Hi Retro heads,

Many years ago, one of the first things I bought in the land of the big PX,
was a Colt AR15/M16 20 round box magazine at the military museum on
Oahu.  Back then I used some steel wool and got the mag to look uniformly
silver.

Fast fowards almost 40 years to today, and would like to do that again.  I have some mags
that missing their finish, but they seem to be stained grey or bronzey colors, under the dry film
not the silver.

How does one get the mag all silver?

Thanks!

Keep steel woolin' til you get through the bronze to the silver.

GI mags are aluminum, with a hardcoat anodizing treatment applied (the bronze layer), then usually a dry film lubricant applied (the grey layer).

MEK will cut the grey lube film off, but if they've already worn through the anodizing, you won't get much farther. You might get a new mag from Brownells and try.

I've seen and owned quite a few used USGI 20 round mags. In my observation, some have the dry-film over natural colored aluminum, while others have the dry-film over the golden-bronze color. The golden-bronze didn't wear through to the silver color, it was never there on the silver mags. On the mags which are silver under the dry-film, the metal exposed when the dry-film wears off will turn gray with handling, sometimes even showing fingerprints. The silver or bronze base color doesn't even seem to be related to the mag's manufacturer.