Tag: Ruger

Ruger’s .45 Blackhawk and Red Dot Accuracy

By Joe Berk

I saw the Ruger Blackhawk you see above in a forum post several years ago and wrote to ask if the owner if he would sell it.  The answer was yes, and after navigating all the California hurdles, the revolver found a home in my gun safe.  Several things attracted me to it. It is a 200th Year Ruger, it is in as new condition, the cylinder throats had already been reamed to their correct dimensions (several .45 Colt Blackhawks left the factory in 1976 with undersized throats), and the grips are nice (much nicer than normally seen on a Ruger Blackhawk).  The grips have great figure and the wood-to-metal fit is superb (something rarely seen on a new Blackhawk these days).

Fancy wood. I’m guessing this is Gonçalo Alves wood. The wood-to-metal fit is way better on this 50-year-old revolver than it is on current production Rugers.
The right grip is just as pretty as the left. Ruger used to get it right.

You saw my previous post 0n fitting the Power Custom base pin to this revolver, and another in which I compared this handgun to two other .45 Colt handguns (a 4 5/8-inch stainless Blackhawk and a tuned Taylor Uberti Single Action Army replica).  I had not really done any load development for the Blackhawk you see in this blog, and I wanted to start doing so this week.  I grabbed some ammo and headed to the range.

Getting out to the West End Gun Club has been a bit dicey over the last month or so.  With our heavy rains, Lytle Creek has been running high.  My Subie came through, though, like it almost always does.

I say “almost” because a couple of years ago under similar circumstances, I almost became a U-boat commander.  You may have read that blog before.

My first target at 25 yards with the 5.9-grain Red Dot load I had previously evaluated at 10 yards was mediocre.  The group was high and big.  Ordinarily (and with an accurate revolver), I can put a box of ammo into a 25-yard group you could cover with a silver dollar.  That wasn’t happening with this load.

Meh. I’ve done better.

When my buddy Kevin saw the above target, he asked if I was using a shotgun.  I understood his point. So I set up another target, again at 25 yards and with the same load, figuring I’d do better the next time.  The results were the same.

Another group with the 5.9-grain, 200-gr truncated roundnose cast bullet. Just like the group above. High left, and too damn big.

Must be the load, I thought.  I switched to the last box of .45 Colt loaded with Trail Boss powder (it was 6.4 grains of Trail Boss under the same 200-grain roundnose, flatpoint, cast bullet used above).  That’s a load that’s done well in other guns chambered for this cartridge.  The results were almost identical to the Red Dot load.

Same bullet, but with 6.4 grains of Trail Boss.   Maybe the group was a little tighter.  Maybe not.

So far, the .45 Blackhawk results with Red Dot were disappointing.  The groups were too big and too high.  My Blackhawk’s rear sight is all the way down, so it I knew it was time to try something different.  I had some 230-grain roundnose Missouri bullets hiding somewhere under the reloading bench, along with another box of 200-grain Speer swaged bullets, but I didn’t think either of those would be the answer here.   A heavier bullet (like the 230-grain cast roundnose bullet) would shoot higher.  That’s what heavier handgun bullets do because they generate more recoil and have a slower muzzle velocity (and that causes the bullet to spend more time in the barrel as it rises), giving a higher point of impact.   I also had some 185-grain full metal jacket bullets (a little lighter than the ones I shot here), so I tried them.  Maybe they would be the answer.  I went home and loaded some of those to try the next time I visited the range.

An unusual appearance cartridge: The .45 Colt with 185-grain Winchester jacketed semi-wadcutter bullets.

I prepared 20 .45 Colt reloaded rounds with the 185-grain Winchester jacketed semi-wadcutters with the same Red Dot propellant charge as previously used (5.9 grains), and then I reloaded another 20 rounds with that Winchester bullets and a heavier charge (6.7 grains of Red Dot).

The first group (loaded with 5.9 grains of Red Dot and the 185-grain Winchesters) printed high and to the left.  The group was a little tighter, at least with respect to lateral dispersion.

Way high, a little left, and a few flyers. The rear sight was already in its lowest setting. It was pretty windy that day.

I next shot a group with a higher Red Dot charge (6.7 grains).  It moved the group down substantially (a hoped-for result) and the group was tighter.  Ah, progress.  It comes in many forms.

With a higher Red Dot charge (6.7 grains here), the group moved a little right and a little lower. That one flyer on the left? Who knows?

A quick check of the fired cartridges confirmed what I was experiencing when extracting the above rounds.  There were no pressure signs, and extraction was easy.

No primer flattening, and easy extraction. These loads showed no signs of high pressure.

I went home and reloaded more .45 Colt cartridges, this time with even higher charges.  The recipes this time were the same 185-grain Winchester jacketed semi-wadcutters, but with 7.0 grains and 7.3 grains of Red Dot.

