AW mag feeding issues.

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farrar86

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Minuteman
Feb 15, 2017
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Missouri
#1
Morning! I have a W3 with a Zeus action. Trying to make AW mags work. Mags I have are used, like 7 years old. Got them used so I'm thinking maybe they're worn out.

One round only, right side of mag, it feeds fine. Any more rounds they either hit the side of the chamber, or the bolt starts stripping the round but then rides over it.

I was told and I believe the lips on the mags have not been modified.

If someone has a spare known functioning mag I could buy or barrow that be cool.

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#2
Is there enough vertical play in the magazine that you can push the magazine up tighter to the action by hand? If so, does it feed properly when held tight via hand?

AW and AICS mags typically require different height or adjustable height mag catches.
 
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#3
Rio Precision Gunworks said:
Is there enough vertical play in the magazine that you can push the magazine up tighter to the action by hand? If so, does it feed properly when held tight via hand?

AW and AICS mags typically require different height or adjustable height mag catches.
Click to expand...
I will try. Looking at older threads about this, one guy said the primer should just clear the magazine looking at the back. Obviously mine are higher than that. I'll try pushing the feed lips down a little. I have to really tap the mag to get it to seat.
 
#4
If you adjust the feed lips down, you're going to lower the rounds. Which means it will lower them in relation to the bolt body.

Since the mag latch is catching even though you have to tap the mag, its going to still sit at the same height in relationship to the mag lip on the magazine even though its easier to insert the mag. The end result of pushing feed lips down will be easier insertion of mag, but a lower amount of the round exposed for the bolt to pick up.

The Zues action doesn't have a lug oriented at 6 o'clock that would extend further down into the mag to strip a round......so it needs as much of the round exposed as possible.
 
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#5
If anything, widening the feed lips at the forward (towards muzzle) most point might help. Since the round is being pushed to the left or right and hits the breech face of barrel.
 
#6
The starting but then riding over sounds like a weak mag spring, as soon as rd starts up feed ramp the spring isn't strong enough to keep rd up and bolt skips over it. Usually that will be more of a problem when magnus empty and not be noticeable as it's fuller. The lips look a little spread, closing them up will tuck top rd down a little but it will also keep casehead closer to centerline and maybe keep tip headed into chamber. There appears to be enough bolt/casehead overlap, and it sounds like mag is as tight to action as can be.
 
#10
Got a pic of my 3 at mags with small primer 22creed
20240402_184059.jpg

2 lug and 3 lug(1 lug at 12 oclock) are always gonna be a crap shoot to get to run. Any particular reason you want to use at mags? Master race(lol) badger 2013.....
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#11
6brshooter said:
Any particular reason you want to use at mags? Master race(lol) badger 2013....
Click to expand...
Im trying to keep the mag profile down. Also like the easy feeding. I ordered some MDT mags that will hopefully solve my issue of mag wobble when shooting off barricades. I ordered a mag lip tool, hoping adjusting them a little helps. The springs may be worn out, again got these mags used. Was told theyre about 7 years old.
 
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#12
farrar86 said:
Im trying to keep the mag profile down. Also like the easy feeding. I ordered some MDT mags that will hopefully solve my issue of mag wobble when shooting off barricades. I ordered a mag lip tool, hoping adjusting them a little helps. The springs may be worn out, again got these mags used. Was told theyre about 7 years old.
Click to expand...
You can pull the follower and spring and stretch it out. Brand new AW magazines are shipping and won’t feed. They don’t have nearly enough upwards spring pressure and what is there is forward biased causing the ass end to dip. I had to work all of mine over or the bolt would over ride the cartridge and my action has a 6:00 lug unlike yours. This may or may not be your problem but it’s a cheap place to start.
 
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#13
I've got a solus 22 creed pva barreled action coming, hoping to use at mags but if it is a pain, I'll stick with aics. I find your comment on easy feeding interesting. I always felt the center feed aics, with its inline feed path, to be smoothest feeling.
 
#14
6brshooter said:
Got a pic of my 3 at mags with small primer 22creed View attachment 8387572
2 lug and 3 lug(1 lug at 12 oclock) are always gonna be a crap shoot to get to run. Any particular reason you want to use at mags? Master race(lol) badger 2013.....View attachment 8387576
Click to expand...
This is the elephant in the room. For the most part, if there isn't a lug in the 6 o'clock position, there's a chance to be some feeding issues with double stack, double feed mags.
 
#15
wade2big said:
You can pull the follower and spring and stretch it out. Brand new AW magazines are shipping and won’t feed. They don’t have nearly enough upwards spring pressure and what is there is forward biased causing the ass end to dip. I had to work all of mine over or the bolt would over ride the cartridge and my action has a 6:00 lug unlike yours. This may or may not be your problem but it’s a cheap place to start.
Click to expand...
Well shit....I ordered 2 last night. Going to a match tomorrow, mag tool I bought didn't ship on time so I'm at the mercy of someone at the match. I did pull the follower out of one that I have and noticed the spring was very light. But if they're like that from the factory, here's hoping it's the feed lip position.

I spoke with Joel via email about this. He said there shouldn't be any issue feeding from AW mags but he didn't have a W3 to confirm about the stock.

What action are you running? I'm really tempted to sell this Zeus and get a Tempest.
 
