Black Dog Machine's .22 50 round magazine was launched late last year. It works with a variety of .22 Long Rifle AR-15 conversion kits and AR-style .22 rifles (Atchisson/Ciener style drop in conversion kits, Kel-Tec, Sig 522, Tactical Solutions uppers, Model 1 Sales and Spikes kits.). Price is $80.
The improvements in the new gen-3 mag are: steel feed lips, no need for magazine loader (follower can be manually pulled down) and 30-round capacity (old mags were 26-round capacity.)
I first mentioned the new "Tan" M16/M4 magazine back in June.
New and old, and older
The Program Executive Office (PEO) Soldier agency has just blogged about it ...
“With the improved magazines, we’re taking weapons reliability up another notch,” said LTC Chris Lehner, Product Manager Individual Weapons. “By incorporating a heavier, more corrosion resistant spring, along with a new follower design that does not tilt inside the casing, our engineers were able to develop a magazine that presents a round to the weapon with even greater stability. Increased magazine reliability results in overall improved weapon system performance.”
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“Soldiers can remember it like this: ‘Tan – is the plan. Green – start to lean. Black – take it back,’” said LTC Lehner. “While the improved magazines increase reliability to an even greater degree, the new magazines by no means reduce the importance of Soldiers keeping their weapons clean and lubricated appropriately for the environment. Also, Soldiers must be proficient on conducting immediate action (SPORTS) if their weapon has a stoppage.”
Video of the new follower in action.
The Army has also developed a nifty tool to check if the feed lips are worn out. It is kind of a no-go gauge for magazines. If this does not already exist for civilians or law enforcement, I imagine it would be a popular accessory.
The Cheaper Than Dirt Blogger has written a how-to on loading Bulgarian/Romanian/Chinese AK drum magazines. It is an interesting read for any firearm enthusiast nut.
Caleb got thinking about bolt action rifles and noted that no bolt guns exist to his knowledge that can feed from STANAG (AR-15 / M16) magazines.
everyone seems to be talking about how the world/economy/social order is going to collapse soon (it’s not) I figured the best rifle for that collapse would be a bolt action .223 with an 18 inch barrel, forward mounted optic, back up iron sights, and the ability to feed from standard AR15 magazines.
This got me thinking and I could not come up with one that did.
My artist impression of what such a Remington 700 would look like.
The Australian AIA M-10 “5th Generation” Lee-Enfield rifle comes in 7.62×39mm and feeds from a AK-47 magazine. The one pictured below is being sold on gun broker. Not many are available in the USA because after it was found out that some parts of the rifle (maybe the whole) was manufactured in Vietnam, they were banned.
While 30 round magazines are not as practical on a bolt action as they are on a semi-automatic, magazine parity with the AR-15 would be a big bonus. Remington and Ruger are you listening?
In March Brownells were awarded a contact for 1.4 million M16 magazines. They have just shipped the first 60,000. Interestingly these have a new propriety anti-tilt follower, instead of the normal green follower.
The new military magazine manufactured by Brownells
Larry, from Brownells, told me that the follower will unfortunately not be available to the civilian market as part of the contact prohibits them from using the design for any other purpose than the military.
The RCI XRAIL (Roth Auto Index Loader) is a auto index loader magazine extension that can expand a tubular shotgun magazine to hold up either 14 rounds (compact version) or 23 rounds (full version).
This video shows the XRAIL mounted on a Benelli M2 Tactical. The benelli magazine appears to be shortened and the gun can now hold a total of 26 rounds.
Now I will be honest with y’all, I don’t actually know what an “auto index loader” is. This is how I imagine the system may work:
* Each of those tubes are a magazine.
* Each of those magazines feeds into the shotgun magazine.
* Once a magazine is depleted it rotates.
* The final magazine contains a spring long enough to feed the shells that are in the shotgun’s magazine.
Because I enjoy making you suffer by awful drawings, here is a graphical representation. The blue box represents the shotgun magazine. The red boxes represents the XRAIL magazines. In this example the shotgun magazine holds three rounds while the XRAIL has three “magazines”, with two holding two shells, and the third a spring.
