All About Gun Magazines

A magazine is the section of the gun that stores and supplies the bullet to the chamber which is connected to a repeating firearm. When a firearm holder fires a gun, the magazine operates by relocating the cartridges stored in it into a location that it can be fed into the chamber to create impact. A removable magazine is normally called a ‘clip’ and are heavily monitored by gun control laws because it is an important piece of most repeating firearm.

Gun magazines are made in many shapes and sizes such as bolt action express rifles, that contain only a few rounds to machine guns that can hold hundreds of rounds. The guns that can utilize a wide variety of magazine usually use a box or drum magazine and some handguns can even operate from both magazines and belts. The most popular type of magazine in modern firearms are the detachable box type magazines. This cartridge in this magazine is located in either the column in a staggered zig zag manner or with the bullet placed one above the other. When the firearm cycles, then the cartridges are moved to the top of the magazine by another bullet forced by spring tension to either a side by side or a single feed position.

Certain gun magazines like single or multiple tubular magazine are usually found on most lever action rifles, and pump action shotguns whether round or flat nose. These magazines hold cartridges end to end inside of a spring loaded tube, running parallel to the barrel or in the buttstock and is normally fixed to the firearm when being used. The main problem with tubular magazines was that when the bullet tip makes impact with the primer of the cartridge ahead of it during recoil, it would sometimes iginite which made it very dangerous to use so it was made obsolete within armed forces when the pointed ‘splitzer’ bullets came into use.

There are also cylindrical designed magazines such as drum and rotary magazines which has a larger capacity than box magazines. Drum magazines are placed mainly in light machines guns such as the Heckler & Koch MG36, however these magazines are more unreliable and complicated. In some drum magazines, the cylindrical chamber pushes the loose rounds into an exit slot while the cartridge stays parallel to the axis of rotation. When the magazine is loaded, then a wound spring forces the partition on the rounds. A single staggered column is pushed by a follower through a curved path. From there the rounds go through a vertical riser either from a single or dual drums. Other types of magazines include, Pan and Helical. There are also exceptionally high capacity magazines which are designed to hold way more cartridges that the normal capacity but such magazines are prohibited. Magazine capacity is often decreased by the design of the firearm, like for example internal, tubular, or rotary magazines. Many pistols and rifle magazines classified as “high capacity” by gun control laws are really the factory standard magazines originally made for use with their respective firearms.