Magazine Tapping

[Tom-May]

Another question for Vietnam vets out there.

In films set in Vietnam, soldiers are sometimes porteyed as tapping loaded magazines against hard objects (usually their helmet) before loading the weapon prior to action.

Is there any valid mechanical reason for this? Is/Was it a widespread superstition (if so, what was the idea behind it)? Was it possibly a local superstition picked up and spread by film makers? Or is it just something made up by Hollyweird?

Just curious.

Tom

[Niner]

I was one thing or the other of an FO team. When the shooting started my job required from me something more important than M16 fire most of the time. I'll ask the question on my 6/31st site... real 9th Divison mud dog Mekong delta infantry in Vietnam.

My personal memory doesn't record knocking clips against anything, but because of the grit that got into clips they could stick. I used to trade out all of my magazines every few months because of the mud, grime , etc. that used to get into them.

We used to carry them in the cloth bandoleers that the ammo came in. The feed end down to drain water better. The cloth banoleers had flaps that kept some of the dirt elements out, but when you crossed streams and set up ambushes in flooded rice paddy, the ammo was less than clean.

We also never loaded every round of a 20 round clip. The spring had as much as it could do in a clean clip. 18 rounds to a clip was all I carried.

[Niner Delta]

Most of Gollywoods versions of combat are not the way most of us remember it. I had the same job as Niner, in the same unit, only I was there in 1969 and Niner in 1970. There were many times that I used my M-16, but I don't remember ever tapping the mags on anything. And you sure as hell wouldn't do it at night. If they did tap them, I think that Niner has the obvious answer about the mud and grime.

But I do remember the cloth bandoleers and the mud and water and rice paddies.

Vern.

[wh12725]

The tapping should be done at the time the mags were loaded with rounds....not when being loaded in rifles. The purpose was to ensure as best one can that the primer end of the rounds were seated as close as possible to the magazine. The M16 has always had a thing for chambering issues. It's the same process as loading an M-N or Enfield, etc. If the round is too far forward in the mag it will tip up while being chambered and the bullet tip fails to enter the chamber. Tapping while loading is a Hollywood version.

[spearedum]

I used to load 19 rounds into my mags, and carry 2 cloth bandoleers. In Hollywood, they carry a mag on their helmet, or a band of M-60 rounds up there(?). In reality, it was tooooo hot to even wear a helmet (and the flak vest we put under our seat to protect our family jewls!) and wore a boonie hat.

When I was on recon, I taped two mags togather to fire 39 rounds in a hurry. I practiced hitting the ground on my elbows to keep the mag from digging into the ground. The idea was to fire as many rounds as posable in the triple canapy jungle. The loud, unstable M-16 rounds would bounce around the jungle like a shotgun. You never saw your target, you just shot at a noise or a flash.

I never walked point, flank, or drag, so I staied in the middle of the patrol. I was too stupid for point, and would get lost on flank... I just needed to stay away from drag! Some times I carried the M-60 or RTO (S**t) The Pric-25 was a bitch!

My partner liked the M-79 with the shot-gun rounds, but one day he sliped on a log crossing a stream.. another combat loss. No one wanted to dive into the water to retreve the M-79. We were humping to our pick-up point nearby.



Taping the mag on something hard wouldn't hurt, but it was not necessary in our AO. Vietnam was a different war for every part of the country. I was in the central highlands, and we had jungle, open planes, hills and mts. that we had to hump.

In basecamp (Camp Enari), things were a lot different from being out in the boonies or the bush. At Earni, when I wasn't out doing an artillery survey I would get other duties. Bunker guard, duty driver, convoy driver, recon patrol, KP, grab a**, BS, drink warm beer, fill sandbags, build bunkers, hump 100lbs bags of cement, ect. If it moved silute it, if it didn't move paint it!

Although, durring the monsoon, it got cold at night in the mts. There were times I wore a halmet, usally while on bunker guard or when an officer was around. Not very often in my experiences in Nom.

We had a 2LT on our OP for about a month, and he got us to build two small bunkers to replace out tent. Then he came down with malaria and I never saw him again.

Thanx Dante'

[Brass Rat]

I wop the back of mine on the heel of my hand after loading them, old habits I guess, I just like to look down and see them all lined up against the back of the mag.

Kinda like grounding them to the inspection side I guess

[wh12725]

Brass Rat -

I still do.....for everything, .45 auto mags, M-1, everything. Just a habit that's been with me for nearly 40 years!

[303]

I don't automatically do it every time I load a magazine, but I sure tap them if I look and see a round that's not back where it's supposed to be. I remember whacking them on my steel pot... but I was in armor for awhile in Vietnam and remember whacking magazines against an APC, and that worked much better. But yeah... that was when we were loading them back in the rear. If anyone had started whacking magazines on a steel pot in the field I would have administered a buttstroke to his head! Well... maybe not, but I would have wanted to.

Some used 18 round per mag, but others including me used 19 rounds. Using 20 rounds just flat didn't work... but after awhile I scored a couple of 30 round mags and loaded them each with 29. They were brand new, and could have probably handled the full 30 rounds... but I didn't care to chance trying that.

But we didn't move an inch without both flack jacket and steel pot on. I never knew it was possible to sweat so much! I rode sitting on a board busted out of an ammo crate, laid across the open TCs hatch... one boot propped up on each side of the .50 cal. Nobody rode inside of an armored vehicle in my unit except the drivers, and they had to be inside in order to drive...

[wh12725]

Welcome 303!

It was the mag springs that were subject to being bad. I've seen them compressed with 20 rds (in the 20 rd mag of course) where the spring would be so tight as to overlap itself. I always used 18 rounds but was not able to get any 30 rounders.

[303]

While I was in 3/5 Cav I was allowed to keep my own "personal" magazine supply and didn't have to worry much about their condition... But later in D 1/502d we had to turn our magazines in every time we came in from the field... though of course I always forgot to turn in those two new 30-rounders in my shirt pocket. But I disassembled and cleaned every "new" (i.e. crappy old) magazine I drew the next time, and I never ceased to be amazed at how filthy they were inside. It wasn't unusual to find them with visibly compressed, or in some cases even seriously rusted springs. I picked and chose what I was going to carry carefully AND cleaned them well. Probably 95% or more of the springs did not show any rust and my guess is that none were supposed to... but some did, and those did not leave the pile from which magazines were being issued, at least not with me.