeah, too much coffee today, but you can see many of the more common errors with trigger control with a handgun so equipped. That was a three inch target at 22 feet. I was not able to practice my presentation from holster as the camera tripod was in the way. 

The more common mistakes I see with lasers and dryfire are these:

Not maintaining a proper sight picture: Most people will lower the handgun to make sure they see the laser at distance. OK, but remember that the laser is a device that can fail.  To me doing the same thing every time is paramount to running a handgun successfully. If you can't see the red dot, you are now more behind the curve as you must raise the gun to gain proper sight alignment.

Chasing the laser: Many will chase the red dot on target to get it "just so". You don't have that time.

Not practicing in context: Practice proper presentation from concealment. Got external safeties? Manipulate them!  BOTH ways! Deactivate to get the shot and reactivate to holster!

This is also a great time for the malfunction drill. Click, no bang after the shot. Do your drill! I leave it to you to decide on the tap rack or variations of that. I have been taught several different ones for semi autos. If you decide to do the malfunction drill, simply take the follower and spring out of a magazine to prevent the pistol going to slide lock. 

So here is the new caliber specific device for dryfire:

Here is what it looks like:

I like it as I can leave the batteries in it and it is machined to prevent extraction and more importantly prevents loading a live round if it is in the chamber. 

On the back of the unit it receives the firing pin impact to activate. Then you get momentary laser "firing" for feedback. 

The last thing? Coupled with the matching target you get this:

So when you get done, you can see where you were hitting: 

Hitting the "display" target on the left will show you where you were hitting. The "reset" on the right will clear your string of fire and both targets add a degree of marksmanship to running one of these. 

The only thing I would ask for? A remote timer to give me a beep and then tell me time to first hit. 

FTC stuff: I payed for everything here!