So Sebastian was the first on our side to report this:
Does this winning smart holster really put a bar through the trigger guard? Seriously? That’s not how retention should work. Leave this stuff to gun people!
And here’s the image, just in case you doubt it’s that dangerous.
Sebastian points out that the people designing this crap are electrical engineers/Computer nerds, not gun people with engineering backgrounds, so they might overlook a fundamental bit on gun safety….like rule #3.
But I think more embarrassing is that a very similar “Safety” Mechanism caused a negligent discharge in an airplane cockpit.
Here’s a video on how that went down:
Of course the people running the competition aren’t just anti-gun nuts who know nothing about guns.
Mike “The Gun Guy” Weisser was one of the judges!
In the interests of full disclosure, as they say, Mike the Gun Guy was a member of the panel that chose the recipient student team which received the award. But it was a tough choice because all the submissions were serious, contained multiple technologies, and most of all indicated a great deal of thought and hard work.
Of course we know Mike is insanely anti-gun, and likely insane, and has some serious issues with his gun-knowledge, and some SERIOUS issues on gun safety.
My favorite carry gun. Glock 19. But only if I’m wearing a coat with a nice pocket or cargo pants with a large pocket because I never wear a holster. It’s such a great gun. Fits perfectly in my hand and lets off with much less snap than the sub-compact 26 which I have to carry when I’m wearing pants with smaller pockets.
Yep, this guy owns a gun shop, is an NRA instructor, and the king of the anti-gun “You aren’t qualified enough to own or carry a gun!” mode of attack.
Last I’d like to talk about this holster. Not only is the retention bar completely dangerous, but the holster technology is garbage too!
The winning design includes three security options.
First, the gun owner’s fingerprints must match before the weapon can be removed from the holster.
If that doesn’t happen a key card like sensor worn on the owner’s lapel can release the weapon.
Finally, a voice recognition device can also be used to match the authorized owner and free the gun.
So I can start with agreeing with Sebastian, making it a holster is a GREAT idea, as that doesn’t require you to put stuff in a gun that likely wasn’t designed to have room for this stuff. Battery life will always be an issue, as will simply not using it. Much like your carry permit will do you no good if you aren’t carrying, whatever your tamper-resistant solution is it isn’t worth crap if you just toss your gun in a desk drawer.
So let’s talk about these technologies.
Fingerprint reader: Great system IF, your hands are dry, clean. and you aren’t wearing gloves.
Really this is the least flawed technology here, but that’s a low bar to clear here. I’m sure this technology can improve….still if your hands are muddy,dirty, bloody, sandy, or wet this shit will likely not work no matter how good the technology gets. Further Gloves will 100% prevent this technology.
Now onto the voice recognition software. Let’s go back to the news:
Testifying for the defense during a pre-trial hearing Thursday, an FBI voice-recognition scientist said that he didn’t believe it was possible to identify who was screaming in the background of a 911 call placed the night George Zimmerman shot and killed Florida teen Trayvon Martin….
…He said because the screaming voice was affected by distress or emotion, there was no way to compare it to “reasonable, natural speech and come up with correct answers.”
So in other words, you can program this holster to recognize your voice, and even if it is 100% accurate (it won’t be), that’s great if you’re going to the range, or running your police qualification.
But if your life is on the line, and adrenaline is in your system, your voice very likely won’t sound the same, and the computer probably won’t recognize your voice.
So when you’re under attack, and need your gun RIGHT NOW to defend your life. your gun will not leave the holster.
Also I suspect there might be some issues if you’re woken up at 3am to the sound of broken glass, and you have adrenaline, plus sleep on the old vocal cords.
But at least the retention bar might shoot you in the leg while you struggle with it.
But this gun has a final fallback: The RFID.
This is JUST a key that fits a lock. Hey but since it takes battery power it’s “SMART”.
This is the crux of my hatred of this “Smart Gun” hype. We already have guns that have integrated key locks. I don’t like them, and I have intentionally spent more money for guns that don’t have an internal lock.
But this technology is essentially identical, and has the same problems. Then key can be lost or stolen, you can do the simple and sloppy thing of leaving the key next to the locked gun which is almost as bad as doing nothing at all, and it likely complicates the draw stroke, or depending on where the person keeps the key, make it impossible to draw the gun if you only have one free hand.
I’ll close to say I’m not opposed to smart guns, but all “Smart Gun” action right now is being conducted by the anti-gunners, and everything being presented is total garbage that will get good people killed.
No thanks!