Home Forums Hunting & Shooting AR and Tactical Rifles Magazines - what's how what's not

I'm seeing new plastic? magazines in alot of pictures.

What are they, and are they crap or good.

Spot

Some are crap, some not.

I bet my life on MagPuls and original Colt's. I haven't tried the ProMag "polymer" so I can't speak to them.

Ed

I like Magpul P-Mags but am gonna stick to black ones, I haven't had any problems but have seen reports of the tan and green ones cracking. The black ones are GTG.

However I will never get rid of my GI and Colt 20's with aluminum followers, they are still my favorite.

ProMag doesn't make anything that works correctly. Magpul and Lancer both have quality mags that have been out long enough now to be proven.

P-Mags all the way.

I recently ordered a 3-pack of the 20 round Magpul Pmag's with the "ranger" bases. They sorta have a cool factor to them. After a little "hands on" with them I still think I like the GI ones better. 3 will satisfy my curiousity in them for now.

Terry

IMHO, the 20's aren't a significant improvement over the GI 20's. From a durability standpoint, yes, but a function standpoint, no. The 30's are a functional improvement over the GI 30's. They were made from the ground up to work with 30 so no more downloading and follower tilt problems are pretty much nonexistent as they were pretty much purpose built with anti-tilt in mind.

Don't the 20s include an anti-tilt follower?

Yes they do. I think what Hound VA is refering to is some of the GI 30's aren't as reliable as they should be. This problem has been addressed with the GI 30's and isn't really a problem anymore or I should say hasn't been a problem for me with any I've bought in the last few years.

I would question the durability statment though. Plastic cracks over time and the Pmags will suffer from this. The Pmags come with a little plastic "keeper" that snaps on top of the magazine when it's not in use. I would bet this is to keep the rounds from pressing on the mag lips and prolongs thier life.

I like the Pmags but as of now I wouldn't replace all my GI mags for them.

Terry

MagPul P mags are good
ProMag? too many good choices to take a chance on them.
Lancers are good from what I have read too

USGI are good, esp the old 20 rd with alloy follower. My favorite mag by far.

C-products are good. If you do happen to get a bad mag, they will replace with no questions asked.

Duckear, that's what I've heard about Cproducts too. However, I have four bad 6.8's and haven't gotten any responses to phone calls or emails. I guess I'm lucky I only have 4. CH

Yes, but follower tilt in 20's hasn't been much of an issue as it is a straight body mag. The 20 round GI magazine has remained the standard for reliability in the AR. The replacement AT followers in use by the military and on the market for GI mags have been designed specifically to work in the 30's curved body. They don't generally interchange from the 30's to the 20's without modification. Modification to the length of the legs is what one needs to do in that case in order to maintain capacity.

30 round GI mags are generally downloaded by 2 rounds to help ensure reliability when used by folks for in harms way. Does that mean that your GI 30 won't work with 30 in it? Nope, it means that it is significantly easier to load a 30 round mag loaded with 28 rounds in it on a rifle with a closed bolt.

The 30 round PMAG was designed from the ground up to be loaded with 30 rounds and inserted on a closed bolt. The PMAG body was designed slightly longer in order to resolve that issue.

As far as durability goes, the military has always considered the AR mag a disposable item, hence the reason it was made of thin lightweight aluminum. GI magazine are not intended to be kept loaded for longer periods of time as the thin aluminum will bend due to spring pressure forcing the load stack into the feedlips, hence the reason for stripper clips. This is also called feedlip creep. Denting an aluminum magazine to the point of rendering it inop is pretty easy and doesn't require a lot of force. The dust cover on the PMAGS is to eliminate pressure on the feedlips. Magpul had had a 30 round PMAG loaded for a few years now with no dustcover and no change in feedlip dimension. While plastic may crack it appears that in common usage the aluminum mags, being dropped, stepped on, etc; generally suffer more damage. The extreme of the PMAG being run over by a truck is their example. There have been examples of PMAGS with cracked/broken feedlips under normal usage too though. That problem seems more apparent in the PMAGS which are other colors than black.

Should one get rid of all of their good working GI mags? No, while I do see the PMAG and the Lancer mag as improvements, I don't think they're a huge leap and bound above that of a GI mag. They do have some benefits durability wise for how I utilize my mags as they sometimes do get stepped on and often dropped, but in the end mags are a disposable item. I have stepped on and had drop damage that rendered a few GI mags inop, so for me, I am more inclined to use the polymer mags.

Also have had good reports on the TAPCO polymer mags from a friend of mine who used them at Tactical Response civillian contractor class. He says they are as good as the MAGPULs. I am sticking to MAGPUL for mow tho...

There have been examples of PMAGS with cracked/broken feedlips under normal usage too though. That problem seems more apparent in the PMAGS which are other colors than black.

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I heard the same thing from some Marines awhile back. I suspect the heat from full auto fire is to blame, at least in part. This was the case with the older polymer mags we were issued 20 years ago.

I had to send a pro mag metal 10 round back because my new 204 would jam using it. I've got an old metal colt 20 round and I think a brownell that works fine.

My take is it has something to do with the polymer mix being slightly different for the different colors. Much in the same fashion that OD green handguards often had significantly less rigidity when compared to black handguards made by the same manufacturer. I could be completely off base though as I haven't sat down and directly compared the tan and black PMAGs I have in that regard.

I worked at a plastic plant a long time ago. One thing I do remember is when we molded in black we only used about 1/2 the tint beads as when we did other colors. That may have something to do with it.

Terry

What are the most reliable 20 round metal mags to stock up on now?
I have a few old 20 round colts and 2 new ones that shipped with my 6940. I haven't shot enough I don't guess to see a failure in a 20 or 30 round PMag.I've dropped loaded black, green, brown ones, no failures no cracks no problems, best of all they can be bought affordably. Ran over a scratched up loaded green one with my 2500 HD on concrete a few times. No issues.
The best metal mags I've ever used are PRI's for my 6.8. But no way i could afford a fleet of of those. Would If I could.

NHMTG makes the 20 rds for Colt and are probably the best option out there for new mags but they will have the black plastic follower. Not really a problem but I found a source for the alloy followers awhile back and replaced all of mine, that source has since dried up.

Really any of the GI surplus mags with the alloy follower are hard to beat.

Just stay away from curved 20's and any off brand.

I thought this was pretty interesting and there are other "tests" that are similar on youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCFXcOOb4jc