I clean my carry mags every year or so. I have dedicated range mags that cleaned when they need it. I've switched entirely to Magpul mags in my 9mm Glocks so disassembly is easy.

I traded into a Gen 1 Glock 17 years ago. It was built in 1986, and it was thirty years old when I got it. It is... very well used. Guy I got it from said it was a police trade-in gun. It has all the signs of being carried a lot more than it's been shot, but plenty of both. It came with all the original parts, including two original NFML early magazines. Everything, and I mean everything on the gun that could hold dust, fouling, and carbon build up had it. It was fairly packed with crud. It was amazing. I cleaned it out and had little black dust bunnies all over my desk. What I didn't do was take the magazines apart. I have no reason to believe they were/are any cleaner inside. I don't shoot them often, but when I do, they function 100%. That was enough of an endorsement for me to never take apart a Glock magazine unless I wanted to change out a baseplate, and after the one time I dropped a 17+2 that hit just right and exploded on the floor in a shower of ammo, I decided those weren't worth bothering with, either.

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The pressure needs to be at the very bottom of the sides of the mag body. A c-clamp won't do it without permanently deforming the mag body.

A c-hair too much pressure on that c-clamp will do just that. I was just lucky.

I clean my glock mags whenever I get a new / new to me magazine; disassemble and just check it out, clean it, reassemble and basically don't clean inside again till i have reason to believe it needs it. Wipe down outside when i clean the gun. Do this with any mag.

I only do it if they get stuck in the mud or something weird. We had a T&E G45 a while back and we beat the crap out of that thing, on their request. We did stuff to that gun I wouldn't want to do to mine but it held up fine. I was sure the mags would be nasty so I pulled them apart and they were actually just fine after a wipe down. No rust anywhere.

I don't see the need to disassemble and clean unless you had an odd circumstance or maybe once every 10-20k rounds (arbitrary number) or something.

Every mag I get is taken apart. Then cleaned and inspected then lubed with Mag-Slick which is a dry film lube.

I have found all kinds of junk plastic from the mag making process as well as metal shavings and debris in brand new mags. I have found followers that were sticking or binding in the mag tube that needed attention.

My mags don't see a dirty use environment so further attention is on a as needed basis.

I feel that using the Mag-Slick dry film lube is the best lube for my needs. It dries and doesn't leave an oily residue which can attract dirt and debris IMO. Have never had any rusting of springs or mag bodies so I feel its doing its job of rust protection as well.

In general use, not so much. But I've been shooting some dusty, sandy places where the mags have seen earth so yes, those mags along with the guns get a serious once over. I've got a set of the 'C'-shaped squeeze tools but I will admit I get lazier as I get older so I usually go the 'bottle opener' approach:



It's not that hard on the the mag body or the base plate, but it does put forces on both in ways in ways that they weren't really intended to take. However polymer dragging on polymer is pretty forgiving and I've yet to damage any of my mags using this tool.