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Dinzag Bullet guide question


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Hey all. You know I like to experiment and play. So, I'm done with my promag experiments and such. Definitely a worthwhile venture. Obviously not for everyone, but for those willing to do a little tweaking, definitely a cost efficient means of magazines.

 

Anyway, I digress. My next experimenting may be with the dinzag bullet guide. The only problem with experimenting with it, is you really only get one chance at drilling a hole. Matter of fact, I was contemplating semi-permanent installations until my experimenting is done. But my question, that I haven't been able to get a definitive answer on, is: Does the Dinzag bullet guide HAVE TO hang over the front as it does, to be effective? Basically, the existing design of the bullet guide has it hanging over the front and sitting almost flush with non-OEM/Surefire magazines. I understand the rational of having the bullet immediately ramping it's way up. However; as has been realized; this makes using the Dinzag bullet guide with OEM/Surefire magazines almost impossible without some grinding on the magazines. Has anyone tried seating the Dinzag bullet guide more forward, and mounting it flush with the magazine side of the trunnion? It's only 1/8". Is this a situation where that 1/8" won't allow non-oem magazines like the bulgies to ramp up soon enough? I think if the dinzag bullet guide was capable of being installed and using both oem/surefires as well as circle-10 or any other recommended magazine, that it would indeed be the best solution. But with the cost of .223 surplus magazines getting higher, and less available, wanting to use OEM/Surefire magazines, which are also coming down in price, might be a more feasible option. Fortunately, it looks like the promag magazines should work fine. That would probably be the PERFECT solution. $11 promag magazine, 3 seconds to PURPOSELY snap off the tab (Bullet guide); and use the Dinzag bullet guide.

 

Also, another reason if the bullet guide could work successfully by moving it forward a little, would be so a person could also but in a renegade AR-15 magazine adapter. That will most likely be either next on my experiments, or after the dinzag. If an OEM/Surefire won't fit with the current dinzag design, neither would a renegade. But that would be the ultimate. Dinzag which is permanent; AND a renegade, that can be put in or out at the speed of a magazine. Then, you'd be able to shoot OEM Saiga, Surefire, Promags with the tab broken off, bulgies, all other .223 style, as well as all the AR-15/M16 magazines you could use. And FWIW, that is my ultimate design. Find a way to make ALL the magazines work in the Saiga .223.

 

So, if anyone has any 1st hand info on the Dinzag that can help determine if there's some major issue with it having to have an overhang, that would be cool. If I can get my ultimate goal figured out, that would be great. If not, I'd like to be able to get a Dinzag to at least work with oem/surefire magazines WITHOUT ANY modification to the magazines. thanks.... mike.....

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I just installed a Dinzag bullet guide in my 5.45 Saiga on Sunday. Due to the overhang, I had to cut a significant notch in the front of my factory 10-round magazine to make it fit after installing the guide. The front lip of the mag has to be cut down to the same level as the front of the follower plate on an empty mag. My four Russian plums seemed to fit just fine when test fitting the guide, but after drilling, tapping and screwing it down, they would stop just short of latching and required a couple of minutes of work on the forward lips with a jeweler's file. Now all 5 latch up nice and snug. I recieved my first ammo yesterday afternoon and shot a total of 140 rounds out of all of them (full 30 out of each plum and two 10-round loads out of the factory) and they all fed perfectly.

 

 

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Thanks for the responses. I just received an email back from Dinzag. Brian, from Dinzag stated:

 

We tested shorter guide designs to clear the factory type mags. Depending on the mag and ammo used, reliability would go south. Sometimes the rounds would not lift high enough, sometimes the last round in the mag would not feed, some would have the bolt ride over them, etc.

 

Ideally the guide could be shorter if it could be thicker, but there you run into bolt clearance issues.

 

The current design ensures reliability with pretty much any mag we ran in it.

 

We revisited a lot of the same issues when we designed the 5.45x39 guide and thought we had developed a solution we could implement across the board for all guides. Unfortunately in testing it didn't pan out either.

 

So, it looks like this could be one of those situations where I'll have to rethink using the bullet guide. The bullet guide is one of those deals where you only really get one chance at installing it. And now, with most of these ak-47, galil, weiger, circle 10, and so on costing around $25-$30, and the Surefire magazines, which work perfectly on a factory stock saiga dropping their prices down to about $27.50 through our sponsor Carolina shooting supply, it almost seems like it's not worth doing the bullet guide option. However, the promag magazines are actually a very good magazine once you get past that POS tab bullet guide it has built in. If you spend 3 seconds with your thumb and snap that damn thing off, the Dinzag bullet guide is perfect for that. And those magazines only cost $11 each if you buy a pack of 8. So, I'll have to definitely rethink my next project. I am definitely leaning towards doing a Renegade AR15/M16 magazine adapter project first; then I can rethink the bullet guide possibility. Except for the promag with the tab snapped, I'm not seeing the cost benefit. When the surefires were $40+ each, there was a definite difference. But with those prices coming down, definitely something to think about.

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