Are you new to tactical shooting sports? Have you recently purchased or are thinking of buying a chest rig and need some tips on how to use it? Here are some tips and tricks on how to handle rifle magazines when using a tactical chest rig.
Place your full mags in the pouches top-down. If you are using an AK-47 place the magazines with the concave end of the mags facing your strong hand. When you go to reload, reach for a fresh mag with your weak hand, and you will grab it in a more “natural” way to reload .
When a magazine is empty, you have a couple of choices. If you don’t mind dropping it on the ground, do this:
With your strong hand on the pistol grip and your weak hand on the forearm, move your pistol grip hand forward and push on the mag catch without touching it with your weak hand and without letting go of the pistol grip. The empty mag will drop free and fall to the ground. Then let go of the forearm with your weak hand and go for the fresh mags. Simply reload with a fresh one that you pull from a pouch in a “natural” position in your weak hand.
If you don’t want to drop empties in the dirt, do this:
Take the empty magazine out of the rifle and reload with a fresh mag, charge the weapon, and either :
a) Wedge it between the chest rig and your body. Continue shooting and don’t worry about dropping the empty.
b) If you have time, store the empty mag in the slot created by your removal of the fresh mag. Tip: store empty mags face up or facing the wrong way (concave side toward weak hand) so you immediately see they’re empty when you go to reload.
c) Use a “dump pouch” attached to your chest rig or belt.
Many shooters leave one empty slot in their vest just for the mag that’s in the weapon.
Retaining a magazine under pressure using these methods takes practice. Remember slow is smooth, smooth is fast. In other words take your time and get the movements down, your speed will naturally increase.