US PALM AK30 Magazine

[jimdigriz 580]

I still look forward to seeing Post's technique, but he has an uphill battle in terms of getting it adopted.

 

I'm guessing he's referring to the "hasty hasty sling".

[bigsal 757]

I still look forward to seeing Post's technique, but he has an uphill battle in terms of getting it adopted.

 

I'm guessing he's referring to the "hasty hasty sling".

Time will tell.

[GeorgiaPD 408]

Nice write up Sal. I am looking forward to the remainder of your findings

[bigsal 757]

TEST 4:

DROP TEST

 

METHODOLOGY: Each magazine was Dropped, feedlips down, from a height of about 10 feet (I stood on the back of my VW and let gravity do the work). Magazines fell onto Idaho's hard earth/rocky surface.

NOTE: as you can see from picture two some units landed on their side once or twice. I repeated the drop until they slammed against the ground feedlips first.

 

 

RESULTS: All Magazines survived. Polish Slabside unit had feedlips scratch significantly, though no significant fractures.

 

 

 

NOTE: This week I placed several magazines outside buried in a vermiculite/top soil mixture. I will conduct fouling and cleaning tests next week. Please continue to check out this thread throughout the week for extras!

Edited September 14, 2010 by bigsal

[bigsal 757]

Nice write up Sal. I am looking forward to the remainder of your findings

 

 

Thanks bro ! I will do a unified write-up when the final tests are complete this coming week.

 

UPDATE: Thread reaches 1100 views in under a week!

[bigsal 757]

UPDATE: See Below!

Edited September 17, 2010 by bigsal

[bigsal 757]

TEST 5:

 

Fouling.

 

Methodology: A magazine might function well clean, but in the field things get dirty. So I decided to simulate extreme exposure to the elements with this test. We took the US-Palm AK30 and thee Bulgarian ((10)) magazines and compressed their springs down. While each spring was down, my 7 year old dumped wet soil/vermiculite/plant material into each magazine until the magazines were full of debris. Magazines were buried under more top soil and left on my front porch for a period of one week. During the week, it rained twice. I will dig these up tonight or tomorrow morning and test their ability to come clean and function.

 

The Contenders:

 

 

Soil in magazine:

 

Who will be victorious?

[Sam Cro 14]

Bigsal, very cool review!! I can't wait for the final results!

[bigsal 757]

Bigsal, very cool review!! I can't wait for the final results!

Thanks bro!

[cellsworth 21]

Sal, this is the best magazine review I have ever seen! Great job!

[bigsal 757]

Sal, this is the best magazine review I have ever seen! Great job!

Thanks man!

[chevyman097 2,579]

Ew fake peanut butter, stuff is filled with poison. All natural is the way to go.

[Stansplace 414]

Watching this closely, if I am not mistaken one of the mags you are testing doesn't have a removable floor plate. Is this correct? If so that mother is gonna be a bear to get the crap out of.

[VaiFanatic90 360]

Watching this closely, if I am not mistaken one of the mags you are testing doesn't have a removable floor plate. Is this correct? If so that mother is gonna be a bear to get the crap out of.

 

Yes, the US Palm AK30 magazine does not have a removable floor plate.

[bigsal 757]

Ew fake peanut butter, stuff is filled with poison. All natural is the way to go.

 

All food is filled with trace amounts of poison. I am not rich enough to eat all organic. PB and J is a cheap way to feed my growing family....

 

Watching this closely, if I am not mistaken one of the mags you are testing doesn't have a removable floor plate. Is this correct? If so that mother is gonna be a bear to get the crap out of.

 

 

Watching this closely, if I am not mistaken one of the mags you are testing doesn't have a removable floor plate. Is this correct? If so that mother is gonna be a bear to get the crap out of.

 

Yes, the US Palm AK30 magazine does not have a removable floor plate.

 

Both of you are correct. However the AK30's follower has small holes in it and because of the fact it cannot rust, it is meant to be run under warm water for cleaning. I have my doubts, but I will find out tomorrow!

