OT question for M1 owners - which mags do you recommend?

[O.S.O.K.]

I am looking at purchasing an M1 Carbine. Why? I don't know... its C&R and I can have it shipped to my door - that's one thing, they are super fun to shoot - that's two, not too expensive (3), are decent self defense rifles with soft point ammo (4), have all kinds of stuff available (5), can shoot reloads (6), are historical US miliatry rifles (7), my dad has my M1 Garand and would probably trade for an M1 Carbine.... (8)... did I mention they are fun to shoot?

Anyway -the reason for the thread is that I'm looking at a purchase of a WWII milsurp model and would like to know about magazines for these. Like what kind to get for it... there are milsurp 15 rounders available for $24/each, 30 round aftermarket models for $12.50... 20 rounders, etc.

Are these picky about their mags? Are aftermarkets usually pretty good? I found some at J&G that have good ratings from buyers - $12.50 price is good too.

I am mostly interested in practicality for the mags - I always try and get a minimum of 5 high cap mags for my semi auto rifles/carbines. But I'll probably go for 7 at least for this....

What's the word fellas?

Oh, and while I'm at it, anybody have any good leads on decent ammo for this too? How do they like Wolf?

[mescalero1]

I bought a big lot of US milsurp mags from Sarco years ago 15 rounders, I like them better.
If you want to shoot the 30 rounders make sure you get an M2 mag catch for it.
I have two, 1 in .30 carbine
1 in 5.7MM Johnson
As with my AR's
I prefer the shorter mags.

[mescalero1]

1 important thing I forgot to mention, my friend Kieth has a cast bullet & load that will go 5 for 5 right thru the STEEL rim of a 1950 Chevy pickup.

[2ndovc]

Olny trouble I've ever had was with the aftermarket / cheapo 30 rounders.

I've had one or more M1 Carbines since I was a senoir in HS. My Dad tried to talk me out of buying my first one ( what are you gonna do with THAT?) an early Winchester ( But Dad, it's a Winchester) for a couple hundred bucks. Probably every last dime I had at the time.

I bought a pile of 15 round mags from just about every manufacturer from Springfield Sporters in PA for $1 ea. in varing condition. Even dented , rusted and beat up every one of them worked.

I think as long as you stick to an original mfg. from WWII / Korea you'll be fine.

Still have that Winchester


jb

[Ben_Rumson]

I like the balance of the Carbine better than the 30 rounders..++ what the other fellas said.. I've tried the Wolf For the price it's OK..it all goes bang and accuracy with it runs at 4" or so @100..It's cheap because it's steel cased ammo and to keep it from rusting it's polymer coated..I have found that some of this coating gets left behind in the chamber and builds up causing POI change by the time I get a box thru it..I let it go one time until there was an extraction failure.. The stuff comes out fairly quickly with powder solvent on a brush..Now I spin the rounds in a drill & remove the coating with a 3M pad and POI doesn't shift anymore.
I'm thinking/investigating of putting a special handguard on it http://www.ultimak.com/BuyM1C.htm and mounting this on it.
http://www.trijicon.com/user/parts/prod ... tegoryID=8

[Cliff]

There was a guy by the name SCHERER who had cornered the market on the M1 carbine mags back in the 60's at some good prices. I believe he still is selling these and they were all millitary mags in good shape. Last time I came across his ads the prices of course had gone up. Unforturnately I no longer know his address or even if he still has them. He does sell all kinds of hard to find magazines as well. I don't know if an online search would find him or not. I got mine around 1969 and at a price of about 3 bucks each if you brought 10 or more. Okay I did find his address but it is around five years old. It is Scherer Supplies, P.O. Box 250, Ewing, VA 24248, his phone number was or is 423-733-2615 and the Fax is given as 423-733-2073. I know he does work the gun show circuit as well. Good Luck if this helps.

[JerryB]

My grandson bought a Universal a couple of years ago, great shooting carbine with no trouble. He has the best luck with 15 round GI mags.Our dealer friend gave him a 30 round mag and he took it back to buy some more of the 15 round mags.The 30 will jam all the time and takes away from the way the carbine handles.
As far as ammo goes, he ordered 500 rounds of Federal ball from ammoman.com, they have free shipping on all orders.
He keeps one mag loaded with soft point and one with ball.

