Steel AK-74 mags

[Slater]

In the history of the AK-74 system, how common were steel mags? I bought a couple of the Polish steel mags last year from Cole's, and until I saw them advertised I thought that AK-74's used plastic mags exclusively (except maybe for early prototypes).

[nathanm40a1]

They are not uncommon. I have 6 of them I will probably sell later because I don't like them as much as the polymer mags. These were the first mags the Polish issued before they transitioned to polymer mags for the Tantal. They also acquired some East German bakelite mags and painted them black for issue to their troops at one time.

[96 SS]

Polish and Romanian steel are the only two I know of. They are not "rare" but can be somewhat harder to find vs poly

[OH58D]

The Soviets experimented with some steel AK-74 mags before they went with the bakelite version. For the Romanians and their AIMS-74 they used exclusively steel mags. They are similar to the Polish version but there are some differences if you looked at both side by side. A Romanian AK-74 mag has upside down U shaped dimples at the top on both sides.

[Bret]

... and the Romanian AK74 magazines are generally worth more than the Polish metal magazines.

[Jaws]

The Romanian 5.45x39mm Ak's are not technically AK74's. More like AK47's converted to 5.45x39mm with some minor changes.
Romania was not in the best terms with Soviet Union after the intervention in Chechoslovakia and a lot of Russian stuff was either off limits for Romania, or they didn't want to buy stuf from them anymore.
A lot of "made in Romania" military hardware started showing up back then, in an attempt to become self reliant.