[paprotective 362]

Great review Sal.. You are da'man..

[VaiFanatic90 360]

 

Watching this closely, if I am not mistaken one of the mags you are testing doesn't have a removable floor plate. Is this correct? If so that mother is gonna be a bear to get the crap out of.

 

Yes, the US Palm AK30 magazine does not have a removable floor plate.

 

Both of you are correct. However the AK30's follower has small holes in it and because of the fact it cannot rust, it is meant to be run under warm water for cleaning. I have my doubts, but I will find out tomorrow!

 

Yeah, I'm curious to see if a good washing out will do the trick. Might have to take a shower with it, hah.

[bwade 38]

Thanks for doing this bigsal. I will probably never buy a Palm 30 but its still nice to see these kinds of things done.

 

Kudos to you again good sir.

[bigsal 757]

Thanks for doing this bigsal. I will probably never buy a Palm 30 but its still nice to see these kinds of things done.

 

Kudos to you again good sir.

 

You are most welcome bro!

 

 

Great review Sal.. You are da'man..

 

Thanks man!

Edited September 18, 2010 by bigsal

[shades_of_grey 1,092]

I still look forward to seeing Post's technique, but he has an uphill battle in terms of getting it adopted.

 

I'm guessing he's referring to the "hasty hasty sling".

Time will tell.

 

Here are those pics I promised ya of my offhand sling technique, sal. I don't think I'm breaking any new ground here.. as it's quite simple, yet works well:

 

 

If I slightly move my support hand forward, the sling drops free.. so I am most definitely not in danger of getting "tangled up" while using this technique:

 

 

ymmv.

Edited September 18, 2010 by post-apocalyptic

[bigsal 757]

I still look forward to seeing Post's technique, but he has an uphill battle in terms of getting it adopted.

 

I'm guessing he's referring to the "hasty hasty sling".

Time will tell.

 

Here are those pics I promised ya of my offhand sling technique, sal. I don't think I'm breaking any new ground here.. as it's quite simple, yet works well:

 

 

If I slightly move my support hand forward, the sling drops free.. so I am most definitely not in danger of getting "tangled up" while using this technique:

 

 

ymmv.

 

Thats for the pics Post_A, I think picture 1 is unacceptably tangled and would result in my death in a gun fight. Picture two is more acceptable. If it works for you, then use it however!

Edited September 18, 2010 by bigsal

[shades_of_grey 1,092]

...Thats for the pics Post_A, I think picture 1 is unacceptably tangled and would result in my death in a gun fight...

 

Might work out that way for you... not for me. You of course realize that the sling is not wrapped around my torso or anything. I don't see the "tangle" there. *shrug*

 

...Picture two is more acceptable. If it works for you, then use it however!

 

All it takes to move the sling's position from where it is in picture 1 to where it is in picture 2 is moving my support hand from where it is in the first pic to where it is in the second. It's very easy to free your support arm if it becomes necessary, without taking your eyes off your target/s.

 

Anyway, as well as it works for me, I s'pose it might not for some people.

[bigsal 757]

Extra movements are extra movements. As a general I don't like having to do more then I must.

[bigsal 757]

[my762buzz 141]

Nice testing thread.

[bigsal 757]

TEST 5 Results (part 1 of 3)

 

Magazines appear in my front yard buried by debris, dirt, wood-chips, dog-mess, and vegetation:

 

 

Each magazine is removed from their tomb....

 

Note: There is a small amount of rust on the right hand side of the floor-plate on the ((10)).

 

Magazines Side-by-Side in my bathtub, each is full to the brim with dirt. I followed a simple procedure for each. I would remove the Floor Plate from the ((10)) and take out the spring and follower. I would then wipe the dirt out of the magazine body with an oily rag. The US-Palm AK30 would be run under "hot soapy water, rinse and invert to drain". as per official instructions.

