Bushmaster 5 round magazine dissasembly question

[cablemonkey]

Hey,

I've got a couple of Bushmaster 5 round AR mags that I want to get apart to clean. The only thing is I can't figure out how to open them.

There's a small hole in the floor plate that looks like it's full of epoxy or something.

Near the bottom of the mags, on both sides, a round metal thing protrudes. I thought it was a ball-detent system at first but it doesn't seem to want to move.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

-C.

 

[juliet lima]

AFAIK, those are not meant to disassemble.

 

[cablemonkey]

How are you supposed to clean crap out of them then?

 

[Questar]

You cannot open them from the bottom... ATF rules in the US require that they be truly "permanent" so they cannot be dissassembled.

I've taken them apart through the top... simply push the follow down on one side until it flips vertical and then you can actually pull and twist it out through the top... careful not to bend the lips of the magazine.

The follower and the spring can be removed and you can clean it... then reassemble by reversing the process. It isn't a great way but it does work.

Mark

 

[cablemonkey]

Thanks Mark, I'll give that a try.

 

[bear.23]

I cheated I sold mine off once I got them dirty....

 

[cablemonkey]

I did manage to get one apart using the technique Mark described. There was a little rock banging around in there that had been driving me crazy.

Then I decided I really wanted to get the floor plate off, so I drilled out the epoxy. It holds a small pin in a groove in the centre of the larger pin that comes through the sides of the mag. Once the small pin drops free from the bottom, you can slide the larger pin out, and disassemble the mag normally.

The five-round-only blocking is part of the floorplate, so I don't get why it's made the way it is, unless there's a law somewhere that this is sold in that says "Mags can't come apart."

The only thing now is in order to re-assemble it, I'm going to have to come up with some way to keep the small pin in the hole. I suppose I could always epoxy it back up, but that kind of defeats the purpose. I think I'll see if I can cut some threads into the plastic and sub a machine screw for the small pin.