Bicentennial Ruger – The ExhaustNotes Blog

I’ve been a Ruger No. 1 fan for close to 50 years. It started with one I’ve written about before, and that is a Ruger No. 1A chambered in the awesome .30 06 Government cartridge. I’ve spent time on the range and I’ve hunted with this rifle, and it is probably my all-time favorite firearm.

What attracted me to the No. 1 was my father’s fascination with the rifle (he never owned one, but he wanted to), the beautiful and exquisitely figured walnut Ruger used on these rifles, and their style. To me, they just look right. My fixation started in 1976. Ruger roll-stamped every firearm they manufactured with “Made in the 200th Year of American Liberty” that year.

Rugers with this roll-marked stamp are known as Liberty or Bicentennial guns.

Like I said, the walnut on my Ruger .30 06 is exquisite on both sides.

As I said, the highly-figured walnut is exquisite on both sides of this .30 06.

The Ruger No. 1 came in different configurations, and the ones you see here are what Ruger called the 1A. They had 22-inch barrels, iron sights, and the Alex Henry fore end (that’s the fore end with the notch at the front). There are all sorts of suppositions about what why the notch was originally included on the Farquharson rifles that influenced the Ruger No. 1 design, but no one seems to know for sure. I just like the look of the thing. To me, these rifles are elegant. They’re not particularly light, but they’re short and it’s easy to get around in the woods with one. Back in the day, I bought a straight 4X Redfield scope and a still prefer a 4X non-variable scope for hunting (even though it’s tough to find one these days; high-powered variable scopes are all the rage).

Those west Texas days back in the ’70s were good. We spent a lot of time (essentially every weekend) out in the desert north of Fabens chasing jackrabbits and coyotes, and the No. 1 you see here sent a lot of those critters to the Promised Land. Jackrabbits were grand fun. It was hard to believe how big some of them were.

The accuracy load for my .30 06 No. 1 is the 130-grain Hornady jacketed softpoint bullet over a max load of IMR 4320 propellant. IMR 4320 is no longer in production, but I’ve got about 10 pounds of it so I’m good for a while. The rifle will put that load into an inch at 100 yards all day long, and the 130 grain Hornady bullet seems to be perfect for jackrabbits. Yeah, I know, that’s maybe a little more power than needed for Peter Cottontail, but hey, like Donald Rumsfeld used to say: You go to war with the army you have.

The .30 06 also does well with other loads. I was on the range with the ammo I had on hand a week or so ago with heavier bullets and I was pleased with the results. I tried 180 grain Remington bullets loaded on top of 48.0 grains of IMR 4064. Those loads shot low and had perceptibly heavier recoil, but they grouped under an inch at 100 yards.

Three shots at 100 yards with the Ruger .30 06 No. 1A. The load was the 180 grain Remington jacketed soft point bullet and 48.0 grains of IMR 4064, with military brass and a CCI 200 primer.

The title of this blog is A Tale of Two Bicentennial No. 1 Rugers, and that brings us to the second rifle. I was in Ohio on a secret mission about 15 years ago and the guy I visited there learned of my interest in guns. He took me to a local shop that only sold through an online auction (that was the gunshop’s business model). When we arrived, I quickly noticed another Ruger No. 1A, this time chambered in .243 Winchester. It was a bicentennial rifle, it looked to be a near twin to my .30 06 1A, and I had to have it. I tried to buy it while I was there and have shipped to my FFL holder in California, but the owner confirmed what my friend told me…I had to bid on it at auction. I did, and I won the auction at $650. Bear in mind that these rifles’ list price in 1976 was $265, and they typically sold at $239 back then. If you think I got scalped, think again. I won the auction, and the MSRP on these rifles today is something around $2,000. And the ones made back in the 1970s are, in my opinion, of much higher quality in terms of walnut figure, checkering, and other attributes.

A .243 Winchester Ruger No. 1. It wears a period correct El Paso Weaver 4×12 telescopic sight.

Ruger used to put fancy walnut on the No. 1 rifles. Today, not so much.

A fancy walnut, red pad Ruger No. 1. Sweet!

Like the .30 06 No. 1 featured above, this .243 is also a Liberty gun.