Edited September 18, 2010 by bigsal

[bigsal 757]

TEST 5 Results (Part 2 of 3)

 

The ((10)) had a few issues with cleaning. Its base plate took some cajoling to remove as debris has gotten into the space between the steel floor plate and the magazine body. Once I was able to remove the spring and follower were easy to clean off. (Part 3 of this review tests functionality when I hand feed 30 rounds through each).

 

The AK30 had a few issues when cleaning as well, which stem from its five-sided-box design. To begin it would be a pain in the ass to remove enough dirt and grime from this thing in the field without access to hot running water. Here is a picture of my engaging in "rutine" maintanaince as specified by the manufacturer.

 

Water is added:

 

 

Water is drained:

 

NOTE: Water is able to remove most of what fell into the holes. The thing is, I am not sure everything is gone because you cannot open these things up and shining a small flashlight was not helping me see every nook and cranny. That being said, I ran the magazine under water until all the brown water was gone and I was only chucking out clear H20. Part 3 AND my open letter to US-Palm in a bit.

[VaiFanatic90 360]

Keep it up, I'm watching intently. I figured it'd have issues with cleaning since you can't remove the floor plate or see inside the mag itself to ensure you got every spec of dirt.

[bigsal 757]

TEST 5 RESULTS and an Open Letter to US-Palm (Part 3 of 3)

 

Methodology: after magazines were cleaned, they were loaded with 30 rounds of Yugo Surplus. Magazines were each placed in magwell and hand-cycled. NO ISSUES WITH ETHER MAGAZINE. BOTH FED PERFECTLY! Despite the success, after the test I jiggled the AK30 around and I can hear a small particle bouncing around at the bottom of the magazine. This is likely a wood-chip, but who knows. It did not stop the hand cycle (pulled the charging handle and let it fly then repeated 30 times).

 

CONCLUSION AND OPEN LETTER TO US-PALM:

The AK30 is a viable magazine. It wins BigSals thumbs up. However future generations will need the following modifications:

 

1: The polymer that is used in the AK30 is weak and chipped off during my drop tests. This will need to be improved in generation 3 of your magazines.

2: The AK30's five-sided-box design allows this thing to meet my expectations for strength, but it does not allow for field maintenance. A small panel at the bottom that does not compromise the design should be included in generation 3 of your magazine

3: The web pattern on the sides of the AK30 is awkward and will need to be thought out out more. I rather liked the grooves on the front and rear of the magazines, but the web pattern in the plastic on the sides is just to funky a feeling. The Bulgarians have a tighter pattern which is closer together and easier to grip. I would copy what works instead of trying to reinvent the wheel

4: The Creepy Afrika-Corps logo should be redesigned in order to not offend Americans. Remember, we didn't beat the Nazi's only to have their logos plastered on our rifle accessories!

 

The things I really enjoyed about the magazine:

1: The weight is perfect! only the Polish Slabsides weigh less. This is a good thing!

2: I was under the impression the feedlips would be paper thin and would crack.... this was not the case. The THICK feedlips met our rigid requirement and passed the drop tests.

3: While the spring was (and is) extremely tight even after my spring depression test, it was still able to push round up without the same issues the KCI/Kahn (glock) magazines have had. HOWEVER, I only own a few of your magazines and would need a more representative sample to say for sure if problems occur with greater frequency.

4: For some reason I like the holes in the follower!!!

 

Now the bad news: your product is not competitive at its $29+ price point. This magazine could be more justifiably sold at $15-20 in my expert opinion. When Bulgarian ((10)) magazines are $23-26 all over the internet, I would be hard pressed to advise the members of Saiga forum to jump on the AK30.

 

 

Again, these magazines win the BigSal Thumbs Up. They are solid, tough and well made. I hope that someone from the company is reading this review and seriously considers my recommendations. If not, they can all go and suck a dick.

 

Thanks,

Sal

[Stansplace 414]

Awesome review Bigsal! Now PM Makc and request he moves the thread to the review subforum.