Magazine spring concern?

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For those of you that keep your magazines loaded for any lenght of time do you see any issues with spring fatigue? Do you limit the number of rounds in the mag, for example if it holds 10 rounds do you fully load it or maybe put in 7?
 
14 million threads on this...

No. Probably no issues keeping it empty or keeping it loaded. Possible issues constantly flexing/tensioning it. You're unlikely to fire that many rounds.
 
why would i go out and buy a 10 rd mag and only load 7?
Looking at long term storage of a loaded magazine, not sure if you didn't understand the question or were just looking to be funny or something which it was neither. One could assume more tension on a spring would cause fatigue sooner. That's what I'm looking to find out from people that actually do this
 
Looking at long term storage of a loaded magazine, not sure if you didn't understand the question or were just looking to be funny or something which it was neither. One could assume more tension on a spring would cause fatigue sooner. That's what I'm looking to find out from people that actually do this

You've gotten several consistent answers. Unless your questions have changed, I'd say you should feel comfortable loading your mags fully and leaving them until go time.

Which ought to be around Friday? Maybe Saturday?

Me, I store the lion's share of my 7.62x39 in... magazines. For years. I've got no qualms about doing it and no fear they won't feed when I need them to.
 
You've gotten several consistent answers. Unless your questions have changed, I'd say you should feel comfortable loading your mags fully and leaving them until go time.

Which ought to be around Friday? Maybe Saturday?

Me, I store the lion's share of my 7.62x39 in... magazines. For years. I've got no qualms about doing it and no fear they won't feed when I need them to.

Every mag I own is full......there's no potential benefit at all to an empty magazine.
 
Looking at long term storage of a loaded magazine, not sure if you didn't understand the question or were just looking to be funny or something which it was neither. One could assume more tension on a spring would cause fatigue sooner. That's what I'm looking to find out from people that actually do this

I've rotated out mags that have been loaded to capacity for 22 years ( pre Y2K ) and they functioned perfectly.

Load'em up....full.
 
OP: You may also find that loading a storing new mags to full capacity will help break them in as well. Springs do retain a small portion of compression from their original factory assembly after break in. You can see this when you gut a used mag and a new mag of the same make and compare the spring lengths.

Manufacturers calculate for this and compensate by having slightly higher than required follower tension right out of the box (slightly longer spring to account for non-resilient compression). That's why getting that last round in there might be tricky at first. This can sometimes lead to pre break in feeding problems with some double stack mags. I know new MP5 mags can have this issue, as the follower is so tight that it can hang on to a round instead of letting it strip freely. I had to load up two new-old stock preban 30rd mags full and leave them like that for a week before they were 100% reliable. After break in though, they will not compress any further. At least not for a several decades or more. I have one MP5 mag that is older than I am and still operates just fine.
 
I toss this in for fun.
I had not seen or shot the mak90 until I bought my house in 2001. The rifle mags and 100 drum remained in lock up until 2008 when I finally emptied the mags and drum... dump style. Now My guess is the drum was sitting loaded since 1994 the last time we went out to the pits to burn off the corrosive ammo stash and loaded the drum and mags and packed away
 
For those of you that keep your magazines loaded for any lenght of time do you see any issues with spring fatigue? Do you limit the number of rounds in the mag, for example if it holds 10 rounds do you fully load it or maybe put in 7?

This has been a topic for a long, long time. I finally found the answer a few years ago.

The answer is: it depends.

I had a lot of magazines loaded and they were stored for 7+ years. The cheap magazines were damaged from the tension. Feedlips were distorted, for example. Things that are very strong, like steel AK magazines wont and didn't have this issue. Things like cheap AR magazines did. I believe a few 92FS mags also had some problems, but those are notorious for having shitty springs in the 1st place.

A compressed spring shouldn't lose it's memory. That said not all magazine bodies are created equal.
 
There are companies like wolff springs that make replacement magazine springs for hundreds of different guns. Mag springs are cheap &easy to replace. Just like recoil springs they can and should be replaced at regular intervals......but we're realistically talking thousands of rounds and years of use. I've replaced mag springs in my Ruger P94 mags, because it is a 25 year old gun with at least 5k rounds .......probably 10k or more that I dont know of . (I bought it used. )
If you are worried , purchase some mag springs and keep them in your parts kit.
 
Looking at long term storage of a loaded magazine, not sure if you didn't understand the question or were just looking to be funny or something which it was neither. One could assume more tension on a spring would cause fatigue sooner. That's what I'm looking to find out from people that actually do this

I bet my life on mags that are always loaded to capacity, unless I'm shooting out of them. So they spend 3 months under tension, and maybe 20 minutes without tension, while I reload them. Rare examples of failures are everywhere, but not the norm.

Edit: Ok, I'm talking name brand stuff.
 
I go with 10% unloaded for most mags, ie 30 rounders in forgotten storage have 27 in them.

Low capacity 7, 8, and 10 round mags I keep full always.
 
This has been a topic for a long, long time. I finally found the answer a few years ago.

The answer is: it depends.

I had a lot of magazines loaded and they were stored for 7+ years. The cheap magazines were damaged from the tension. Feedlips were distorted, for example. Things that are very strong, like steel AK magazines wont and didn't have this issue. Things like cheap AR magazines did. I believe a few 92FS mags also had some problems, but those are notorious for having shitty springs in the 1st place.

A compressed spring shouldn't lose it's memory. That said not all magazine bodies are created equal.

It's safe to say though, that if the product in use isn't junk, leaving mags loaded won't matter.

-Mike
 
It's safe to say though, that if the product in use isn't junk, leaving mags loaded won't matter.

-Mike

I'd say so for the majority of mags, yes. Just wanted to add that caveat. The AR mags were so damaged that they wouldn't even fit in the magwell, That's how I initially noticed there was an issue. I wish I kept the mags so I could see what brand there were.
 
I'd say so for the majority of mags, yes. Just wanted to add that caveat. The AR mags were so damaged that they wouldn't even fit in the magwell, That's how I initially noticed there was an issue. I wish I kept the mags so I could see what brand there were.

Years ago I had a few mags like that a lot of them were unmarked. When they failed multiple times in testing I usually threw them downrange and shot them to pieces, and threw the bits in the trash before I left the range. [laugh]
 
Every guy-hobby struggles with these existential questions. Do I leave my mags fully loaded? Do I need to age my tubular tires for 6 months before gluing? Do I lift the plane or let the sole slide on the wood during the back stroke? Does my solid state amp sound as good as tubes? Do I need to shoot RAW?
 
Many say that springs only weaken through flexing. Apparently the physics backs it up. I was one of those people. However, I’ve seen a fairly good (albeit short-term) experiment on YouTube and there was permanent spring compression. However, it mostly only affects springs they are kept near their peak compression. That will depend on the magazine design as much as it depends on how many rounds you load in.

All that said, I don’t worry about loading mags full and storing them. Just buy spare springs and replace them every 5-10 years if you’re concerned.
 
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