I had reworked many Winchester 94s and both the 336 and 94 Marlins, but I had never done a Model 92 until a friend of mine walked in with a little .357 Rossi carbine—a 16-incher at that. This gun was very tight, too tight for it to operate as he wanted it to as a working gun that goes with him almost everywhere.

If someone were to ask you which products Colt has sold over the years, would you say a .22 semiautomatic rifle? I didn’t think you would. Colt made three versions of .22 rifles, the Courier, Colteer and Stagecoach, as well as others under several private-label names for Sears, Wards and other companies. This alloy rifle shot well, but did not hold up well. Unless it was kept oiled and clean, the alloy parts wore very rapidly. In spite of this, the little Colt rifles were good enough lightweight shooters that most owners will pay to get them fixed rather than discard theirs.

Check out several videos this week: Women competing at this year's Steel Challenge World Speed Championships in HD! Also, a tax website put together a video of an Apple iPad being shot with a shotgun. And Nashville-based songwriters Jamie Teachenor and 'Banjo' Ben Clark produced a powerful video that uses a lot of gun imagery plus some recognizable gun spokesmen.

What's ahead for the midterms? Jeff Knox at The Firearms Coalition says, 'There might be a few Democrats who haven't been able to bring themselves to declare support for the Second Amendment, but the official party line is broad support for the constitutional right, while interpreting it in the narrowest terms, and doing all they can to undermine and dismantle it.' As for the other party, 'Republicans, on the other hand, are generally supportive of the right to arms, but few of them have any more understanding of the issue than do the Democrats. They definitely lack the resolve and the backbone to vigorously oppose the Democrats' attacks on the Constitution and the President's appointments of radical extremists to the courts and high level government positions.'

Exclusive community benefits are yours, free!

Ruger 77 Mark II 243 Heavy Barrel

Courtesy, Gun Tests

This was an excellent rifle that worked exactly like it was supposed to.

This was an attractive $685 rifle, with a blonde-colored laminated stock sporting an extremely nice and well-done matte finish. After our initial negative experiences with the electronic Remington, the entirely conventional Ruger, with no gizz-whizzes or batteries or insulators needed to make it go bang, was most welcome. Besides .243, the same rifle is available in .223, .22-250, .220 Swift, 25-06 and .308.

All the metalwork except the sling swivel studs was finished in a semi-matte light color that Ruger calls Target Gray, which we found very attractive in contrast with the light-colored stock. The studs were blued. The 26-inch-long stainless-steel barrel was free-floated evenly all the way back to the action. The Ruger’s bolt felt a trifle stiff at first, but after cycling it a few times, it became very slick. The bolt came out and went back in easily via the Mauser-style release at the left-rear corner of the action. Ruger’s now-standard safety, on the right rear corner of the action, felt good and worked properly. The bolt body had a bump on its left side, similar to those on pre-’64 Winchester Model 70 rifles, to help smoothness. It worked fairly well when everything was new, and even better after we shot the rifle a bit.

Wood-to-metal fit was excellent. The steel floorplate opened and closed positively to release the contents of the four-round magazine on command. The trigger pull was a dream. It broke at 2.5 pounds with zero creep, quite a nice surprise for a new American-made rifle. The Ruger literature specifies the trigger is fully adjustable, another nice feature.

We mounted an Artemis 7x50 scope in the Ruger rings that accompanied the rifle, and went straight to work. At the range we discovered a reluctance to feed rounds from the magazine into the chamber. The rounds seemed to go part way in, and then hang up on something. We had to rattle the bolt back and forth to get the rounds to go all the way in. This characteristic did not diminish during our shooting sessions. Chambered but unfired cases showed circumferential scratching halfway up the main

Courtesy, Gun Tests

The fully adjustable trigger broke at 2.5 pounds and felt a lot lighter. There was significant light takeup, but it gave an extremely clean break. The mag held four rounds and feed was a bit problematic.

Instead, they were bumped ahead of it and were forcibly held slightly downward when their rims contacted the front end of the extractor, which caused them to bind on the rear end of the chamber. The solution seemed to be to polish the rear edge of the chamber slightly, or ignore the problem and push the cartridges firmly into the chamber, and let time and wear do the work of smoothing up the feeding. Another possible solution would be to round the small squared-off lower front edge of the extractor.

Neither the Remington nor the Ruger were light rifles. At 11.0 pounds the Ruger was a pound heavier than the Remington. Felt recoil was very slight. The Ruger’s forend was much wider than the Remington’s, and as such, offered a much larger surface for supporting the rifle over sandbags, or whatever.

On the range there were no big surprises, only that the Ruger preferred the lighter 80-grain Winchester load, putting them into three-shot average groups of 1.0 inch. The 100-grain ammo averaged only 1.7 inches. Clearly, this varmint-type rifle wanted varmint-type bullets, and it would be lots of fun working up a “perfect” handload for it. Many of the Remington’s groups were half the size of the Ruger’s, but its overall average of 0.8 inch puts it close to the Ruger, and we believe a rifle that delivers one-inch average groups out of the box shows good evidence of being able to beat that with careful handloads tailored to the individual rifle. Both of these rifles clearly invited such efforts.

