Does emptying and reloading mag regularly at shooting range weaken the spring ?

[indyyy]

I currently own a 357 Taurus 65 revolver and plan to buy a semi auto Ruger SR9C or S&W SD9VE soon to carry. This will be my first semi auto firearm.

I've seen and read many threads that discuss keeping a magazine loaded for years and the experts and more experienced owners say it's unloading
and reloading the magazine that weakens the spring and that keeping it loaded for 20+ years is fine.

To me this is the obvious follow up question, and I've never seen a thread on it: If I go to the rifle range on a weekly or monthly basis and
practice shooting my semi auto regularly, how long - whether it be number of rounds or weeks, months, years- can I expect the spring in the
magazine to function properly before I need to replace it ?

I'd like to keep the discussion to well known brands like S&W, Ruger, Glocks, Sigs, etc.

Thanks for your input!

 

[Stengun]

Howdy,

I have a Glock 20 10mm that I bought in 1993 and one of the original mags has been loaded for about 99% of its life and the spring is just as good as a brand new mag I bought 2 years ago the has never been loaded.

Cycling a spring causes it to fatigue.

Take your Mom's car for example: it's valve springs get cycled once for ever two revolutions of the engine. After your Mom has driven her car for 200,000 miles, the valve spring(s) will have cycled over 200,000,000 times and will lose roughly 10% of their original strength.

The springs in a pistol mag are a little different than valve springs but you can cycle them for a lifetime without ever having an issue.

I have a 10 round "ban era" G22 mag that has been used to fire over 10,000rds and it's still fully functional with only as tight lose of tension.

Two groups of people will tell you that you need to change your mag springs and that's the people that make mag springs and the guys that have played " Call of Dooty" one time too many.

Paul

 

[indyyy]

Thanks for the response. I had a cheap cobra pistol 10 or so years ago and the spring became weak after using it 5 or 6 times. It's good to know the Glock's mag is built to last.

 

[Stengun]

Howdy,

Thanks for the response. I had a cheap cobra pistol 10 or so years ago and the spring became weak after using it 5 or 6 times. It's good to know the Glock's mag is built to last.

Cheap pistol, cheap spring. The quality of the spring's steel and it's heat treatment makes a BIG difference.

Paul

 

[whodat2710]

No. Maybe back in the day when semi-autos were new. Compression from being loaded for a long time and or weakening from frequent use should not be a problem. Inspect per mfg recommendations.

 

[Eidolon]

Magazines wear out if it's that much of a concern buy some spares

 

[mudshark100]

The most important thing is to have good, reliable magazines (including springs) for your defense. I have magazines that are dedicated strictly for defense ammo and separate magazines dedicated to target/competition. The defense magazines say compressed until I cycle out with fresh defense ammo (every 6 to 12 months). The target magazines get compressed and released regularly during target practice and IDPA matches and have gone for years without an issue; however, I never use them with defense ammo. Just my thoughts.

 

[indyyy]

Thanks for the thoughts mudshark. I was thinking having separate magazines dedicated to defense and target might be a good idea and you gave me a good time frame for cycling the defense mags.

 

[Eidolon]

Thanks for the thoughts mudshark. I was thinking having separate magazines dedicated to defense and target might be a good idea and you gave me a good time frame for cycling the defense mags.

range magazine and carry magazines are a good idea. on the range you should be training to reload by just letting the empty magazine fall to the ground, this can damage your magazine and cause it to malfunction so you don't want to do it with a magazine you carry

 

[Stengun]

Howdy,

No. Maybe back in the day when semi-autos were new.

Wow! Your freakin' kidding, right?

The first true revolver was made in 1833 and first cartridge revolvers were produced around 1856. The first production semi-auto pistol was introduced in 1894, just 60 years after the first revolver.

Heck, even the ol' 1911 has been around over 100 years.

Paul

 

[NCIC105]

No....

 

[whodat2710]

No....

Regarding your "2-gun" statement. Both of mine are on the same side since they would be drawn with the same hand. Are you ambidextrous? :biggrin:

 

[NCIC105]

Yes......I thank my Father for that.....He made us practice weak hand when we were kids....

 

[SCfromNY]

Talking 1911s that I use in competition. When I feel that the mag springs are getting a little weak, and it does happen but it takes A LOT of loading and unloading, I replace with my personal preference Wolfe. There has never been any proof that keeping a magazine loaded weakens a spring to any degree.

 

[kelcarry]

The most important thing is to have good, reliable magazines (including springs) for your defense. I have magazines that are dedicated strictly for defense ammo and separate magazines dedicated to target/competition. The defense magazines say compressed until I cycle out with fresh defense ammo (every 6 to 12 months). The target magazines get compressed and released regularly during target practice and IDPA matches and have gone for years without an issue; however, I never use them with defense ammo. Just my thoughts.

From the answers you can get opinions on failure/no failure. I replied off of this reply because that is exactly what I do. My FN57 came with 3 mags. One is dedicated to the "big boomers"--it stays loaded and the spring is never stressed in terms continuous compression on loading/no compression on emptying the mag. The other two mags, with capacities of 20 rounds each are used for target shooting and I never put the full 20 in them; it just seems that full stress/full unstress is avoided by only going 10 or 15 rounds each time. Probably best advice---buy spare mags and use them for targets--leave the "big one" alone.