Military Grip Angle Magazines—Care and Feeding of High Standard Pistols

Our enjoyment of High Standard military grip angle target pistols is sometimes lessened by poorly feeding magazines.  It is frustrating to experience a jammed cartridge during a rapid fire string in competition.  It never helps a shooter's score.  So shooters spend a good deal of time, effort, and money on magazine selection and maintenance.

 

The purpose of this article is to help people determine which magazines to obtain, which to avoid, and how to get them to feed properly.

 

Note: these ideas may also be applied to slant grip angle magazines used in big button style pistols.

First, my opinion is the original Connecticut High Standard military grip angle magazines work the best in these pistols.  However, since these magazines have not been made for over 30 years, it is getting more difficult and expensive to locate good original ones.  If a person keeps an eye out for them, they can be found at local gun shows, eBay, GunBroker, or other places.  I remember not long ago getting a good red base original magazine for $10 at a gun show. It is not very likely to have that happen again!  Most of the time a person will have to spend quite a bit more than that.  However, by looking around carefully, a good magazine can still be purchased for $35 to $60.  Usually Connecticut magazines do not require more than cleaning and checking for any problems with bent lips or rust.  I rarely find that I need to adjust the feed lips on Connecticut magazines.  The easiest way to tell a CT magazine is to look for the 5- and 10- round count markings on the side of the body, and a metal base.  The early magazines had red plastic bases attached to the metal bases and the later magazines had all metal bases. 

That leaves us with the “other “ magazines made for High Standard pistols.  A person can find magazines from Mitchell, Stoeger, High Standard of Houston, TX, and InterarmsTX (not related to High Standard), as well as Triple K made versions.

Most magazines found in the aftermarket are Triple K made.  There have been at least four versions of magazines made over the past 40 years.  The problem I see with the Triple K magazines is there is a lack of consistent quality control of making the dimensions the same from one mag to the next.  This is why there is no easily defined and certain measurement of feed lip gap and so forth that would make these magazines work with all guns.  So tuning is usually required with them. In addition, the feed lip areas are not hardened, so they may or may not hold adjustments over time.  I have attached photos of some of the generations of Triple K magazines over the years.

Note:  Click on photos for larger views.



Triple K Type 1 to Type 4, L to R



Triple K Type 1 to Type 4, L to R






Triple K followers Type 1 to 4, L to R

Type 1 is easily identified by the very dark green plastic follower.  These were made up to about 1990.  These magazines should be tossed in the trash, since I think they are useless.  The metal shells are thin and easily bent.  They will not hold adjustments very long.  The springs are too weak, and the feed lip geometry is very far off from the CT magazines.  These have spot welds only on the forward portion of the body.

Type 2 is similar to the third type, but only has spot welds on the forward portion of the body.  Otherwise, they are pretty much the same as type 3.  I think these were only made for a short time around 1990 until Triple K determined that spot welds should be added to the rear section of the magazine body.

Type 3 was probably made from about 1990 to sometime in 2005.  These magazines have spot welds on the front and rear portions of the bodies.  The springs are usually a little weaker than CT magazines.  The feed lip geometry has the front of the rear lips too close to the breech face of the barrel.  These might be modified by filing back the feed lips to make them more like CT magazines.  Otherwise, it is difficult to get these to work.

 Type 4 was introduced in 2005 and is a great improvement over the earlier versions.  The feed lip geometry is better.  The front of the rear feed lips are close to the required 0.800 inch distance from the lips to the breech face.  The springs are closer to the tension of the CT magazines.  These can be made to work with lip adjustments.

So my recommendation for working on Triple K magazines is to destroy and discard all Type 1 magazines, not bother with Type 2 and Type 3, and concentrate efforts on adjusting the Type 4 magazines.  The key things for determining a Type 4 versus the others is to look at the Dura-Matic magazine release pocket on the side of the magazine, and the shape of the top front of the rear shell.  The older types have a rectangular pocket formed by the punched hole on the outer shell, whereas the type 4 pocket has barreled sides in the punched hole.  The most useful difference in the type 4 is the shape of the top front of the rear shell.  This corner is rounded on the type 4, but is pointy on the earlier versions.  The CT magazines have the rounded corner also.  Of course, the other main difference is the location of the front of the rear feed lips on the Type 4.  This design is much closer to the CT magazines.

