Has anyone gotten hands on with any of the new "Enhanced Performance Magazines"?  Would these have any advantage for someone just using M855 or M193?

http://soldiersystems.net/2016/08/16/first-look-new-us-army-enhanced-performance-magazine-for-m4a1/

Meh.. My "obsolete - do not use" mags are still serving me fine

For semiauto use it doesnt really matter

You shouldn't see much difference unless your shooting M855A1 and have to worry about feed ramp wear.

^^^THIS

Don't need em. Still want a few...

If you truly need them you are probably in the military and they will give them to you.  Most people here will have no use for them but will want them anyway.

Same here but I only trust Magpul followers if I have to use USGI. I'll stick to PMAGs and L5AWMs.

The Army just loves wasting even more taxpayer dollars just to say they invented something

Didn't know that 855a1 had an issue in gi mags with a tan follower. My plt in Afghanistan got a connexion full of 855a1 and had no issues other then mags wearing out and rifle related issues.

How are they wasting money?  There was a problem so they came up with a solution.  It will save money in the long run.  Good thing the military doesn't need AR15.com approval for every change they make.

hes probably saying it would have been easier to buy & test what was already available on the civilian market instead of spending money for r&d and came out with a similar product.. Expecially for the green & tan follower mags

Yes, thank you for clarifying.

The tan follower also has to reverse the round orientation and use a redesigned spring making it incompatible with Magpul and older USGI followers. Its as if the Army is saying fuck you to Magpul, pisses me off.

There is currently no USGI spec mag(aluminum) on the market that has the feed angle the military thinks will cut down on wear.  Regarding stuff available on the civilian market I don't think these companies mentioned give it away to the military, nor should they be expected to.  The redesigned spring helps prevent the follower from tilting, has nothing to do with making them incompatable.  The military could care less about what is available in the civilian world.  If they like something (example: camelback)s, they buy it.  If they don't they don't.

As I said the above statement is valid for the green & tan follower.
The Brits made a smart move buying the emags IMHO.

The newer m855a1 mag is a different story..

Did anybody report it being more effective than standard 855?

from the previous thread...









New magazine is shown in grey, the old in orange - note the different feed lip profiles.

The green follower mag was the first upgrade ever made to the 30 rd mag since it was invented.  There was nothing on the civilian market at the time.  It was the military's idea and considered a temporary fix at the time (which means they planned something more definitive in the future: the tan follower).  The 30 rd mag was their design, the improved (green)follower was their design.  They do what they want when they want and owe no one.  When they upgrade tanks and helicopters I doubt they check the forums first. When the green follower came out everyone on this forum raved about how great it was.  How times change.....

Me too. I like that tan shade.

Don't care either way about the color, but the different geometry and follower plus my desire and hope for M855A1 over run to hit the market some time when I have the $ to actually buy a thousand or so leads me to want a few.

I suspect they will end up on the EE same way the tan follower mags are.  1000 rounds of 855 won't do anything to your rifle I believe the wear is noticed after 50,000 or so.

If the military is planning on replacing all the mags in the system with these new mags, (that's 7 mags for every M16), they might as well have switched to the 6.8SPC.

 

iirc, they're being replaced through attrition

Has anyone handled one? How's the finish? Picture makes it look glossy like Teflon offerings.

That will take decades. Every unit I served in replaced maybe a dozen mags a year out of 700-800 we had on hand.

Yeah, I've only ever been issued green followers, might've even had a black follower back in boot camp. In fact, the green follower ones I was issued at my current duty station two years ago were given to me brand new still in the boxes!

Comments after the article were interesting.

Its "GREEN" ammo. Lead free. Seems that the penatrator tip like to sepirate from the copper and go it's seperate way. M885 ball ain't bad ammo, it was designed at a time the Army was worried about fighting countries that had body armor. It's good at wants it's intended for. I have a stash of tan follower mags. All have worked 100% with 855 and 855a1. All issues I've ever had was due to age and mags being at the end of there service life or damaged.

I still have a hand full of black follower mags from the '80s that have never had a mag related failure with M193 or M855.This includes a lot of full auto firing back when I was issued an M16A1. Go figure.