#16
I am in the same boat as you are (Terminus Zeus + W3) and my setup seems to work. I did get an extended mag catch and slowly grind it down until a brand new AW magazine just barely locks into the chassis (I do have to use some upward force to get the magazine to lock into place). So far these work feeding 6.5CM without issue (probably about 400 or so rounds). I did have to readjust the feed lips on some older AW mags I had that I had been playing around with to try and get a 6BR with an HRD magazine kit to run (it never was 100%). If I remember correctly once the proper height had been obtained at the back of the magazine I opened up the feedlips on the front of the magazine (closest to the barrel) slightly.
 
#19
wade2big said:
You can pull the follower and spring and stretch it out. Brand new AW magazines are shipping and won’t feed. They don’t have nearly enough upwards spring pressure and what is there is forward biased causing the ass end to dip. I had to work all of mine over or the bolt would over ride the cartridge and my action has a 6:00 lug unlike yours. This may or may not be your problem but it’s a cheap place to start.
Click to expand...
I bought an AW mag for a new Zeus action. This is exactly what I experienced. Bolt just rode over the top of the rounds. Total bummer cause loading rounds is such a breeze. I’ll try stretching the spring like you say. Thanks for the tip
 
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#21
Life would be a lot easier with AW mags if every bottom metal had an adjustable mag latch. This is why I love my MDT bottom metals. Very easy to get any mag to feed without having to mess with the mags too much.
 
#23
steve101610 said:
Life would be a lot easier with AW mags if every bottom metal had an adjustable mag latch. This is why I love my MDT bottom metals. Very easy to get any mag to feed without having to mess with the mags too much.
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A buddy has one that he’s used grey ops mag in and it seems to be working well. I will most likely follow suit if the long latch doesn’t do it
 
#25
Jcarpenter223 said:
Care to share front and rear feed lip measurements?
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Here is where I wound up. It is in a VisionPro chassis. If I remember correctly, I adjust the mag catch to its highest level. The mags have no slop in the chassis. Setting the front wider allow the tip to rise up right into the chamber as I move the bolt forward. I didn't measure it before so I am not sure how big of a change this was. But it works. I like the easy loading and compactness of the AW mags. These are 10 round 308 mags being used for 6.5CR rounds.

(edited to use table function to make it a little more readable)

Mag 1Mag 2
Front0.686in0.689in
Rear0.646in0.647in
 
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#28
If I remember correctly, I moved the front lips out a little. I grabbed the lips with the pliers. I can't say if it lifted the lip or just pushed the wall out. I did not move it much.

The issue I had was that the bullet tip would move forward below the feed ramp and the bolt stopped. This all happened the first time out with my newly assembled rifle. I was able to get it to feed if I pushed the magazine up. The first thing I did was adjust the mag catch latch all the way up. That helped but not consistently. Then I opened up the front feed lips a little. My thinking was that with wider front lips, the front of the round would lift out sooner as the bolt moved it forward. It did cause a change in angle and that was enough.

What are the measurements on your non-adjusted mags? I'm curious to learn how much I actually moved them.
 
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#29
tbk5 said:
If I remember correctly, I moved the front lips out a little. I grabbed the lips with the pliers. I can't say if it lifted the lip or just pushed the wall out. I did not move it much.

The issue I had was that the bullet tip would move forward below the feed ramp and the bolt stopped. This all happened the first time out with my newly assembled rifle. I was able to get it to feed if I pushed the magazine up. The first thing I did was adjust the mag catch latch all the way up. That helped but not consistently. Then I opened up the front feed lips a little. My thinking was that with wider front lips, the front of the round would lift out sooner as the bolt moved it forward. It did cause a change in angle and that was enough.

What are the measurements on your non-adjusted mags? I'm curious to learn how much I actually moved them.
Click to expand...
I have a brand new mag that I haven’t messed with yet.

Rear 617
Front 605
 
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#34
lash said:
Does one of these work better than the other?
Click to expand...
Hopefully the long latch comes in before the end of the week and I can really start to tune it. With small latch nothing really feeds well without pushing up on the mag.

What I’ve noticed is the back of the mag can only move so far up until it hits the edge of the action cutout, was wondering if that added to the issues.

Also noticed on the new mag that the follower will tilt down, raising the rear of the follower and essentially create a bolt lock back feature lol. I may pull have to stretch out spring
 

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#36
Jcarpenter223 said:
Hopefully the long latch comes in before the end of the week and I can really start to tune it. With small latch nothing really feeds well without pushing up on the mag.

What I’ve noticed is the back of the mag can only move so far up until it hits the edge of the action cutout, was wondering if that added to the issues.

Also noticed on the new mag that the follower will tilt down, raising the rear of the follower and essentially create a bolt lock back feature lol. I may pull have to stretch out spring
Click to expand...
The bolt lock feature is by design, you know your empty(you can remove this by sanding an angle onto the rear of the follower to bolt rides over). The aw cut of the bottom face of action prevents the mag from riding too high in mag well, also by design. Aw mags can be tricky, some are awesome out the package, others you'll tweak and tweak.
Make sure you just set it up to provide upward pressure from extended latch to keep the mag seated against the base the action, a lil clearance is okay usually but you don't want much, very close to touching. Also make sure the mag falls freely from the well when depressing mag release. Too much pressure and it can cause issues dropping the mag. The chassis with adj latch, and mdt adjustable dbm latch is very nice for tuning. Gray ops AW mags for br and gt have adjustable latches built in, however their 308 aw mag doesn't. I have all 3 versions.

The gray ops AWS are solid thus far. Wish the GT mags had more coal inside. I use the GT and BR interchangeably with gt and BR variants without hiccup. Rounds do strip smoother from the AI VS gray ops tho, I'm sure that's from steel VS milled aluminum.
 
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