Speargun Trigger Safety Importance

[popgun pete]

Many guns don't have a safety because the manufacturer never bothered to add one. Reverse triggers don't have a lot of space to incorporate a safety in any case as the sear lever sweeps through the location immediately behind the trigger where a safety would usually be applied. It is possible to mount a safety in the trigger finger guard frame such as is used in the MVD guns. If you dive from boats and are keeping away from fellow divers then a safety may not be necessary, but diving around reefs both near and slightly offshore it is possible to encounter other divers who you do not know. If those other divers start to follow you then you would hope they have safeties on their guns and use them. A following diver has the potential to shoot divers in front through being careless and not concentrating on what he is doing.

 

[Leander]

For me the safety helps to make sure the line release doesn't get activated by accident when I'm on the bicycle, packed with all the gear. Having the spear or the line stuck in a wheel while in traffic wouldn't be too nice.

 

[Andrew the fish]

no one mentioned tokarev’s safety?

 

[Μιχαλης Μαρουδας]

Here in Greece, manufacturers such as bleutec, meandros, mvd etc, who make their own mechanisms avoid it actually for safety reasons. A loaded gun is never safe

 

[Spearito]

Neither, it is my assertion of fact.

Why do manufacturers include them? Ask them. I partially addressed that point already though: competitions (and competition). Also, it could be a feature on a newbies checklist - who might mistakenly perceive it as necessary or useful, perhaps by association with firearms, which are quite different. Or they might want to do competitions or, at least, have that as an option. Manufacturers may then fear not including one might become a deciding factor for some when purchasing. They also no doubt figure that you don't have to use it: for example unlike firearms, I am not aware of any speargun that enables the safety automatically when you load.

Personally, I would prefer that my (band powered) spearguns do not have "safety" catches, for various reasons. But I don't do competitions.

I asked this same question to one of the guys from Salvimar 2 years ago. (lets call him "bob" in case he's full of S.). He explained that in some regions (in the context of Spain for instance), a speargun falls in the (non-fire) sports gun category (think hunting crossbow), thus requiring a safety mechanism of some sort. I remember researching it a bit and found some snippets of this potentially be truth, but like all legislation in Spain, GREY is the predominant color.

 

[miker]

When I had my military service I remember the guy saying "The empty gun kills"
You must consider your speargun always as loaded and ready to fire and never turn it against your partner.
I remove the safety trigger myself!

 

[Leander]

Here in Greece, manufacturers such as bleutec, meandros, mvd etc, who make their own mechanisms avoid it actually for safety reasons. A loaded gun is never safe

Mvd does have a safety, but it's in the trigger guard, not in the mech. It's a simple, but effective, rotating switch that blocks the trigger.

 

[popgun pete]

Mvd does have a safety, but it's in the trigger guard, not in the mech. It's a simple, but effective, rotating switch that blocks the trigger.

As seen here.

 

[popgun pete]

Here is the sequence of events when someone gets shot with a speargun. There is shock and a certain amount of disbelief immediately after the event. The perpetrator is usually caught off guard and cannot believe what happened, everything happened so fast. Usually the comment is made that the gun just went off by itself. Police seize the speargun for examination.

Scenario 1. The gun is tested and they find that the gun only shoots when the trigger is pulled, but it may have a sensitive trigger. The investigation finds that the user was careless as the gun had a safety which the perpetrator did not use as well as being careless with a loaded weapon. The gun manufacturer gets out of jail because he points out that with the safety engaged the gun will not shoot.

Scenario 2. As above, but the speargun safety was removed by the user. The judge asks why this is so, the user replies that it costs fish. The judge is not impressed and the user is now in a lot of trouble because he contributed to negligence in operating a dangerous weapon.

 

[popgun pete]

They are there only to be engaged when you want to shoot the fish of your life. They will not avoid the gun to missfire. In some guns, it engages alone and you don't realize it until you want to fire.

