Springfield Armory XD(M) OSP - Clearing Malfunctions
Rob PincusRob Pincus demonstrates proper malfunction clearance of a red-dot equipped handgun, using a Springfield Armory XD(M)® OSP™ (Optical Sight Pistol), which allows attachment of popular red dot optics directly to the XD(M)® 4.5-inch pistol.
The Wrong Way
During shooting drills, when there is a malfunction, Rob often sees shooters tap the magazine and then blade their hand in front of the optic and use the optic as a leverage point to rack the gun. This works in one instance: if you have an empty chamber. But if you have a different kind of malfunction that requires you to clear the chamber, by using this motion, your hand blocks the ejection port, thereby making the situation worse.
You want to get out of that habit, and if you’re new to optically sighted handguns, make sure you never get into that habit.
The Right Way
Here’s what you should be doing in order to clear the chamber: rip the magazine out, then get a good overhand grip on the slide and around the optic, and use the slide as much as you use the optic. This means you are behind the ejection port when you rack and clear, then get the magazine and reinsert it firmly. Grab the slide, come up and over, again grabbing behind the optic, pull and release. Do not use the optic as a leverage point.
You don’t want to block the ejection port but you also don’t want to touch the front of the optic lens, transferring oil, sweat and other substances from your hand onto the optic, therefore clouding it. Soon the optic will be unusable.
Summing Up
Actually, whether the handgun is equipped with an optic or not, always grab the slide in an overhand manner behind the ejection port so that anything that needs to come out of there can do so easily, cleanly, and as quickly as possible.
I wanna talk a little bit about gun handling, and specifically malfunction clearing with an optically-sighted gun. If we've got something like this Springfield Armory XD-M with an OSP setup with the Venom and we have a malfunction, I want you to see what I normally see with people who are jumping into this red dot sights on a handgun thing. Here's what I see a lot of times. They'll drive out, they get the click, they'll tap, and then they'll kinda blade their hand right in front of the optic and kinda use the optic as a leverage point to rack the gun. And if all I have is an empty chamber situation when I get that click, that'll work.
If I have a different kinda malfunction, obviously some people don't like any malfunctions whatsoever. Think we're gonna get rained on here pretty soon. But if I get a different type of malfunction that requires me to clear the chamber, if I were to drive out right now and click and have a bad primer or something like that with this gun, and I drive out, come back in tap and do the same exact thing. I just use like a knife hand up against the front of that optic, and I drive back. I am now blocking the ejection port.
And by blocking the ejection port, I'm actually making my situation worse. So I haven't actually cleared the situation, I've now made it worse so that if I didn't notice I made it worse, I would come out and click again. Of course, I have to start a reload, get into this situation. And then, once again, I've put a new magazine in. If I come up here and hit this again, I'm still making it worse and worse and worse.
So we wanna get out of that habit right away. In fact, if you're new to optically-sighted handguns, you wanna make sure you never form that habit. So we actually wanna do, when we have to clear the chamber, rip that magazine, is I wanna come up just like I would normally get a good overhand grip, just come up right around the optic. And I'm using the slide as much as I'm using the optic, but I'm still behind the ejection port. when I rack.
When I rack and clear, come back, get my magazine, insert the magazine firmly, come up and over again, grabbing behind that optic, pulling and releasing. So I'm grabbing here underneath the optic. Sure, I happened to grab a little bit of it, but I'm not using it as a leverage point. Not only do I not wanna use it as a leverage point because I'm blocking the ejection port, I also wanna be sure I'm not always touching the front of that lens, obscuring it, getting my oil on there from my hand, sweat from my hand, then dust gets on there. Obviously there's a lot of dust that's coming out of the ejection port.
Pretty soon, I can't use my optic because I've clouded it. So we wanna try to keep that as clean as we can, we wanna try to keep the ejection port as open as we can. And whenever we're running the gun, whether it has an optic or not, make sure we're grabbing that slide in an overhand manner behind the ejection port so anything that needs to come out of there can easily and cleanly as quickly as possible.
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