Handgun coil

[mikec62001]

What is the purpose of the coil that is usually attached to the bottom end of a handgun?

Is this to stop the sidearm from falling out if the shooter is doing physical stuff like climbing or running potentially losing it?

[Firefly26]

It would help if you had a photo to reference from but from your description I would say yes, it is for hooking a lanyard to your weapon so you don't lose it. It would probably be better to ask these questions in a handgun thread that is already going...

[Hispeed1]

Gemtech has a nice one, comes in different colors too:
http://www.gem-tech.com/trl.html

Pistol retention is one of it's main purposes-like you said, so it won't fall off you. Another good purpose is to be able to hang onto and retrieve your pistol should an aggressor grab it from you, you can just step to the opposite direction. Read up more on it, the pistol lanyard is useful and tacti-cool.

[mikec62001]

Thanks for the response guys :o)

[Hollis]

It is a carry over from the days of the cavalry. They even had slings for rifles and sabras. On horse back dropping one weapon was much more problematic and infantry. Still has purpose today. p-)

[Waterman]

My time was spent in/on boats.......you didn't want to be dropping gear overboard.

[Crewdog]

Affectionatly named the "dummy cord" comes in many forms the one with the coil is simply one of them.

[rhino]

my buddy calls it "Officer retention cord" 'if you find a handgun just fallow the linyard and you are surly going to find an officer attached to it'