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I think that it partiallydoes, Jimmy. The firing pin catch does have a steep angle to it where it mates with the steep-angled sear catch. If you were to simply lift the slide up, the movement of the mating surfaces would release tension on the striker by a full 2mm. This would make the cocked tension probably about 20% or less, and wouldn't detonate a primer.

As far as Handy's last comments were concerned, I would have to say that the firing pin catch, if it were to break, wouldn't break in this manner. The catch is heavily chamfered and is larger in area at the base (where the greatest cantilever moment is located) then at the mating surface between the two parts.

Fatigue cracks, and catastrophic failures in general, occur at dicontinuities in the material, whether it be a flaw or at a corner in the material. Flaw size dictates the concentration of stresses at any given location, as well as, the fatigue life of a part. With a chamfered base, the firing pin catch is much less prone to stress concentrations than it would have been if there were sharp edges between the pin-catch and pin-body. Furthermore, failure theory points to a failure being at the point where energy is conserved the most. I

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