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I have seen over and over and over and over again people saying when you clean your gun or simply take it apart you should have your ammunition and magazine in a complete separate part of the house than you are. Now before you jump on me and try and tell me why you think it is and act like I do not do that I do. I have always been taught to keep them totally separated. But if you think about it why is it necessary? If we truly believe that our guns will not go off unless the trigger is pulled why do we have the mind set of the magazine or just one round will all of a sudden jump into the gun and fire? If you set the mag and rounds to the side on the other end of the bench I am pretty sure nothing's going to happen unless you Consciously pick it up and load it. Now if you don't realize you are doing that maybe you need to reevaluate some things. But just curious on yalls thoughts.

So that a split second of inattentiveness doesnt cost someone their life. It only takes one time. I have had weapons for 30+ years. I have yet to have a negligent discharge.

cmgee67 wrote:I have seen over and over and over and over again people saying when you clean your gun or simply take it apart you should have your ammunition and magazine in a complete separate part of the house than you are. Now before you jump on me and try and tell me why you think it is and act like I do not do that I do. I have always been taught to keep them totally separated. But if you think about it why is it necessary? If we truly believe that our guns will not go off unless the trigger is pulled why do we have the mind set of the magazine or just one round will all of a sudden jump into the gun and fire? If you set the mag and rounds to the side on the other end of the bench I am pretty sure nothing's going to happen unless you Consciously pick it up and load it. Now if you don't realize you are doing that maybe you need to reevaluate some things. But just curious on yalls thoughts.

It's a reasonable point. I guess the question is what makes you more likely to accidentally shoot something when you're cleaning your gun than when you have it on your person or stored elsewhere loaded?

I've never understood how the gun goes off when cleaning it. You should always take the mag out and clear the weapon before ever sticking your monkey digits in the trigger guard if it requires a pull of the trigger for take down. But to a post up above I have developed routines and practices. That's why it's in a separate room when being cleaned or taken down but to be honest it's not comepletely necessary if you think about it. I won't change my habits but I'm making a point.

The biggest thing to have in a different room is distractions.

Having the ammo in a different room isn't a bad idea, just so long as you don't handle the gun any differently because the ammo is distant.

My guess is the formality of moving the gun away from the ammo is a good way to overtly acknowledge there is risk to be managed when you manipulate a gun.

Complacency can cause many things to happen once you've done something hundreds of times.

Still in my first year of daily handling a firearm so I'm still extremely cautious about safe practices. However I just cleaned my pistol with the magazine and 1 loose round on the table.

I'm learning a lot today. Now I can add "monkey digits," and "idiot finger," to "booger hook" in my vocabulary of proper terminology for those "in the know" just from a few posts today alone. Now I know what not to do when cleaning my "gatt" and back up "roscoe" Man, I love this place.

I don't do that. After I clear the weapon, I unload the mags and put the rounds where they won't roll off the table.

The last thing I do is either inspect and clean or at least wipe off the mags, then reload the mags, then the gun.

bblhd672 wrote:Complacency can cause many things to happen once you've done something hundreds of times.

Still in my first year of daily handling a firearm so I'm still extremely cautious about safe practices. However I just cleaned my pistol with the magazine and 1 loose round on the table.

This was driven home to me many, many years ago. A gentleman who was a client and friend of my father and a school friend of mine was killed in a gunsmith's shop. He sold high quality cutlery, knives, scissors and surgical equipment and was at the shop on business talking to the gunsmith who was working on a pistol. I'm sure the gunsmith had routinely checked firearms for decades to ascertain their safe condition, but what was a routine action was somehow overlooked with tragic results. Likewise a police officer I knew and had sold firearms to accidentally shot and killed another officer who was visiting him. He was showing him a little pocket semi-automatic pistol. Habitual behavior can become so automatic that the mind assumes it is done.

G26ster wrote:I'm learning a lot today. Now I can add "monkey digits," and "idiot finger," to "booger hook" in my vocabulary of proper terminology for those "in the know" just from a few posts today alone. Now I know what not to do when cleaning my "gatt" and back up "roscoe" Man, I love this place.

+1 - monkey digits is great!

I think its’ just a matter of what works best for you. Personally, I also don’t see any real reason to move ammo to another part of the house. The other end of the table is far enough for me. But I can’t fault someone for the practice of remote ammo placement if that’s the system that works for them. I think for some folks, that’s part of their mental checklist and there’s nothing wrong with it. I agree with earlier posts that complacency and distractions are two of the primary causes for accidental discharges. Once a round starts it’s way down the barrel, you can’t bring it back and that demands our full attention.

Lots of good discussion!

Yes idk where monkey didgits came from. Bizarre things seem to come out of my mouth regularly lol.

A few weeks back I think I put a post on this forum where I described an incident from my youth in UK when a friend of mine reassembled his .380acp PPK after cleaning and shot a hole in the wall in front of him. After which we found the bullet on the floor behind us where it passed between us as it bounced out of the masonry. So that might suggest that putting the ammunition well out of the way is probably a good idea, though placing it in another room might be excessive.

Now if you are cleaning the mags as well as the weapon that should not be a problem as you will presumably empty them before or immediately after the stripping of the weapon. Thus refilling any mags should be something you will do post reassembly and should be part of the deliberate process of loading the weapon to prepare it for use.

As for keeping the mags separate from the weapon, well that is not always a practical proposition. Some pistols (the Browning Hi Power for example) have a magazine safety. You need to insert a mag in order to drop the hammer. OK I know it is possible to insert a finger from your non-shooting hand into the mag well and tickle the safety so that the trigger can be pulled, this is actually my preferred method, however not everyone has fingers that are able to do this. Therefore for those weapons having an empty mag available is essential. I suppose if that causes too much concern then take a battered old mag that is no longer reliable remove the spring and follower and keep it for that purpose, maybe paint it white.

I only break down my pistol after I've removed the magazine, ejected the chambered round, and triple-checked the chamber for live round. Once the chamber is checked, I move the loaded mag and loose round to my computer desk across the room. When I return to the pistol, I look in the chamber again, just to make sure nothing is there. Obsessive? Yes. Safe? Yes. I have never had a ND, but I have been in a room with a retired Arkansas State Police captain who did, when he forgot there was a round in his pocket gun, a tiny Beretta .22 with a tilt-up barrel to eject the chambered round. He checked it by firing a round into the floor under the coffee table. I was sitting directly behind the coffee table on the couch. Thank God for shag carpet and wooden floors.