About 15-20 years ago I got my first two Butler Creek "Steel Lips" mags for one of my Ruger 10/22's. It was the first 10/22 I ever owned and I got a few more since then... 
The reliability of those two Butler Creek magazines was horrendous and they would cause failures to feed and often destroy the ammo by the bolt pinching it every 3-4 rounds, to the point where I just gave up on them. I was spending more time clearing malfunctions and throwing away ammo than I was shooting. A few fellow range members at the time recommended jamming a piece of cardboard from a .22LR box in between the mag and mag well to give the Butler Creek mags the "right angle" for better feeding, but that hasn't worked very well for me either. Anyway, jamming cardboard in a mag well to make the gun run correctly is ridiculous and not at all up my alley. I'm of the opinion that something that's designed to run in a platform should run flawlessly, without this type of improvised BS mods right outta the box...!
I ended up throwing these two mags in my parts drawer in disgust and swore I'd never buy another "Butler Creek" product ever again. The BX-1 mags from Ruger ran flawlessly in the rifle, by the way. I was sold on only buying and using original Ruger mags going forward. Lesson learned.
Fast forward to last week, when I was looking to procure an extra BX-1, BX-15 or BX-25 mag or two for my 10/22 Takedown (upgraded with the Volquartsen heavy firing pin and exact edge extractor) ahead of a planned range trip. All the 10/22 mags at the store were sold out (obviously!), except one "open package" Butler Creek mag that looked suspiciously like a customer return. The sales person at the store stated that those used to be indeed quite bad, but that the company corrected their design since. Reluctantly, I bought it... half expecting another useless item that would end up in my POS gun parts drawer, lol.
The initial impressions out of the box were quite good. The plastic these mags are made of is very slick (almost feels greasy) and it goes into the 10/22 like it's oiled, just snapping right in place. Removal with the stock mag release is very easy and intuitive too, kind of feels very AK-ish. The extra long grip on the mag allows for much quicker mag swaps than the original flush BX-1 mags. The only concerning part was that the mag would "jam up" on my stainless steel 22LR snap caps and not feed right, occasionally. This did not inspire much confidence to be honest, but I needed to test the new magazine with actual brass-cased ammo at the range.
So... off to the range I went with a buddy. We fired probably 100+ rounds through that magazine (CCI Mini-Mags and Remington Golden Bullets) and the mag ran FLAWLESSLY! I was really impressed, given how very low my expectations were. The loading is actually easier on it than on the BX-1 from Ruger, as the tension is just right and it feels like an already "broken in" magazine. The only downside I suppose is that these mags cannot be disassembled for cleaning when they potentially foul up and you need to wash / submerge them in soapy water to clean, according to information online. They have a drainage hole at the bottom, so that should help in draining and drying whenever a good cleaning is needed.
Funny enough, the only malfunction I got at the range out of my 10/22 Takedown was with the original BX-1 magazine from Ruger, where a FTF on a Remington Golden Bullet caused the round to get stuck at a 45 deg angle and the bolt to shave off a part of the bullet tip. I was not expecting the BX-1 to get beaten in reliability by the Butler Creek!
Overall, I'm very impressed with this Butler Creek Steel Lips magazine. I've got an original BX-25 on the way to compare, but if the Butler Creek mags run this good, then there's no real need to pay extra or wait for "back in stock" for the original Ruger BX-25 mags.
P.S. That's our EM332 Scorpio rifles in the pictures, along with my 10/22 Takedown. Very handy little rifles and extremely reliable. I actually got better groups with the Scorpio than the 10/22, despite the shorter barrel. Worth every penny at $209 (Tenda)
All rifles were equipped with the UUQ Prince7 red dots ($70 @ Amazon), which are the Sig Sauer Romeo5 clones. Good red dots for a fraction of the cost. Some sources claim they come off the same assembly line as the Sig Romeo5 in China.
The reliability of those two Butler Creek magazines was horrendous and they would cause failures to feed and often destroy the ammo by the bolt pinching it every 3-4 rounds, to the point where I just gave up on them. I was spending more time clearing malfunctions and throwing away ammo than I was shooting. A few fellow range members at the time recommended jamming a piece of cardboard from a .22LR box in between the mag and mag well to give the Butler Creek mags the "right angle" for better feeding, but that hasn't worked very well for me either. Anyway, jamming cardboard in a mag well to make the gun run correctly is ridiculous and not at all up my alley. I'm of the opinion that something that's designed to run in a platform should run flawlessly, without this type of improvised BS mods right outta the box...!
I ended up throwing these two mags in my parts drawer in disgust and swore I'd never buy another "Butler Creek" product ever again. The BX-1 mags from Ruger ran flawlessly in the rifle, by the way. I was sold on only buying and using original Ruger mags going forward. Lesson learned.
Fast forward to last week, when I was looking to procure an extra BX-1, BX-15 or BX-25 mag or two for my 10/22 Takedown (upgraded with the Volquartsen heavy firing pin and exact edge extractor) ahead of a planned range trip. All the 10/22 mags at the store were sold out (obviously!), except one "open package" Butler Creek mag that looked suspiciously like a customer return. The sales person at the store stated that those used to be indeed quite bad, but that the company corrected their design since. Reluctantly, I bought it... half expecting another useless item that would end up in my POS gun parts drawer, lol.
The initial impressions out of the box were quite good. The plastic these mags are made of is very slick (almost feels greasy) and it goes into the 10/22 like it's oiled, just snapping right in place. Removal with the stock mag release is very easy and intuitive too, kind of feels very AK-ish. The extra long grip on the mag allows for much quicker mag swaps than the original flush BX-1 mags. The only concerning part was that the mag would "jam up" on my stainless steel 22LR snap caps and not feed right, occasionally. This did not inspire much confidence to be honest, but I needed to test the new magazine with actual brass-cased ammo at the range.
So... off to the range I went with a buddy. We fired probably 100+ rounds through that magazine (CCI Mini-Mags and Remington Golden Bullets) and the mag ran FLAWLESSLY! I was really impressed, given how very low my expectations were. The loading is actually easier on it than on the BX-1 from Ruger, as the tension is just right and it feels like an already "broken in" magazine. The only downside I suppose is that these mags cannot be disassembled for cleaning when they potentially foul up and you need to wash / submerge them in soapy water to clean, according to information online. They have a drainage hole at the bottom, so that should help in draining and drying whenever a good cleaning is needed.
Funny enough, the only malfunction I got at the range out of my 10/22 Takedown was with the original BX-1 magazine from Ruger, where a FTF on a Remington Golden Bullet caused the round to get stuck at a 45 deg angle and the bolt to shave off a part of the bullet tip. I was not expecting the BX-1 to get beaten in reliability by the Butler Creek!
Overall, I'm very impressed with this Butler Creek Steel Lips magazine. I've got an original BX-25 on the way to compare, but if the Butler Creek mags run this good, then there's no real need to pay extra or wait for "back in stock" for the original Ruger BX-25 mags.
P.S. That's our EM332 Scorpio rifles in the pictures, along with my 10/22 Takedown. Very handy little rifles and extremely reliable. I actually got better groups with the Scorpio than the 10/22, despite the shorter barrel. Worth every penny at $209 (Tenda)
All rifles were equipped with the UUQ Prince7 red dots ($70 @ Amazon), which are the Sig Sauer Romeo5 clones. Good red dots for a fraction of the cost. Some sources claim they come off the same assembly line as the Sig Romeo5 in China.
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