I seem to hear this fairly frequently on this forum, then some dealer or manufacturer of something "better" will chime in and say you are mistaken and that that old outdated stuff will get you killed.  It's coming......three, two, one.......

MRBF is what, 3,000 to 6,000 on the old designs and maybe 8,000 on the new designs.  Even with the older designs you won't see a lot of failures.



 

This.  

 

Or you can use Gen 3 PMAG's, the new GI mags mimics their profile.

The new followers and stiffer springs are to cure feed problems related to higher cyclic rates, which you M16A1 didn't have.  A suppressed 10.3" on full auto is a entirely different beast.

I wonder how many millions of our tax dollars were spent on this vs. the COTS solution of REV M3 PMAGs, for what would probably be a lower price over the life-span of the weapon systems.

Replacing millions of followers for higher cyclic rate weapons that only a few thousand soldiers use is lunacy when units are parking vehicles for weeks on end so they don't break during use. No budget for repair parts.

The entire fucking government is ate up with lunacy.  

The real irony is that in the units that rate the 10" barreled guns, they rarely shoot them in ful aut.

I learned this when I went through an Advanced Urban Combat Course. Solution to a non-existant or rare issue.

...but if it just solves one problem on one occassion...government is always doing myopic fixation type things. Be it with the military, or healthcare, or whatever

I upgraded my 100% reliable black follower magazines to the first generation green followers, then here came the Magpul antitilts and yep, another upgrade for magazines that already worked.  Learned my lesson, should have stuck to the old adage "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" from the start.  Think I'll pass on any more magazines or upgrading what I have.

I figured this out years ago but everyone here wants "upgraded" and "better".

Not really.  If they are being replaced gradually what does it matter?  The development costs will easily be absorbed into the production costs over time.  I would hope the military is constantly improving their gear.

Nice thread, thank you.

Anyone put hands on any of these?

The USMC did.  They worked so well they went and bought Pmags.

I don't plan to bother. I'm moving to gen 3 pmags to solve the slow feeding mag issues I get from milspec aluminum mags. They can't keep up with my semi auto fire.

Yes. I have shot them a decent bit. About 2,500 rounds through 6 of them. Mostly one of my personal rifles, but I did run a rifle qual with them and my issued m4.

Between the 2, I had zero stoppages or malfunctions with these mags. I did have a bad tan follower (Brownells, not an EPM)  that gave a double feed on the 6th round fired, after the third string it was destroyed (figure it was damaged feed lips), no more stoppages. My personal rifle was shot with m193 type ammo, and the issued was of course using m855 (LC12 head stamp). Neither rifle was cleaned or had additional lube put on during the shooting. My personal rifle was using marine grease as I always use, and my m4 was of course with clp. I typically don't have any problems with tan follower (Brownells) mags, so the MRBS/F is negligible.

Maybe it's a placebo effect, maybe it's real, either way I can feel a difference in the cycle of operations when it feeds. The improved angle is much smoother than the predecessor. It seems like the round has to jump less, it slides gently. I suspect even without using m855a1, it will improve failure rates and decrease wear in the long term.

I did NOT use ANY m855a1 at any point, as the usmc does not (yet) use the round.

The finish seems of lower quality, but good enough. It does chip off, but just being brown from the start could be considered a tactical advantage. I think it is (but I am NOT some highspeed operator, nor do I play one on the internet).

They have a standard usgi baseplate, so they will accept such accessories like magpul ranger plates. I have had no issues with the mags I installed some ranger plates on.

I do believe these to be an improved design and am completely comfortable with using these for any purpose, I would trust my life to them in combat.

ETA: all rounds fired were semi-auto (for you civilians that don't know how a usmc rifle qual goes). Maybe within the next month or 2 I will get a chance to shoot some bursts, we'll see. If I do, I'll report back.

Already have a ton of gen 3 PMags should I ever come across some M855A1. 

Now to buy a dozen or so in the new MCT color. 

I made the above remark because the 6.8 requires mew mags as well. If your going to replace 7 million mags, might as well improve the caliber as well.

Still warrants a good ol

Changing mags is much simpler than a new claiber, new gun, new mags, new everything because want 6.8 despite M855A1 working out to 600M.