Check out this video. The gun was not mine, but a friend's and the safety engaged alone.

Some guns had/have poorly designed safeties, but that does not mean that they cannot be done properly. One well-known brand and its clones had safeties that could not be relied on as "safe" and "fire" had only slight changes in the blocking or release clearances and the required amount of switch movements that meant the gun could be in either state regardless of the initial setting, which is why they were removed. Transverse sliding safeties or rotating cam safeties with a detent or friction action to stop them moving too freely are preferable to fore-aft sliding button safeties unless they have been carefully designed.

 

[Leander]

I wonder if there are any firearm users who remove the safeties.

 

[popgun pete]

It is instructive to examine how the safety works in each case. Most band guns use a safety that blocks the trigger swinging rearwards. The blocking action keeps the trigger holding onto the sear lever's tail end so that the sear lever cannot revolve and release the spear tail. When the gun is reloaded with the spear the trigger mechanism has to be able to move in order to reset which requires the safety to be “off”, otherwise the trigger will block the necessary sear lever tail movement. This does not happen with triggers that stay in the depressed position after the shot as the safety cannot be applied unless the trigger mechanism is latched. An example of the latter type is the Sea Hornet/Biller trigger mechanism. Another is the old Voit/JBL trigger mechanism.

Most pneumatic spearguns use a sear lever that is essentially a flattened out single piece trigger, so their safety devices only block the external trigger, they have no effect on the sear lever which to shoot has to be pushed up at the rear by a moving pin that traverses the gun's pressure boundary. Therefore imprisoning the trigger with the safety does not lock up the sear lever as it does in band guns. However many pneumatic guns directly control the line release finger with the trigger movement and in some guns the line release can operate the trigger if the former is pulled forwards. Thus if line wraps were grabbed or pressed against the gun’s tank tube then the line release could fire the gun by rotating the trigger at its lower tip. The design of line releases has since changed to prevent this from happening, but you would not want to bet on it, so applying the safety before line wrapping the pneumatic gun is a good idea.

There are band guns that have a moving pivot point on the sear lever that causes the sear tooth to push down to allow the spear tail into the mechanism. Unfortunately on some models the mechanism could be jammed rather than locked up which meant applying the trigger safety did nothing to lock the spear in the gun. The spear might hold with a first band, but applying the second made the gun shoot without warning. On better designed guns with this problem a warning sign that the trigger mechanism was not properly locked was that the safety would not fully move to the "safe" position. By removing the safety switch this warning sign was lost.

Gun users should understand how the safety on their gun actually works and how it operates in conjunction with the other parts of their weapon rather than see it simply as a "black box" switch.


Automatic pistols often have multiple safeties, one on the barrel slide and one on the trigger. Because pistols are short they can be rotated easily during (mis)handling, so safeties are necessary to prevent accidental shootings of bystanders or the operator of the gun.

 

[sharkey]

I wonder if there are any firearm users who remove the safeties.

It will depend upon the action & if the firearm is being imported or exported as this is about the only time it will be checked. In Australia every firearm must have a safety & that safety must be clearly marked “safe” & “fire”. A speargun only requires a trigger guard.
Even with safeties most people with break action firearms will carry their gun broken & only close it at the last moment before bringing it to the shoulder. I regularly hunt with a bolt action with the bolt lifted & safety off rather than trust the safety. Most of my rifles are retrofitted with a Winchester type three position safety, but I still don’t trust the very best safeties available. Those with hammer guns will put the hammer at half cock rather than trust the safety. Others will choose to carry their gun with an empty chamber rather than trust a safety.
Having a good safety is not a substitute for safe handling. It is essentially an attempt to be lawyer proof when someone doesn’t follow safe practices.

 

[sharkey]

Here is the sequence of events when someone gets shot with a speargun. There is shock and a certain amount of disbelief immediately after the event. The perpetrator is usually caught off guard and cannot believe what happened, everything happened so fast. Usually the comment is made that the gun just went off by itself. Police seize the speargun for examination.