Connecticut HS magazines

Connecticut HS magazines

Connecticut HS magazines, followers

There are other differences in some of the shapes of the shells between Triple K and CT magazines.  The front of the CT magazines looks different than the Triple K magazines.  I doubt that it means much for function.  However, the height of the kicker lips (front lips) on all of the Triple K magazines is lower that the kicker lips on the CT magazines.  The purpose of the kicker lips is to push the cartridge rim up fully into the pocket in the slide when feeding the cartridge the last bit into the barrel.  The Triple K kicker lips do not contact the rim as much or at all as the CT magazines. 

As far as Mitchell and Stoeger magazines are concerned, I think these are best left to people who own those brands of High Standard clones.  These magazines are stainless steel and were probably made by Triple K.  These are not a good choice for feeding Connecticut High Standard pistols.

High Standard of Houston has used several versions of magazines over the years.  The magazines used in the first years of production were well made with reasonably good feed lip dimensions.  However, they are not easily found on the used market, and are not a good choice since the feed lips are hardened to the point that they are brittle and can snap off like glass if adjustments are attempted.  When that vendor no longer supplied magazines to High Standard, Triple K furnished the magazines for use in Houston's pistols.  The second generation of magazines used by Houston High Standard is what I term Triple K Type 3.  These were used until sometime around 2005.  At that time, Triple K came out with their Type 4 version which had significantly improved feed lip geometry.  They provided magazine shells to High Standard where the feed lip area was heat treated and original CT style followers installed.  These are good magazines for the shooter to work with.



HS Houston magazines
1 early magazine, 2 &3 Type 3, 4&5 Type 4

  




HS Houston magazines
1 early magazine, 2 &3 Type 3, 4&5 Type 4



Assorted Magazines
Left side, top to bottom:                Right Side, top to bottom:
Houston HS first version                                    InterarmsTX
Houston HS second version                          Triple K Type 4
Houston HS current version                          Triple K Type 3
Connecticut HS                                         Triple K Type 1    

InterarmsTX is selling their version of High Standard magazines.  These use Triple K Type 4 supplied shells which are then heat treated in the feed lip area, and red plastic followers installed.  The magazines are matte blue finished.  There does not appear to be any other changes in dimensions.

Some of the dimensions that a person should start with when adjusting magazines are to ensure the distance from the front of the rear lips to the breech face is about 0.800in., the measurement between the front lips is about 0.230”, and the measurement between the rear feed lips is about 0.185 In.  These are just starting places and a pistol may require adjustment by trial and error.  One of the problems I have seen with the Triple K magazines (including Houston High Standard and InterarmsTX) is that the height of the feed lips above the frame rails is more variable than on the Connecticut magazines.  If the rear feed lips are too low, it causes the angle of the cartridge to be higher when trying to feed it into the chamber, and this can lead to the cartridge not feeding well. 

The adjustments of the rear feed lips is done by widening or narrowing the gap between the lips.  This will cause the cartridge to feed higher or lower into the chamber.  If the cartridge is feeding low, then the gap should be widened.  If the cartridge is feeding high then narrow the gap.  The front edge of the rear lips is the key point, since the rim of the cartridge is held by that point until the slide moves the cartridge far enough forward to release the rim entirely.  The timing and angle need to be correct for feeding to happen properly and consistently.   The front feed lips need to only be adjusted to center the round and have perhaps a slight drag on the bullet as it is feeding.  The late Jim Barta had some pretty good tips for tuning and also for ensuring the aftermarket magazines were fitted to the magazines well.  Some shimming might be required to keep the magazines from rocking back and forth as cartridges feed. The CT magazines normally do not need work in that area.  His tips are available here:  www.histandard.info/Jim_Barta/ .

Finally, my recommendation is to obtain Connecticut magazines if possible.  The next choice would be the current Houston High Standard or InterarmsTX magazines, since the feed lips are heat treated.  After that, the current Triple K Type 4 magazines can be tuned to work.  I would not select the older versions of Triple K, High Standard of Houston, Mitchell, or Stoeger magazines.