Why is the Glock base plate so different...

[Spyder]

Do you people really have so much trouble with taking them apart? A vice???

Take the normal glock takedown tool...or a drill bit, or small screwdriver, or whatever else. Poke it in the hole halfway, pry sideways. The tip of the tool touches the inside of the mag body and it takes no more force than a 4 year old child would apply. The plate slides right off, and is about as easy as taking a sip of room temperature coffee.

What the hell?

[Notpc]

Do you people really have so much trouble with taking them apart? A vice???

Take the normal glock takedown tool...or a drill bit, or small screwdriver, or whatever else. Poke it in the hole halfway, pry sideways. The tip of the tool touches the inside of the mag body and it takes no more force than a 4 year old child would apply. The plate slides right off, and is about as easy as taking a sip of room temperature coffee.

What the hell?

Pry sideways? Don't they come off/on front to back?

[Spyder]

It's sideways if you're holding it that way in your hand!

Pry towards the angle they are supposed to go. It's incredibly easy.

[deckhandmike]

Yep, best 10$ you can spend. Takes one second.

[FalconLair]

Do you people really have so much trouble with taking them apart? A vice???

Take the normal glock takedown tool...or a drill bit, or small screwdriver, or whatever else. Poke it in the hole halfway, pry sideways. The tip of the tool touches the inside of the mag body and it takes no more force than a 4 year old child would apply. The plate slides right off, and is about as easy as taking a sip of room temperature coffee.

What the hell?

It's sideways if you're holding it that way in your hand!

Pry towards the angle they are supposed to go. It's incredibly easy.

Spyder, thanks for your help - first time Glock owner and i've never had to deal with their magazine - it's definitely different from any other i've had

i have a new G19 gen5 and the magazine has a sort of catch that sticks out and creates an interference if you try to pull it out of it's track - many seem to be familiar with it so im guessing it's been around a spell

it looks like this - are you saying it can be removed in the same manner you mentioned? I read some earlier model Glocks magazines don't have that



i like the reply from riewpolar too - seems plausible
what purpose does it really serve, the base plate isn't going to slide off without it - seems like overkill on the design

[FalconLair]

But the CA 10 round mags are much more difficult than free state mags

Actually you must push the locking plate down first (way down), before squeezing the sides. The locking plate keeps the sides from being squeezed if it is in the normal position (see pics below).

The reason CA mags are so hard to get apart is because the locking plates cannot be pushed down far enough to allow the sides to be squeezed, because the 10rd mags have reduced body volume inside.

Any CA mags I have get modified locking plates, so the mags can be squeezed never the less. Just dremel a crescent shape into the sides of the locking plate.

i see what you did there and it looks great, my only thought would be if im going to put in the time and effort to do that, why not go with what riewpolar advised and just take a sharp knife or dremel and cut or grind off the plastic notch they put at the end of the magazine? Now you could just remove the plate without the use of anything except the hole punch tool

Am I the only one that takes an exacto
knife and cuts away those small plastic nubs on the sides? Makes removing and reinstalling the base plate so much easier and no way those base plates are coming off inadvertently, even with those nubs gone. It’s a tight fit anyway, not quite sure why those nubs are there

[SkyHawk]

i see what you did there and it looks great, my only thought would be if im going to put in the time and effort to do that, why not go with what riewpolar advised and just take a sharp knife or dremel and cut or grind off the plastic notch they put at the end of the magazine? Now you could just remove the plate without the use of anything except the hole punch tool

Because the tabs & notches are there for a reason and give extra retention to the base plate. I personally would never remove the tabs on the mag body or the notches they lock into. 10 seconds with a dremel and 1/2" sanding wheel gets you the modified locking insert, and still give the benefit of the tabs and notches. I don't have any CA mags anymore, but if I ever do again they will all get the mod.

Also, anyone using any tool including that fancy $10 tool / pry bar to remove their baseplate without pushing the locking insert down far enough to use a squeeze tool (and using the squeeze tool or squeezing the mags), may as well just cut their tabs off now because the tabs and/or notches are going to get jacked eventually.

[Spyder]

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3JTd2384EZQ

[Spyder]

Falconlair, yes, they all have that tab and they are all very easy to take apart. See the above video. It takes him 1 minute to describe what takes 3 seconds to do.

Glock mags are easier than AR mags. I have done it literally thousands of times on hundreds of mags. It doesn't hurt them at all. Putting them in a vice is more damaging.

[FalconLair]

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3JTd2384EZQ

Falconlair, yes, they all have that tab and they are all very easy to take apart. See the above video. It takes him 1 minute to describe what takes 3 seconds to do.

Glock mags are easier than AR mags. I have done it literally thousands of times on hundreds of mags. It doesn't hurt them at all. Putting them in a vice is more damaging.

thanks, that was helpful

[FalconLair]

But the CA 10 round mags are much more difficult than free state mags

Actually you must push the locking plate down first (way down), before squeezing the sides. The locking plate keeps the sides from being squeezed if it is in the normal position (see pics below).

The reason CA mags are so hard to get apart is because the locking plates cannot be pushed down far enough to allow the sides to be squeezed, because the 10rd mags have reduced body volume inside.

Any CA mags I have get modified locking plates, so the mags can be squeezed never the less. Just dremel a crescent shape into the sides of the locking plate.

my magazines are all 15 round capacity - would you still recommend doing that to the locking plate? it seems like i should have enough clearance by depressing the spring far enough down as to clear any area that needs a little squeezing

[Notpc]

It's sideways if you're holding it that way in your hand!

Pry towards the angle they are supposed to go. It's incredibly easy.

Gottcha! It just read kinda weird when you wrote to pry "sideways".

[SkyHawk]

my magazines are all 15 round capacity - would you still recommend doing that to the locking plate? it seems like i should have enough clearance by depressing the spring far enough down as to clear any area that needs a little squeezing

No there is no reason to do it to the free state mags because you can push the locking insert down very far, and then the mag body can be squeezed if you want to, or the baseplate can just be gorilla'd away which will slightly compress the mag body on the way out.

[Spyder]

Gottcha! It just read kinda weird when you wrote to pry "sideways".

I just learned words.

[FalconLair]

my magazines are all 15 round capacity - would you still recommend doing that to the locking plate? it seems like i should have enough clearance by depressing the spring far enough down as to clear any area that needs a little squeezing

No there is no reason to do it to the free state mags because you can push the locking insert down very far, and then the mag body can be squeezed if you want to, or the baseplate can just be gorilla'd away which will slightly compress the mag body on the way out.

so i took a pair of channel locks, protected the magazine body with a soft cloth, depressed the spring about an inch with my punch then applied slight pressure around the bottom of the magazine with the channel locks and the base slid right off - pretty easy, still those little notches seem a bit overboard

all in all turned out fine