Most recently, good buddy John gave me a bunch of assorted brass and I started loading bits and pieces of it. I loaded the .30 40 Krag and wrote about it a week or so ago. There were a few pieces of .243 Winchester brass and that had me thinking about the .243 No. 1 in this blog. You see, I bought that rifle, stuck it in the safe, and never fired it. That was a character flaw I knew I needed to address.

I thought I had a set of .243 dies, but I was surprised to find I did not. I had some ammo, so I guess at some point I had .243 dies. I bought a new set of Lee dies, and I already had some .243 bullets. And as it turns out, the Lyman reloading manual lists IMR 4350 as the accuracy load for 60 grain bullets, and I had some. I only loaded six rounds (using the brass John gave to me), and I thought I needed to buy .243 brass (everybody is sold out of .243 brass right now). Then I started poking around in my brass drawer and it turns out I have five boxes of new Winchester 243 brass. I swear I’m gonna find Jimmy Hoffa or an honest politician in my components storage area one of these days.

The Tula factory ammo I had didn’t shoot worth a damn. Tula is cheap ammo, this stuff was old, and it grouped around 2.9 to 3.5 inches at 100 yards. I also had some very old reloads that had 100 grain Sierra bullets and 34.0 grains of IMR 4064, and it did only marginally better. The six rounds I loaded myself with the brass good buddy John provided was better. At least I think it was better. I used 65 grain Hornady V-Max bullets and 43.2 grains of IMR 4350 powder. I had one good group and one lousy group. But hey, Rome wasn’t built in a day, and I’m just getting started. I’ll buy some heavier 6mm bullets (.243 is 6mm), I’ll try them with a few different loads, and you’ll get to read about it here on the ExNotes blog.

More stories on Ruger single-shot rifles (the No. 1 and the No. 3) are here.

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I am a fan of both the No. 1 and the No. 3 Ruger single shot rifles. The No. 1 is the more elegant rifle with a fancier lever, a pistol grip stock, checkering, a rubber shoulder pad, a slick quarter rib, fancier walnut, and more. The No.3 was the economy version without checkering, plain walnut, an aluminum (and later plastic) shoulder pad, and a no frills look. When I started collecting these rifles in 1976, the No. 1 was chambered in contemporary cartridges and priced at $265. The No. 3 came in classic chamberings; in 1976 that included .22 Hornet, .30-40 Krag, and .45-70. Ruger listed the No. 3 at $165, and you could buy them all day long for $139. Which I did. In 1976, I bought No. 3 rifles in all three chamberings. All had the “Made in the 200th Year of American Liberty” inscription.

Take a look at the finish on this Ruger No. 3. It’s better than how they came from the factory.

I was younger and dumber in those days, and I stupidly sold all three rifles within a year of purchasing them. The Hornet went to Army buddy Jim, the .45-70 went to another Army buddy also named Jim, and the .30-40 was traded for something else I can’t remember. If you’re reading this blog, you realize the phrase “stupidly sold” is redundant. We have all sold guns we wish we kept.

Ruger has to have one of the best fonts ever for chambering designation.

I wanted to undo the wrong I did, and about 15 years ago I started a search to replace my No. 3 rifles. The .45-70 was the easiest to find and the .22 Hornet followed shortly thereafter. The prices had gone up (used, they were going for about $650-$700 back then). The .30-40 Krag was tougher to find. I’m assuming it was because Ruger made fewer of them. Then I spotted something I had to have: An unfired .30-40 No. 3 advertised on Gunbroker, and it had significantly nicer wood then No. 3 rifles typically have. I had to own it and I paid top dollar. When I called the shop, I used my American Express card instead of a certified check because I was eager to get it. I had to pay a 4% premium, but that turned out to be a good thing (more on that in a second).

Unusually highly-figured walnut on a No. 3 Ruger.

The shop that sold it to me did something stupid. They shipped the rifle in the original box with no additional padding and they didn’t insure it. You could get away with shipping a No. 1 Ruger in the original box, as they were stout and contained big pieces of foam padding. The No. 3 had a flimsy cardboard box in keeping with the No. 3’s lower price. You can guess where this story is going.

A view of the No. 3’s port side at the West End Gun Club.

Yep, the rifle arrived with the stock broken at the wrist. Wow. The wood was as beautiful as it looked in the Gurnbroker.com ad, but it was busted. I had a brand new, unfired 200th year No. 3 in .30-40 Krag with nice wood and its collector value was ruined. Like the box, I was crushed.

