BehindBlueI's
Grandmaster
- Oct 3, 2012
- 25,969
- 113
I use one and I'm always on a look for a different option. I like the active retention. Passive retention holsters are fine, but I would hold the same argument. If you're in a situation to get thrown down into the snow, mud, etc. or you're "bumping it on the door jam" and breaking the holster, what are you going to do when your gun is knocked out of the holster and away from you? With the serpa, someone isn't just going to grab the butt of the gun and snatch it away. I want some sort of active retention.
If your passive retention/friction lock holster coughs the gun up because you get knocked down, hit it, etc. then your holster sucks. There's plenty of suck holsters out there. There's a big difference between a well crafted and well fit holster and an Uncle Mike's universal sausage sack, though, and a pretty big middle ground.
As a general guideline, if you can't hold the holster upside down and gently shake it without the gun falling out, it probably doesn't have sufficient passive retention if it's OWB. IWB can also rely on the pressure of the belt, and I jokingly say you should be able to hang from the monkey bars without your gun falling out.
If your holster is collapsible, made from soft nylon, is sold by size instead or class of gun instead of a specific model, it'll probably fail this test. It it's quality kydex or leather pressed/molded for a good fit on a specific gun, it'll likely do better. I'm quite comfortable with my Red Nichols Avenger style holster as I went through Craig Douglas' ECQC with it and am well satisfied with its retention and durability.
For real world gun grabs they are almost never from behind, which is what I would have assumed would be the case. They are from the front or side. Anecdotally, crossdraw holsters seem to be the hardest for the victim to protect and retain, and strong side with a forward cant the easiest. I haven't kept hard statistics, so I could be wrong, but that's how it's seemed to me.