Board Thread:Questions and answers/@comment-36639611-20180819084308/@comment-26431461-20180821011725

Yup, as explained above, it’s due to how the magazine was designed. The bolt of a firearm just needs to strip the top round of the magazine into the chamber (which usually doesn’t need the bolt to be directly inside the feed lips). Nerf blasters on the other hand require the bolt to actually go in between the magazine lips to feed darts. One reason for this is because the Nerf blaster’s chamber is located inside the actual bolt, so it would be much easier to just design the magazines to feed how they do right now. On a firearm, the chamber is usually in front of the bolt, similar to how most Nerf Stefan blasters work, to my understanding.

So you’re a firearms guy huh? (Where’s HM when you need him?). Think of it like the Thompson Submachine gun, also known as the Tommy Gun. When using a drum magazine, the Thompson’s bolt feeds rounds from a notch in the top of the drum. Thus, when the bolt is forward, the drum can’t be removed (the magazine is removed sideways). This isn’t really a problem, because of how the Thompson’s bolt cycl- eh, just look it up on your own time. So this is kinda the closest example of a firearm that can only remove the magazine when the bolt is in the rear that I could find.

But not all springers are like this. The Apollo can remove its magazine regardless of the position of the bolt, and I think it’s the same case with the Helios. I’m not 100% sure how RIVAL blasters work, but I don’t think HIRs are chambered the same way darts are. I think they are also “stripped” off the top like how a firearm works (RIVAL mags don’t have feeding lips, but rather a little spring-loaded notch that lets rounds freely escape the mag when disengaged, and the notch is engaged whenever the mag is loaded into the blaster), and thus, can be ejected/inserted at any time since there is no bolt hindering it.

Also, with enough force, you can actually remove magazines from springers with the boltsled forward. I don’t recommend it, because depending on the blaster, it might damage the mag. It also requires the magazine release locks to be removed.