Extended Magazine for Home Defense?

[kd7nqb]

My standard home defense gun is my M&P in .40s&w I shoot well with it and have trained and practiced enough with it that I feel totally comfortable with it. Looking online I have found a number of magazine extensions that will give me +4 or +8 rounds on top of the 15+1 that the gun carries stock.

My question is are there any disadvantages to having an extended magazine.

The only disads I can think of are reliability and looking bad in court.

I full intend on running lots of ammo through the gun with the new accessory before making it "night stand worthy" I don't actually foresee any serious legal issues with using an extended magazine but I could see some DA using it against me saying that I "modified my weapon to make it more deadly" or some BS like that.

Anything else I am missing? I guess the other option to load up one of my spare mags and just make a habbit of grabbing it if I am going to check out a bump in the night.

 

[LeonCarr]

Dude, when some uninvited somebody breaks your door down at 2am to kill you and your family and then take everything you and your family owned, whether or not some persecutor I mean prosecutor is going to hang me out to dry over an extended magazine would be the absolute last thing on my mind. Get your extended magazine or six, load them up, and get a flashlight or weapon mounted light and have it handy in your nightstand next to your gun so you can positively identify the burglar and whether or not he is a definite threat. Not identifying the intruder and shooting one of your relatives is what you should be worrying about instead of a longer tubular piece of metal with a longer spring inside.

Not trying to be a butt, just trying to be honest .

Just my .02,
LeonCarr

 

[zhyla]

I don't think having an extended mag hanging out the bottom is a good idea. It's more prone to snag on something or be leverage for someone to wrestle it away from you. Grab a spare mag if you're really worried about it.

Honestly it's extremely unlikely you'll need more than 3 or 4 shots if something bad happens. I think I read the average incident is 2.6 shots fired.

 

[Gunfighter123]

With 15 in a factory mag , I would NOT go with a 8+ mag --- a 4+ mag would be about the longest I'd run with.

 

[ByAnyMeans]

Go with whatever makes you comfortable and I would not worry about prosecutors but rather surviving.

I use a G26 for ccw and stick a 15 round G19 mag in it when it is on the nightstand. I don't go for larger because it throws the weight and "feel" of the gun off. If adding a non-factory extension on I would put alot of rounds through it to ensure reliability. I usually hear of magazine issues when people use non factory parts.

 

[kd7nqb]

I think I am going to order the +4 extension. Shoot a lot of rounds through the gun with that mag and see how I like it. At worst I have a range toy.

 

[1SOW]

leoncarr +1

I use a 9mm Sig 239 and use the 10 rd optional mag when it's at the beside.

I'd way rather have too much ammo than wish I had more, but that's just me.

 

[Dwrice]

I have an extended Mag for my MP45 in my duty bag. It makes the gun feel a lot heavier even if it holds only two more rounds. I have used it on the range and it does not effect the balance of the gun much.

 

[hak]

one of my HD guns is a Glock19 with Crimson Trace grips, 150 lumen torch by it's side. Loaded by default with the standard 15+1 config. i have 2 other 15 round loaded mags in the safe, 2 17-round mags, and a 33 round mag.

some may laugh, but it has crossed my mind, what would it look like in court when the plantiff's attorney trotted out my weapon, the only time any non-gun-folks have ever seen this type of siloette is when some hollywood movie gives the bad guys full auto pistols:


(not my weapon or pic, just an identical sample)

i agree ("better judged by 12 than carried by 6") especially when family is involved, and i think the 15 roundd factory mags would %-wise feed more reliably than the factory 33 round mag... the big ones are for the unlikely event of an unlikely event made more unlikely by a higher number of BG's, but it's happened before: "...The Billingses were shot and killed July 9 in their Beulah, Florida, home. Seven males are charged with first-degree murder and home invasion robbery..." http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/08/18/florida.family.slain/index.html

 

[rcmodel]

I have had Glock mag extensions pop off when I dropped a mag on the carpeted floor, and puke it's guts out. They all went in the trash post haste as soon as I could take them off.

I would rather have a standard mag that I know will not fall apart.

Anyway, if you can't handle the situation with a standard mag holding 15-17 rounds, it is VERY unlikely another 3-4 rounds of Spray & Pray are gonna improve the situation any!

All those bullets that miss are going to go somewhere.
Even if it is through your wall and into the neighbors bedroom.

rc

 

[Orion8472]

I agree with those who say that, in the unlikely event that someone breaks into your house, it will be one or two guys, and a 15 round magazine will be plenty. If you're worried, just have another magazine or two at the ready. You can still defend your family with a quick mag change, and not having the probability of a prosecutor holding your large capacity magazine up to uninformed/uneducated (in guns) jurors to decide if you were defending or "going rambo".

I have two magazines for my Five Seven pistol that have the 10 round extentions, making them 30 round magazines, but I wouldn't use those for HD. . . . . just for the coming zombie apocalypse.

 

[noeyedeer]

I've found it much easier to get a good, reliable "tap" when the clip is flush.

 

[johnnylaw53]

You need to use what you feel will work for you lots of people keep 5 and 6 shots revolvers as thier HD weapon. It's more important to be able to use your weapon in a situration like this then how many rounds your weapon hold. It seems like this may be looking for a hardware solution to a soft ware problem.

be safe

 

[Trebor]

Stick with the factory mags. The extensions generally don't run as well and also can cause reliability problems. Then there's the fact that they have been known to pop off at bad times. I saw that happen on an extended mag on a Glock in a class I ran.

In general, keep the gun and mags as close to factory stock as possible. The more gizmos or modifications you do, the more potential problems you add.

The exception would be installing a good set of night sights.

 

[Storm]

For univited night visitors I have an HK USP Full in .40 S&W bedside. The mag in the gun is a standard mag so as not to hinder withdrawl from the gun vault. One of the back-up mags is the HK extended mag, the one that is intended to be used with the jet funnel. As it would only go into the gun after it's drawn the overhang isn't an issue for snagging. It's probably meaningless as I really don't see a mag change in too many scenarios.

 

[cleetus03]

Extended magazines (like Mec-Gar and Factory made ones such as Glock) are just as reliable as the standard capacity ones.

The only problem I can see with using one is doing so based on the SOLE notion that the extra capacity will allow you to sacrifice marksmanship for the ability to spray and pray.

However, having a extended magazine that sticks out over a 1/2 foot from your pistol does create a helluva Piece of Mind! There's no DENYING that

 

[s4s4u]

If you can't get the job done with 15 you are screwed anyway.

 

[johnnylaw53]

s4s4u that what they used to say about 6 in revolvers

be safe

 

[atomd]

If you're worried about legal stuff, I think it would come down to how many rounds you actually fired, when you fired, why you fired, and where you fired rather than how many rounds you had available at the time. I'm not a fan of mag extensions. They cause more trouble than they're worth.