Calling a Magazine a Clip

[Cooter Brown]

I never really knew there was much controversy or that people got upset about this issue until I started going to internet forums.

I always used the terms interchangeably for a mag. I knew what a stripper clip was.

I got this from my father, who is a WWII veteran. He's always called the things that went in a 45 "clips". I've met a few other WWII vets, and most all of them used the word "clip" as well.

The old man's 88 years old and a mite cranky sometimes. He ain't gonna be whoopin' up on anybody, but anybody correcting his terminology is gonna get an earful.

 

[sambuh]

..........................

Haha will have to reuse this

 

[4Js]

It bugs me, but I've learned to live with it. Here's my take on it.

My daughter received a Bushmaster AR 15 for Christmas. The other day she took it to her in-law's place. They live a rural area and she wanted to show it to them and let her father in law shoot it.

She popped it out of the case in their kitchen, locked bolt open, and let her father in law hold it. He looked it over, looked at the 30 round magazine in the case, and asked, "How many shells does that clip hold?"

She told him 30, quietly excused herself, went to the rest room and sent a text message to me, telling me about her father in law's question, and asked "Would it be rude of me to correct him."

I told her that if she did it politely, it would be education not correction. He did not know the difference because he never had to. And you need to know, after you educate him, the difference will still not be important to him. In his world they will continue to be "shells" and "clips".

And it won't cost you a dime.

It's fingernails on a chalk board, but I shudder in silence.

Jack,
Anal

 

[bubbiesdad]

 

[mkk41]

What kind of shells do I shoot in my CTG?

 

[Old cop]

I realize it shouldn't bother me but it does, dunno why. That said I usually don't say anything unless I can find a way to correct the person w/o embarassing them. What's worse is the older I get (66 now) the less tolerant I am. Guess that means I'm becoming a grumpy old man (Jack Lemon & Walter Mathow)!

 

[Delos]

How different

Oops a 45 bullet is probably only 60 percent bigger than a 9mm (.355) in cubic inches, doing all the pie R square stuff. (most people do not know that a two inch water pipe is 4 times bigger than a one inch pipe. And a .50 caliber barrel has 4 times the cubic inches of volume as the same length .25 caliber.

But the magazine can be loaded into a 45 auto faster than the stripper clip into a broomhandle mauser.

(Yes I am tripping over my own feet trying to find controversy)

So the magazine is faster to load and resists dirt better than a stripper clip.

Except words change over the years and the "clip" word will swallow up the "magazine" word soon (gag me with a spoon).

 

[handejector]

How about calling a revolver a pistol?

Depends on who you ask.
Col Colt, being one of the first in the game with any success, called his revolvers "the revolving Colt pistol" from the earliest days. Of course, nothing BUT pistols had preceded him, and autos did not exist.

40 years ago, any "Dictionary of Firearms" or "Encyclopedia of Firearms" would tell you revolvers were not generally classed as pistols since a "pistol" had a chamber that was integral with the barrel.
ATF kinda thinks this way. When logging a handgun or filling out the 4473, a dealer should class the handgun as a 'revolver' or 'pistol'.
See the pics of the ATF Regs, page 83.

 

[kozmic]

Not nearly as angry as I get when someone calls an AR-15 a "weapon of mass destruction"!

 

[Beemerguy53]

How do you react when someone calls a Magazine a Clip?

It's a sure sign of an amateur, or someone who doesn't know what he's talking about. How do I react? I almost always patiently explain the difference between a magazine and a clip.

I do the same thing when someone calls a cartridge a "bullet".

 

[ChattanoogaPhil]

I was out looking at some guns today. Thought y'all might enjoy this crummy cell phone pick.



Uploaded with ImageShack.us

 

[David LaPell]

I absolutely cringe when I hear someone saying the word clip when referring to a magazine. Especially when it is some nitwit reporter using the term high capacity ammunition clip. It's a damn magazine, get it right. As someone who used to teach hunter safety courses, we always worked hard to get the kids to learn the right terminology, like when someone says the word bullet to describe the whole round, and one thing we did was always had an AR-15 and asked the class if you could hunt with it. They all raised their hands and said no, and then the other instructor would drop in a five round mag and explain that the gun was now perfectly legal to hunt with, either varmints or deer (legally but we didn't recommend it). At the end of the class those kids had a new appreciation for those guns.

 

[Mike McLellan]

It makes my blood boil! In fact, I'm so mad right now, I'm gonna kick my dog if I can find him.

 

[sambuh]

It makes my blood boil! In fact, I'm so mad right now, I'm gonna kick my dog if I can find him.

http://youtu.be/Xyr-QJ-9CLs

 

[sipowicz]

How do you react when someone calls a Magazine a Clip?

I fall to the ground and weep uncontrollably..oh wait, that's what I do when someone asks me I'm married.

 

[kudzu3]

My Websters says that a clip is (among other defs) a magazine from which ammunition is fed into the chamber of a firearm and a magazine, a holder in or on a gun for cartridges to be fed into the gun chamber automatically. Ain't that about the same thing? The term "pistol" was used to refer to a handgun before the semi-auto was ever thought of. Now, most of you probably refer the .45 Colt as .45 "long" colt.

 

[REM 3200]

It's a sure sign of an amateur, or someone who doesn't know what he's talking about. How do I react? I almost always patiently explain the difference between a magazine and a clip.

I do the same thing when someone calls a cartridge a "bullet".

I would be very careful who you call an amateur, they may prove to you different.

 

[yeti]

I used to try to explain the difference between a clip and a magazine, but I gave up.

I know what they are referring to.

 

[2152hq]

I use the terms interchangeably. Yes I know the difference. It's just not a big deal, at least for me it's not. Kind of like crane and yoke. I use the term crane wether it's a S&W or a Colt. I know what the part is and what it does. If it upsets a purist, I can't help that, but there ain't no Drill Sgt. here.

..and yes ammo is (jokingly) called shells and bullets at the range and skeet field.
Lighten up,,it can all disappear at any given moment.

If you want one that does sound odd to me it's 'charge hole',,when did a cartridge chamber in a firearm become a charge hole.
I cut them w/a chambering reamer. The gun is chambered for a certain caliber..
But I know what the person means,,and they can call it anything they like.
No correction needed from me.

 

[handejector]

If you want one that does sound odd to me it's 'charge hole',,when did a cartridge chamber in a firearm become a charge hole.

The instructions from one manufacturer used to actually say something like "....and place the cartridges in the charge holes...."
Can't remember which one.
Was it Colt?
Sounds like something they would say. After all, WE had to properly name the 45 Long Colt for 'em.