I called the shop owner, who turned out to be a real prick. “It’s your problem, and it’s between you and the US Post Office,” he told me. “You didn’t tell me to insure it, so I didn’t. Once it leaves here, it’s yours.” I told him I was going to have the stock repaired and I offered to split the cost with him, but he kept repeating his mantra: Once it leaves here, it’s yours.

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I told this sad story the next day during our usual geezer gathering at Brown’s BMW in Pomona, and good buddy Dave asked if the gun shop had asked me about insurance. “Nope, he never asked and I didn’t mention having it insured. I guess I just assumed it would be.” Dave explained that I was right to make that assumption, so I called the shop owner again, I explained to him I had learned about insurance responsibilities, and I again offered to split the repair cost. He said no again.

Then I remembered I had used my credit card. I called American Express, I explained the situation, and I told them it would cost about $275 to have the stock repaired and refinished. Not a problem, the guy on the other end of the line said, and just like that, he took $275 off the charge and said that the shop owner had 30 days to appeal. He didn’t, and that was that.

I sent the rifle off and when it came back I was both pleased and disappointed. I had asked the place I use for such work to match the original Ruger finish, but they did not. Instead, it was a much deeper and more glorious oil finish. It was nicer than the original finish, but it wasn’t original. That was good news and bad news. I had planned to keep the gun in its unfired condition, but now that it was busted, repaired, and refinished, it would be a shooter (that was the good news).

You can just barely see where the crack was in the stock wrist, but that’s because I used flash for this photo. In normal light, you really can’t see it.

I didn’t shoot the No. 3 immediately. This all happened 15 years ago before I retired and before COVID hit. I recently decided I needed to shoot the .30-40, so I ordered unprimed brass and Lee’s Ultimate four die set. Both were initially unavailable, but they came in and I was in business. I already had large rifle primers, a stash of what has to be one of the best powders ever for cast bullets (SR 4759), and a bunch of 173-grain gas checked bullets.

.30-40 Krag ammo in new brass, loaded by yours truly.

I seated the cast bullets to the crimping groove and used the Lee factory crimp die, and the cartridges looked great. I tried a number of different SR 4759 powder charge levels in the Lyman cast bullet manual. When I fired on the 50-yard line at the West End Gun Club using the rifle’s open sights, I found that 20.0 grains of SR 4759 is my accuracy load.

I held at 6:00, and the rounds shot very close to point of aim at 50 yards. The target was mounted on its side, as you see it here.

Very modest bore leading in the No. 3. That SR 4759 load with the 173-grain bullet is accurate even with the Ruger’s factory iron sights.

The .30-40 Krag is an interesting cartridge. It was the US Army’s standard chambering after they phased out the .45-70 Springfield. The new rifle was the 1892 Krag-Jorgensen rifle made at the Springfield Arsenal. It was the first military cartridge designed for smokeless (as opposed to black) powder, and it originally fired a 230-grain jacketed bullet. The .30-40 is a rimmed cartridge that looks a lot like the 7.62x54R Russian cartridge (which came out just one year earlier). The ballistics of both are fairly close to the .308 Winchester (which is the 7.62 NATO round we currently use).

.45-70, .30-40 Krag, 7.62x54R Russian, .308 Winchester (7.62 NATO), .30 06, and .300 Weatherby cartridges. The .300 Weatherby is the fiercest recoiling cartridge in the group when loaded with jacketed bullets at factory velocities (the cartridge shown here is loaded with a cast bullet). With the exception of the .300 Weatherby, Gatling guns have been chambered in each of these cartridges. Modern mini-guns are electrically-powered Gatlings chambered in 7.62 NATO (.308 Winchester).

After our experiences in the Spanish-American War, our government load plant created and issued a hotter version of the .30-40 Krag in an attempt to match the speed and ballistics of the Spanish 7mm Mauser round, but the Krag rifles started cracking bolts. All the .30-40 Krag ammo was recalled and reconfigured with the original, lower pressure load. The .30-40 Krag was also used in the Gatling gun. You can read about that here:

The .30-40 Krag only lasted about a decade in US government service. It was replaced with the .30-03 in 1903 (which was soon replaced with the .30-06, which became one of the most popular hunting cartridges ever). The history of this fine old cartridge is interesting; shooting it with cast bullets in a sleek Ruger No. 3 is good old fun. I might never have known that if the stock had not broken.

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