First two shots
3rd and 4th shot.
Last three shots
I have watched the above video frame by frame and there is seems to be some additional things happening during the magazine rotation. Maybe I am completely wrong … in which case I would have patented my above idea and not blogged about it
The system will be able to work on multiple guns. From what I have seen on youtube Benelli and Remington autoloaders work with the XRAIL. I don’t see why this system could not be adapted to work on pump action shotguns, aside from the fact that if would have to be mounted quite far forward.
A very interesting product. Hopefully it will come to market soon (and probably a video game as well, when game designers get word of it)
I think the “spring tension is shot” excuse is a catch-all reason that is over used when us amateur gunsmiths run out of ideas. Like the way they blame ball bearings for everything wrong in turbofan aviation maintenance.
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Here is an example of a spring ‘problem’ that wasn’t from the Cooper Commentaries:
“Our distinguished family member J.P. Denis of Belgium reports that he discovered an abandoned MP40, together with several magazines, in a building that was being torn down. This piece had been left unattended for 50 years with all magazines in full compression, and they all worked perfectly. I think this is marvelous. When you think of the degree to which our culture depends upon springs, it is good to know that spring construction is so well understood.”
An interesting post. We really do rely on our magazine springs. Read it here.
Albert at The Rash Outdoor Chronicles has written a detailed tutorial, with lots of photos, explaining how to disassemble, clean and reassemble the Ruger 10/22 rotary magazine.
In last November for the first time in a long while did Ruger finally start selling mini-14 20 round magazines to the general public. Previously they had restricted them to law enforcement only. Now only 5 months later they are selling 30 rounders!
This is a great move by Ruger. At this rate we should be seeing a 100 round drum pretty soon
Bob Dylan got it right when he sung
Come senators, congressmen, please heed the call
Don’t stand in the doorway, don’t block up the hall
For he that gets hurt will be he who has stalled
The battle outside ragin’
Will soon shake your windows and rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin’
CMMG claims that no other magazine offers greater performance under extreme conditions. It has their new stainless steel anti-tilt follower which features superb stability, minimal drag and unmatched durability.
The new CMMG braided wire spring gives 40% additional pressure over standard USGI springs. A nano-ceramic plated braided wire spring protects for over 400+ hours against salt sea spray.
Repeat after me “clips are used to hold cartridges together for quick loading, magazines are used to hold cartridges for feeding into the guns’ chamber”
The best explanation of the differences that I could find is at The Gun Zone.
UPDATE: Drake from Magpul emailed me to say this was an issue with just one batch and it has been resolved.
This was a very small batch of PMAG’s that had this issue. We addressed the issues internally and solved the problem. We also followed up with all of our customers that we thought may have received these issue mags. Problem solved.
There is a discussion at the M4Carbine.net forum about Magpul polymer PMAGs cracking. Steve from Triad Tactical was running a training program and noticed a bunch of the PMAGs cracking in the same spot.
By the end of the first class, 50% of the pmags were broken. All of them had split where the feed lips meet to form a V on the spine. I called Magpul and they over nighted me 50 new pmags and a prepaid return label for all 50 of the ones I had, broken or not. They asked me a bunch of questions about the who, what, when, where and how the mags had been used. This was very cool and I was pleased with the way it was handled. I was back on track and had one course of 26 in the books, 25 to go.
The moral of the story is that diversity is the key. Don’t rely on one brand of magazine, especially if you are buying a whole lot at once. If a batch is faulty, regardless of wether it is metal or polymer, and you bought a whole lot you are screwed.
Hi, welcome to The Firearm Blog! This blog is dedicated to all things firearm related. If you are into AR-15 and AK carbines, skeet shotguns, self defense pistols or hunting rifles then there will be something here for you. I hope you enjoy it.
I want this blog to appeal to a worldwide audience and so I will focus on firearms and shooting rather than country specific politics. There are already many great blogs defending your rights!
Hi, welcome to The Firearm Blog! This blog is dedicated to all things firearm related. If you are into AR-15 and AK carbines, skeet shotguns, self defense pistols or hunting rifles then there will be something here for you. I hope you enjoy it.