[O.S.O.K.]

Wow - I didn't expect to hear that about the 30 rounders. Thanks for the head up on that. 15 rounders will do nicely then.

I also looked into getting the stuff to handload for this - being a straight/slight tapered round, I can run this through my progressive (old RCBS Ammomaster) with a set of carbide dies.

That'll give me quality ammo. From what I understand, H110/W296 are the best powders.

And it'll get some soft points - they are the same price as the fmj's and have the same nose contour...

I undertand that the carbines usually don't like hollowpoints, but at 1800-1900 muzzle velocity, I would think that softpoints will expand quite well if need be.

Thanks again for the help gents!

[2ndovc]

Just a note: Not all thirty round mags jam.

I have six or 7 fifties vintage military M2 mags and they function perfectly. It's the aftermarket 30s that you have to watch out for.


jb

[O.S.O.K.]

Thanks - I don't think I've seen any milspec 30 rounders... but you never know.

I just snagged the carbine on gunbroker... I was actually bidding on another one and a NR (not rated) bidder kept upping the ante - I suspect collusion... .which can easily be accomplished by having a family member or friend get an account and the bid on your auctions. Regardless, I went back to the drawing board so to speak and found this:



Its a saginaw (General Motors) production M1 with mostly matching parts - many of the ones listed at this or higher price were complete parts guns with nothing matching... so I was happy to find this one. It's also listed with a good to very good bore and the seller is all positive rated with 16 transactions - and he's in Texas which is good for me.

I was looking at the different types - shooter/recent manufacture types and milsurp ones - I decided that I wanted a military surplus/C&R if I was going to do it.... nothing wrong with the shooters, just that they were almost as much $$ if not more and I figure the military models will only go up in value as time goes by...

Again, thank you all for the feedback - I've always wanted one of these and just never got around to making it happen.

[O.S.O.K.]

Olny trouble I've ever had was with the aftermarket / cheapo 30 rounders.

I've had one or more M1 Carbines since I was a senoir in HS. My Dad tried to talk me out of buying my first one ( what are you gonna do with THAT?) an early Winchester ( But Dad, it's a Winchester) for a couple hundred bucks. Probably every last dime I had at the time.

I bought a pile of 15 round mags from just about every manufacturer from Springfield Sporters in PA for $1 ea. in varing condition. Even dented , rusted and beat up every one of them worked.

I think as long as you stick to an original mfg. from WWII / Korea you'll be fine.

Still have that Winchester


jb

Jason, just wanted to say "wow!". You did very well in holding on to that sweety. The Winchesters go for a premium and I mean premium That's very cool.

And I found some 15 round mags from http://www.keepshooting.com that are guaranteed to function or money back. Figured what the heck and ordered some. They are 1/2 the $30 which is the best milsurp price I could find....

[dr walker]

Looks like you found a good one.

I have been looking for good deals on ammo with no luck.

[mescalero1]

You will be happy with that. After you have had it for a while, you will start to get angry when people ask if they can buy it.I do, when they ask if they can buy mine.

[mescalero1]

O.S.A.K.
Go back on and see who winds up buying the other one.

[Old Time Hunter]

Never had a problem with my 30 round mag, but I got 'em from a Milsurp broker back thirty years ago. If you want some good ammo, try this:

http://www.wisconsincartridge.com/produ ... roduct=120

[Rusty]

It's only been about 30 years since I've had much time with a carbine, but reaching back in the dark recesses of my mind I think the difference with he 30 round mags is that they really are intended for the M2 (full auto) version and are a little bit different. The M2 carbine has a different mag. release than the M1. While the Mags will interchange the M2 release has en extra catch on it to told the longer and heavier magazine more securely in place. The M2 Mags also have an extra protrusion back near the catch to engage the extra part of the catch. Sorry for the lack of technical terms but I think you'll get the idea. If you look at the two parts mags and mag release, you'll see the difference.
If you but an M1 that has an M2 bolt in it there might just be some more M2 parts in the trigger guard as well that will help with this problem.

[Idahoser]

Y'all know CMP is selling Carbines now, right? Better deal than gunbroker.