Reader Comments

I do not think of ruger as a top notch rifle. If you work the bolt from the shoulder in rapid fire it will fail to eject the empty case and the second round will jam the action. The problem is Ruger's loose tolerance of the bolt stop and ejector. I traded all my old Ruger 77s for Winchester Model 70s because of this feature and the poor accuracy of the older tang safety models.

Comment by: trent | November 19, 2009

I have a Ruger77 MarkII in .308. With a Zeis 44mm scope, it shot MOA out of the box. Using Federal Fusion 165 grain bullets, I have shot the heart out of a deer three years in a row.

Comment by: lyle n | November 19, 2009

I have a Ruger M77VT MarkII in 223. It functions flawlessly and with my loads of 50gr. Hornady Vmax's, it shoots 3/16" groups all day. The trigger is great also. Absolutely the best and most accurate rifle I have ever owned.

Comment by: Win75 | November 19, 2009

I own a Ruger M77 in .280 with a 4-16x scope. Have never had a problem with it. Excellant long range gun with punch. I shoot the 140gr Remington core-locks and am very happy.

Comment by: cjferco | November 19, 2009

For me the last paragraph say's it all... My Remington VS700 .223 has put all commercial ammo from 40 to 65gr into nice little dime size or smaller. My thinking is that one should not have to "work up" a perfect hand load to get good groups...

Comment by: pitdogg | November 19, 2009

I have a Ruger 77 MkII in 6.5x55 Swedish, and have no problems with it. It is acccurate and has accounted for three mule deer so far this year.

Comment by: Cimbrian | November 19, 2009

I have considerable negative experience with Ruget bolt action rifles. My opinion and my experience is that an equivalent Savage or Remington rifle beats the Rugers by a mile and are more consistant rifle to rifle. I would prefer even a rifle built on a Mauser 98 action if you want controlled feed.

Comment by: MichaelDolin | November 19, 2009

I have considerable negative experience with Ruget bolt action rifles. My opinion and my experience is that an equivalent Savage or Remington rifle beats the Rugers by a mile and are more consistant rifle to rifle. I would prefer even a rifle built on a Mauser 98 action if you want controlled feed.

Comment by: MichaelDolin | November 19, 2009

I bought my Mk II in .270 win. used, from a guy who sold it to me cheap. He thought the barrel was shot out. After 8 or 10 applications of bore foam, I finally got all of the copper fouling out, and the bore is pristine! I began working up loads with the Std. 130 Gr., but found this gun "likes" 140 gr. Sierra bullets, and groups were 3/4" at 100. This is my experience with Rugers in general - they will shoot one load/bullet well and spray the rest.

Comment by: bevmach | November 20, 2009

I actually purchased this rifle from the magazines FFA. While initially there was a hitch in the feeding, that went away with operation. It is now smooth as silk. The same for the not getting under the extractor and marks on the cases... just a few minutes with some Flitz and a mop on a cleaning rod and it is perfectly fine.

This rifle initially got my attention because of the accuracy tests. The best it did was just under an inch. I thought it could do much better. Preparing for a prairie dog hunt this past June I worked up 70gr bullet loads exclusively - no other weight was even tried. I managed to find a sweet spot and this rifle is a 1/2 MOA shooter. While I am a big Savage fan I don't know how you can expect any better than that. I have never owned a Remington or Winchester that was that good out of the box. While pittdog states: Quote: "...My thinking is that one should not have to "work up" a perfect hand load to get good groups..." my thinking is exactly the opposite. Rifle or handgun I expect to work up perfect loads for every gun I own. With the ridiculous cost of factory ammo and the fact I can outshoot almost anything on the shelf I think that's the only way to go.

And to quote the magazine accurate: Quote: "...Clearly, this varmint-type rifle wanted varmint-type bullets, and it would be lots of fun working up a “perfect” handload for it. Many of the Remington’s groups were half the size of the Ruger’s, but its overall average of 0.8 inch puts it close to the Ruger..."

Clearly

Comment by: Markbo | November 20, 2009

Most Ruger's I have seen and used have extremely crude workmanship. If you look inside the action at the bolt lug raceways you will see numerous air holes that are the result of Ruger's crude casting process. Cast steel also is very porous which can result in severe rusting if the casting is not kept soaked in oil.

Until recently Ruger sub-contracted out its barrels which resulted in many poor shooting rifles. For every accurate Ruger I saw at our range, I saw 10 more that would not group very well at all. Hopefully now that Ruger is making its own barrels their guns will be more consistently accurate. But be aware that they barrels are made from the "Hammer fuging" process which has always been considered the worst way to make a barrel in regards to consistent accuracy.

Comment by: wild romanian | January 2, 2010

I understand Ruger purchased their own hammer forging equipment for barrel making. I have a 77 243 built in 1976. During the 70s I understand they used Douglas barrels. Mine is a tack driver.

Comment by: Dan983 | January 14, 2010