Confirming what we already knew: Brownell’s and NHMTG good to go, C-Products Defense, not so much…
My Brownells USI 30 round Mags x 20 with ranger plates and MP followers arrived today. They are uglier than snot. Welds are good, mag is tight, but it looks like someone sprayed them with a thick coat of dull grey spray paint. Anyways, I first took 10 random mags out of their bags and loaded them with 30 rounds of M855 each. Then, I took the other 10 and took off the Ranger Plates. I then took my 10, new-in-package C-Products Defense Stainless Steel mags, took their baseplates off, and installed Ranger Plates on them. I also had 3 well-used Colt/NHMTG with Ranger Plates that were included in this mini-test. The mags were then tested as follows.
Stage 1: Side impact tests. Each mag was dropped 5 times each on its left and right sides, from a height of 5 feet, shoulder height for the average 5’ 8" US adult male, onto the concrete sidewalk in front of my house. Mags were then inspected for damage, and manually unloaded. If no significant damage was noted, the mags were then cleared to proceed to Stage 2, described below. Significant damage was determined to mean any dents that caused the follower to hang up or baseplate disassembly from the drop.
Stage 2: Baseplate impact tests. Each mag was dropped 5 times each, with baseplate pointing downward, from a height of 5 feet, shoulder height for the average 5’ 8" US adult male, onto the concrete sidewalk in front of my house. Mags were then inspected for damage, and manually unloaded. If no significant damage was noted, the mags were then cleared to proceed to Stage 3, described below. Significant damage was determined to mean any dents that caused the follower to hang up, weld failures, or baseplate disassembly from the drop.
Stage 3: Feedlip impact tests. Each mag was dropped 5 times each, with feedlips facing downward, from a height of 5 feet, shoulder height for the average 5’ 8" US adult male, onto the concrete sidewalk in front of my house. Mags were then inspected for damage, and manually unloaded. If no significant damage was noted, the mags were then cleared to proceed to Stage 2, described below. Significant damage was determined to mean any dents that caused the follower to hang up or baseplate disassembly from the drop.
The results were telling. In stage 1, all 10 of the Brownell’s mags passed with flying colors. During the 100 total drops, 10 each for 10 mags, a total of 26 rounds were sprung from the mags. Several drops had one round spring loose, some had no rounds come loose, and a few had 2 rounds released. No failures of the above types were noted. Magazine bodies did show abrasions from drops, consistent with impacting concrete, but no dents. The CPD SS mags performed similarly, in total having 30 rounds displaced, and no catastrophic failures or denting. The NHMTGs also performed well, no dents or failures, and only having 9 rounds sprung from drops. All 23 mags were cleared for the next stage.
In stage 2, again, all 10 Brownell’s passed. Each drop from each magazine sprung loose one round each, with the final drop on mag 10 losing 3 rounds. No damage to the bodies was sustained, and there were no baseplate failures. There was no visible damage to the bodies, and the ranger plates looked no worse for the wear. The first and fourth-tenth CPD SS mags performed well, with each losing one round each, with no damage to the bodies or the ranger plates. However, magazines 3 and 4 had catastrophic failures - the ranger plates blew off, launching the spring and follower, and dumped most of the rounds in the mag; I found one spring about 5 feet from the impact point, but the two followers and the other spring were lost in bushes out front of my house. The NHMTG mags lost one round each on drops and suffered no failures. At this point, 21 mags remained: 8 CPD SS, 10 Brownell’s and 3 NHMTG.
During stage 3, the Brownell’s mags, with their ugly gray paint job that looks like a 2nd grader did it, performed perfectly. Each drop caused one round to spring loose. All Brownell’s were inspected, and the feed lips were abraded, and one mag had the feedlips visibly bent; however, it still loaded and unloaded normally. The remaining nine were fine. The CPD SS mags had no damage to the feedlips, and lost one round each during drops. The NHMTGs also lost one round each on each drop, but suffered no visible feedlip damage.
In summary, I feel that these mags withstood this punishment, and should be good to go. I am leery that 20% of the tested CPD mags — given 10 is a small sample — had baseplate failures. To me, that indicates poor quality control procedures. The other 8 mags from CPD will be my plinking/range mags. The 13 others from Brownells and NHMTG have been loaded to 30 rounds each with MK318 and stored for future use; I did pick one Brownell’s to load my HD gun with. The 13 mags above were also tested for insertion into magwell and tested for ability to drop free when mag release pressed, and no issues were discovered.
In short, the Brownell’s mags, currently going for $127 for 10 with MP follower and Ranger Plates, are an outstanding deal, and should be bought with confidence. As always, NHMTG is good to go as well.
I didn’t run over them with my 2012 F150, because they’d probably die. In my mind, if a mag gets run over, it’s because I’m getting the hell outta there and not worried about retaining that mag.
Thanks for reading, I hope this helped someone somewhere decide on mags.