Scenario 1. The gun is tested and they find that the gun only shoots when the trigger is pulled, but it may have a sensitive trigger. The investigation finds that the user was careless as the gun had a safety which the perpetrator did not use as well as being careless with a loaded weapon. The gun manufacturer gets out of jail because he points out that with the safety engaged the gun will not shoot.

Scenario 2. As above, but the speargun safety was removed by the user. The judge asks why this is so, the user replies that it costs fish. The judge is not impressed and the user is now in a lot of trouble because he contributed to negligence in operating a dangerous weapon.

I have been through this scenario as an expert witness in court for both defence & prosecution. I have also spent many hours at one of our Olympic Archery facilities for the 2000 games with half a dozen detectives & a similar amount of cameras going over every possible aspect of intentional & accidental discharge. As can be imagined a verdict relies upon intent. I have found the issue of a safety or lack there off a non issue & the opposing expert witnesses have also been consistent in this. The last case all that was required was to measure the length of pull ( the travel) & the weight ( how hard it was to pull) to show intent.
A speargun trigger differs from a firearm as it must hold all the power in the rubbers, a firearm trigger only need to hold the spring which pushes a very light firing pin. All the factory produced speargun triggers I have seen require much more force & length of pull than even the heaviest & worst military trigger. If someone fiddles with the trigger then that is a different matter, but that would also exclude the manufacturer from liability.

 

[popgun pete]

It certainly was a query in the Riffe case in the States. The victim had been shot in the spine and his whole life had changed with need for ongoing medical assistance and support and the question of damages as to loss of future earnings. When these things happen the legal quest is on to find someone with the deepest pockets to sue and that in this case was the gun manufacturer. Not for nothing did Jay say that the safety on his speargun saved his business as if he had been found culpable the damages would have been substantial. I know Jay through a friend of the family and corresponded with him a few times. He has passed on now, but this certainly happened.

 

[sharkey]

It certainly was a query in the Riffe case in the States. The victim had been shot in the spine and his whole life had changed with need for ongoing medical assistance and support and the question of damages as to loss of future earnings. When these things happen the legal quest is on to find someone with the deepest pockets to sue and that in this case was the gun manufacturer. Not for nothing did Jay say that the safety on his speargun saved his business as if he had been found culpable the damages would have been substantial. I know Jay through a friend of the family and corresponded with him a few times. He has passed on now, but this certainly happened.

Yes I met Jay on his travels down here & talked to him several times over the phone about triggers & handles & even exchanged letters when people used to do that. I always found him helpful & generous.
I have heard this also but there hasn’t yet been a case I know of where a safety or lack of one has been critical. The prima facie in someone getting shot with a speargun is always going to be unsafe practices or intent.

 

[Bill McIntyre]

Neptonics Universal Safety Kit

Stay safe while diving with the Trigger Safety Kit for Reef Mech, this functions as a rear-sight picture and the kit includes all required mounting equipment.

neptonics.com

 

[popgun pete]

Neptonics Universal Safety Kit

Stay safe while diving with the Trigger Safety Kit for Reef Mech, this functions as a rear-sight picture and the kit includes all required mounting equipment.

neptonics.com

This is a transverse slide safety bar and is commonly used on rear handle pneumatic spearguns. It should be applied only when the gun is latched as the trigger needs to move when the trigger mechanism resets in a band gun. On some guns the ends of the bar are marked with "S" and "F".

 

[Noah spearfishing academy]

i dont like guns with safety , if they have , i will glue or dismantle the safety , safety can cause many problems
like if someone pointed at you with his gun and said ,hey dont worry , my safety is on !
you will understand what i am talking

 

[popgun pete]

That scenario is pointed out in most speargun instruction books, i.e. never point a speargun at another person. Someone who does this is not fit to own a speargun, full stop. The safety is not there for fooling around with a cocked gun.