[O.S.O.K.]

Y'all know CMP is selling Carbines now, right? Better deal than gunbroker.

I just checked their site - the sales link is kapute. Apparently it has been for a while - what are the prices?

I did a search and saw a reference to 2007 pricing of "service grade" Inlands for $495 plus shipping - no sling, no mag.

I got mine for $600 plus the shipping. That includes a magazine (milsurp 15 round) and the sling/oiler. That's about $50 or more worth of accesories, so the rifle was $550. If I paid $50 for being able to see it and read a description ahead of buying, then that's OK. And its a Saginaw - don't know if that's bettor or worse collector-wise?

No FFL transfer because I'm a licensed C&R collector, so to my door.

Most of the pricing on gunbroker was $700 plus plus for this type of rifle. I don't know how it slipped through the cracks... had a buy now the same as the starting bid - but you had to open it up and look.... sometimes you can find decent deals just by going back and looking at the auctions with several days left on them - most people "top line" the auctions I think.

Old Time Hunter - thanks for the link to that ammo - looks like a good price. Wish it gave some indication as to what brass, bullet...

[Idahoser]

The catalog is still available for download.

I got an email from them today about the Winchesters being ready. So this isn't completely accurate. But the price schedule should be right.

R017IN Inland . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . SOLD OUT $495
R017UD Underwood . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . SOLD OUT $565
R017WIN Winchester . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . SOLD OUT $675
R017Q Quality Hardware. . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . SOLD OUT $565
R017RO Rockola. . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . SOLD OUT $675
R017NP National Postal Meter . .Accepting orders beginning 28 April 2008 $575
R017SA Saginaw SG. .. . . . . . .Accepting orders beginning 28 April 2008 $575
R017SG Saginaw S‘G’(Grand Rapids)Accepting orders beginning 28 April 2008 $675
R017IBM IBM . . . . . . . . . . .. Accepting orders beginning 7 July 2008 $575
R017ST Standard Products . . . . . Accepting orders beginning 7 July 2008 $575
R017IP Irwin Pederson . . . . . . . . . . Available via CMP Auction Only

I'd imagine a lot of the ones you see on gunbroker are simply from CMP and marked up, the same way they do Garands. I think they've either raised or removed the limit on how many you can get, since they'll be out of business anyway after the election (course I said the same thing two years ago, and they're still there). It just doesn't make sense to me the commies will realize they authorized this, and will let it stand.

[Ysabel Kid]

I have a bunch of 15's and 30's, and have never had a problem with either in either mine or my son's gun. Some of these I purchased dirt cheap from Sportsman's Guide years ago - again, no problems. I like to have a bunch of magazines for any "battle rifle" I have - just in case (1) I really need to use them in an emergency and (2) the Dem's do something incredibly stupid like banning them. Horde now - # 2 is very likely!

Last several times out we shot Winchester 110-grain FMJ's with no problems. Accurate - but a little on the stinky side. Really - smelled a bit funny...

[Idahoser]

The link is working again.

I tried copy/paste but it doesn't come out right, so I'll just direct you there. It appears lots of stuff is sold out, so maybe I spoke too soon. It used to be there but that was a few months ago. I had the idea I'd get one someday... I guess not.

They do have Garands though. Service Grade for $595 or Field Grade for $495. We've had both, perhaps we got lucky but these were rifles that would sell for $800 and up at a gun show.

The carbines may be out of reach though.

[O.S.O.K.]

$675 for an Saginaw SG - which is what I bought... so I did much better thant the CMP. Their prices IMHO have gone up too high - the whole purpose of the CMP is to get rifles into the hands of qualified citizens so that they can be of use in national defense. Of course, they will point out that they sell out quickly at the current prices - but that ignores the real point....

Anyway, I bet the seller got this at an estate sale or similar... and so is making a good profit regardless. Good for him, good for me

Thanks for the information!

Oh and the description mentioned an "early flat bolt" - everything that he listed was marked SG or S - even the mag is a saginaw




This will be a nice addition to my US military rifle collection - I've got an old sporterized (end wood cut off) Krag that my dad gave me, a 1917 Enfield and a 1903-A3. Not a huge collection - just a side interest really. But its a little bigger now!