Anyone tried cutting down a 30 round mag to 5 or 10 Round Capacity

[25knots]

So I've heard about people taking a hacksaw to AK mags to produce smaller capacity mags, basically cutting them in half or smaller, shortening the spring and reassembling. I'm wondering if anyone's tried this with VZ mags. Yes, I know you can buy 5 and 10 rounders, but they're a bit pricey and I like mucking around on projects with slightly dubious odds of success, especially if its a good excuse to buy new tools (and I'm really looking for an excuse to get a drill press).

So, any thoughts. Should i give this a try or am I asking for trouble?

[RSR]

http://www.czfirearms.us/index.php?topic=65136.msg441903#msg441903

[25knots]

http://www.czfirearms.us/index.php?topic=65136.msg441903#msg441903

Seems like JDA70 got stopped by the paint, though I can't see why a hacksaw or dremel disk wouldn't be able to cut through painted metal, no matter how durable the paint is. It also sounds to me like he had two objectives:

• He wanted to strip off the old paint and duracoat it another color
• He wanted to hack off the bottom of a disassembled 30 rounder and shorten it to a 20 rounder.

I'm not sure if he succeeded (I'll PM him) but if someone else was successful making the second of those two objectives happen, let me know.

[Forced March]

Aluminum HATES being bent, this sounds like a bad idea.  To be clear this idea is entirely doable, however I feel the end result will be janky at best. 

[merlin82plus]

So I've heard about people taking a hacksaw to AK mags to produce smaller capacity mags, basically cutting them in half or smaller, shortening the spring and reassembling. I'm wondering if anyone's tried this with VZ mags. Yes, I know you can buy 5 and 10 rounders, but they're a bit pricey and I like mucking around on projects with slightly dubious odds of success, especially if its a good excuse to buy new tools (and I'm really looking for an excuse to get a drill press).

So, any thoughts. Should i give this a try or am I asking for trouble?

Here's how it's done...
http://www.czfirearms.us/index.php?topic=53003.0

[25knots]

  allright. i'm convinced that this is probably just an expensive way to waste time with only minor if any recoup. i'll have to come up with something more productive to do with my time... wait a second, doesn't duck season start soon?

[JDA70]

I wish I could tell everyone here that it's easy but it's not.

I tried just about every kind of Chemical paint Stripper and that Czech
paint is like cement on those magazines. You'd definitely want to use some kind of blasting
to remove the paint. A wire wheel will also work but it's too time consuming in my opinion.

Then you have to cut and shape the bottom of the magazine correctly  for the floor plate.
Aluminum is nothing like steel so you can't just put a torch to it and start bending the lips out for the floor plate.
I just don't think it's worth the effort so I had to give up. I bought a 10 round magazine and it's good enough.