Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Gunsmithing Magazine alteration of CZ 527 to increase OAL?

Have found myself wishing to increase the OAL of at least 1 of my 2 CZ 527 17-Hornet magazines to allow seating bullets out an additional .100" for 25 grain V-max & or 30 grain Burgers.

Well removing the rear spacer & altering this rear molded spacer proved to be simple enough. just need to drill new holes to secure the spacer now. What I have not figured out yet is the best way to alter the mag follower to adequately fill in the increased length in the magazine.

I was hoping to re-form the rear of follower to accommodate the additional .100" length capacity. Only problem here is that follower is hardened steel and thus brittle. Learned this the hard way guys, yea I broke the rear end of the follower

Best Idea I have come up with so far is to make a aluminum or copper welding fixture to weld the broken rear tab in place Aprox .100" longer than original. sure Ill need to pre heat both pieces prior to filling in the .100 gap as I am sure this is high carbon steel.


Perhaps someone has a simpler solution to the mag follower that I have not considered. If so please chime in I am all ears

James Calhoon makes them available for purchase. To me its worth the money to avoid the hassle. Look on the price list page.

Extended Hornet mag

[quote=haverluk]James Calhoon makes them available for purchase. To me its worth the money to avoid the hassle. Look on the price list page.

Gave Him a ring for the first time where I connected. I have tried before. Anyhow great guy to talk to.

His take on this situation was to go the mag follower rout. The sentiment I took away from James on the CZ 527 Magazine working with the 22 / 17 hornet case just tends to be a PIA due to the larger rim on the case. Go with the single shot follower and the issues go away.

Ill be keeping an eye on him and great things to come in not to many years out.

While Calhoon offers some great stuff I opted to repair the magazine follower as time permits. How the repair gets done is yet to be determined.

In the short run for working up loads with longer bullet seating depth I opted to order a couple bobsled offerings from the CZ store, one for the 17 Hornet and one for the 17 fireball.

In my .22 Hornet I lengthened the mag so I could load Hornady 50 gr spsx's. I removed the spacer, thinned it the required amount, and reinstalled it. Never touched the follower, it has never misfed.