How to weaken a rifle magizine

[THERAVEN]

I have a CZ 527 American 22 Hornet. I have had it for a few years and have never fired it. It is brand new. The magizine spring is the tightest I have ever seen. I can put 4 shells in it with my might. It is meant for 5, no way. Is there any way that I can do any thing to the spring to have less preasure.

[44 AMP]

First step is buy a replacement spring. AFTER you have that (and if it is as strong as what you have now) THEN you can look at options to reduce the tension of the current spring. If the replacement spring is ok, then use it and keep the original as a spare.

When tinkering with spring tension, once done, it cannot be undone, so get a replacement before you start to tinker.

(I assume you have already disassembled the magazine and checked to ensure there is nothing impeding free travel of the follower or spring, right?)

[SIGSHR]

I would rely on Ye Olde Standby of Breaking In. It could be the magazine follower is a little too tight.

[FrankenMauser]

The rectangular-wound wire style spring used in the 527 magazines doesn't lend itself to easy "re-tensioning", since it needs to maintain certain geometry for proper feeding.

You may have to clip a coil off the bottom and see where that gets you; or heat a lower bend to take out the temper.
But take measurements to make sure it will still have enough length, and be prepared with a spare, before hacking it. Once you go too far, the spring is junk.

If there is a *skilled* gunsmith in your area, they might be able to fold up and temper and flat ("accordion") spring for the application.
Yes, springs are easy to make and there are even 'easy' ways for idiots to temper them. But the average modern gunsmith doesn't even understand what a part's function is, let alone how various parts interact. So they can't be expected to understand how to keep a follower level in a magazine. Skill and brains are required.

[jmr40]

That is pretty normal with a lot of magazines. Load it with 4 and leave it loaded. Come back a few days, even weeks later and load #5. They eventually get to the point where they will easily take all of them.


I've had 17 round 9mm mags that I could only get 13-14 rounds in initially. After a few days of being loaded I could get in one more. Then a few days later another, and eventually fully loaded. Left fully loaded for a few weeks and thereafter fully loading it was a lot easier.

[stagpanther]

I know it's completely different--but the tension in my stock CZ 457 magazine is very high also. I mention this because if your's is also under very high tension--be very careful when removing/installing the floor plate if it is made of plastic--I found mine was easy to break if I wasn't careful. The mag well and magazine are the only aspects to the rifle where I think CZ really cheaped out compared to otherwise high quality through the rest of the rifle.

[THERAVEN]

Thank you very much.