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Plus 1 in your pistol

13K views 143 replies 99 participants last post by  pskys2 
#1 ·
Curious how many people load their pistols to mag capacity plus 1. I have developed a habit of not adding the plus 1. That is to say if mag capacity is 10 rounds, I load 10, chamber a round, and don’t top off magazine. This may be silly but I don’t like the top round being too tight with the slide.


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#113 ·
One reason I don't do '+1' is convenience.
Unfortunately I have to go to CA nearly every week. Since I no longer live there I can't legally carry there. And while transporting there it must be unloaded.
I don't have 1 loose round to keep track of.
If 51 rounds in three mags and another box of 50 aren't enough, 1 more won't make a difference for me.

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#115 ·
Curious how many people load their pistols to mag capacity plus 1. I have developed a habit of not adding the plus 1. That is to say if mag capacity is 10 rounds, I load 10, chamber a round, and don’t top off magazine. This may be silly but I don’t like the top round being too tight with the slide.


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I do what you do for the same reason you give. Silly? Maybe but it makes me happy.
 
#116 ·
Hell, I replace 7 rd factory 1911 mags with 8 rounders [ the 7's get used for practice ] to get that extra round [ making it 9 ready to roll in the gun instead of 8 ] The difference between a 7 round mag loaded and not topped off and the 9 rds I carry in mine would be a 23% reduction in capacity. I carried a 1911 when the only mags that were reliable for street were 7 rounders [ and then the 8's came out and some worked and some didn't but not enough to trust them on the street to save by butt ]. Soon as 8's were made reliable enough a decade later, the 7's were relegated to practice and I increased my capacity by 13% instantly. But when 8's weren't a consideration, no way I'd not top off for the street with a 7 round mag. I'd have considered anyone doing so lacking forethought


Carry the 8 rd 45 S+W shield mags in gun and spares, the 6 rounders are for practice only. Topped off, 9 rds once again of 45acp.

Practicing with the double stacks, load insert one in chamber and shoot. Carry double stacks? load, insert one in chamber, remove mag, top off and reinsert. Every round counts when the gun is carried to keep my butt from growing cold.

Who wants a 23% reduction in potential ammo on board when it's for all the marbles? Not I. Hell, its still a 13% reduction from 8 to stock 7's alone.

If my pistol mags are hard to insert fully loaded [ topped off ], I've never noticed as I was trained to slam the mag into the mag well and not be a wimp about it.
 
#117 ·
If my pistol mags are hard to insert fully loaded [ topped off ], I've never noticed as I was trained to slam the mag into the mag well and not be a wimp about it.
My Glock 30 mags are the only ones I’ve ever had a problem with inserting. They are unbelievably tight. Far more than any other gun I’ve ever shot, but I still top them off.
 
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#118 ·
I'm comfortable with only 10 rounds in my Glock 30. Don't really care what anyone else does. If I wasn't okay with 10 rounds, I'd use G21 mags. If that weren't comfortable enough, I'd carry an 18-19 round 9mm, or one of those 32-round mags, or . . . well at some point a person's just got to stop worrying about the little things like a single, solitary extra round.
 
#121 ·
I carry a Springfield XDS mod.2 9mm and always load the mag ,chamber a rd. ,then top up the mag.I have a 7,8,and 9 rd mag. and they all work well this way.Also carry a LCP at times, and always have these mags topped up and carry +1.No problems loading or shooting the LCP this way either.
 
#123 ·
I load 10, chamber a round, and don’t top off magazine. This may be silly but I don’t like the top round being too tight with the slide.
Well think about that, if you just loaded a full magazine then rack the slide to put one in the chamber does it ever malfunction in doing so? If not then it goes to show you that just because it is loaded to max doesn't make it unreliable and not chamber. So you can be safe to say your gun with that particular ammo is safe to do so. It would be the same as if you fired a round and the gun chamber the next round instead of you racking the slide. One extra round is a plus in my eyes.
 
#132 ·
Racking by hand, and the energy produced by the natural recoil of the round are different levels.
Im not saying that a problem will occur, but I prefer to not have the unnecessary pressure against the slide which adds friction, and therefore affects slide velocity, especially if I’m in a situation where I have to fire the gun with one hand, which is known to sometimes produce failures to feed in polymer guns because the grip may not be enough to allow for the slide to complete a full rearward cycle.
 
#124 ·
I'm late on this, but I had failure to feed with a Glock G30 using the flush 9-round magazine shooting +1. The first round stripped off the mag was under so much spring pressure that the case lip caught on the top of the chamber. Their .45 mags are notoriously tight when fully loaded (especially the 9-rounder which I don't carry anymore), so I do not carry my G30 +1.

I have never had this issue with their 9mm's (G26, and G19) or the 10mm (G29). so I carry them +1.
 
#127 ·
My G30 is extremely tight when loaded to full capacity also. I carry it with the 10 round mag, that I down-load to 9, then with one in the chamber. Not too tight that way and nothing I feel is under too much tension when I insert the mag with one in the chamber.

Then my spare mag is usually loaded to capacity, either 10 or 13 depending on which type of spare I'm carrying. Works pretty well for me. But hey, do what you gotta do.

I do always carry my guns chambered though, no exceptions there.
 
#131 ·
There are some pistols that will not work reliably when loaded to +1. I had a glock 30 that refused to cycle @ Full mag +1. I always had to download the mag by one.
Meanwhile, some pistols are purposely under-capacity I think for this reason. The HK P30 for example, could probably be a 16-17 round mag, but it is limited to 15. Loading this pistol to 15+1 is as easy as when empty.
 
#140 · (Edited)
A mag that's designed for X number of rounds is designed for X number of rounds. I have always loaded +1. The gun has to be 100% reliable. If it ain't 100% when +1, then it's broken.
If you have a mag that's not reliable at X rounds, then it's not reliable at X-1.

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