While all this was going on, I continued to cruise the Internet, looking for more information on Red Dot and its reloading peculiarities.  A found a few places where folks mentioned that the powder didn’t meter well.  Usually, my Lee powder dispenser has a consistent drop, so I thought I would weigh a few after I had the dispenser adjuster.  Wow.  Those guys were right.  I was seeing variation of as much as 0.5-grain from charge to charge.   Hmmm.  I was experimenting with charge weight differences as small as 0.3 grains, while the dispenser was throwing in variability of 0.5 grains.  That’s not good.  I filled the powder dispenser, rapped it a few times to settle the Red Dot, and I managed to get the variability down to not more than 0.2 grains.  It was 0.0 grains, which is what I had experienced with other powders, but it was better than the 0.5 grains I first encountered.  Like Donald Rumsfeld used to say, you go to war with the Army you have.  My Army had 0.2 grains powder-drop-to-powder-drop variability, and that’s what I was going to war with.

The next day at the range, I fired 20 rounds at a 25-yard target using a my 7.0-grains-of-Red-Dot load.  It shot a little bit better group, and it had a little bit lower point of impact.  More progress.

Ever wonder why a head shot is only worth 5 points, while a center of mass shot is worth 10? These things sometimes keep me up at night. The point of impact was getting lower with higher charges.

Then I tried the last group I had loaded, this time with 7.3 grains of Red Dot.  I had a few stray shots, but I also had the makings of a better group, and it was lower yet on the target.

A better group. Still too high, but getting better. Those stray shots: Were they the result of shot-to-shot powder charge weight variability, or were they due to pilot error?

At that point, I decided to call it a day with this test series and with this revolver.  Here’s what I concluded from the above:

      • Red Dot is not the best propellant for the .45 Colt cartridge, which is probably why you almost never see it listed in any of today’s reloading manuals.  The above notwithstanding, Red Dot can work for .45 Colt cartridges, as this test series found.
      • Higher charge weights are better, probably because they occupy more of the case volume (the .45 Colt is a big handgun cartridge).  My tests showed that the average velocity, the extreme spread, and the standard deviation all improved with higher Red Dot charge weights.
      • With my 7.3-grain Red Dot load, the average velocity is 980.0 feet per second, the extreme spread is 76.5 feet per second, and the standard deviation is 21.1 feet per second.  These are not the best numbers I’ve ever seen in a handgun, but they are not the worst, either, and a 185-grain, .45 caliber bullet smoking along at nearly 1000 feet per second is nothing to sneeze at.  Other powders would do better in this cartridge (IMR 4227 comes to mind), and future efforts will focus on that.
      • Regarding my .45 Colt Blackhawk shooting high at 25 yards, I don’t know if it’s the load or the gun.  I have another Ruger Blackhawk that shoots high at 25 yards (my .357 Blackhawk).  I have a lower rear sight blade from Ruger laying around here somewhere.   I will try to find it and, after confirming it is lower than the blade currently in the gun, I’ll see how much that helps.

So there you have it:  Red Dot propellant reloads in a Ruger .45 Colt Blackhawk.  If you have a comment, we’d love to hear it.

More gun stories?  You bet!   There’s good stuff on our Guns page on the three Rs (Rugers, revolvers, and rel0ading)!

Tales of the Gun

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A .45 Colt Six Shooter Trio

By Joe Berk

I tested four different .45 Colt loads in three different six shooters yesterday.  The revolvers were an 1873 Taylor-tuned Uberti SAA with a 5½ inch barrel, a stainless steel Ruger 4 5/8 inch Blackhawk, and a 200th Year Ruger 7½ inch Blackhawk. Conditions were way less than ideal: It was windy and I was there in the afternoon, which meant I was shooting into the sun on the West End Gun Club’s 50-foot handgun range.

My Uberti with a Schrade stag-handled large folding knife. Both are elegant.

Every time I shoot the Uberti, I’m reminded how elegant the 1873 design is. The Ruger Blackhawks look good and shoot well, but they are a bit “clunky” compared to the old Colt design.  The 1873 SAA just feels graceful.  It’s a delight to hold and to shoot.

Ruger’s stainless steel, 4 5/8 inch barreled Blackhawk chambered in .45 Colt. It’s a slick sixgun.
A 200th Year 7 1/2 inch Ruger Blackhawk, also chambered in .45 Colt. I bought it about 15 years ago; I fired it for the first time in this load evaluation.

As I was unlocking the gate to get into the range, a low-rent-gangbanger-looking, dirty, tattooed guy pulled up behind me in a beat up old white Honda.  He obviously had been waiting to follow me in.  Even though I’m armed, I’m always a little nervous when I get out of the car to unlock the gate because it’s desolate out there and it’s a good ambush spot.  The guy sure didn’t look like a Republican to me. I asked him to show his membership card and he went into his “no habla” routine. I told him I wouldn’t leave the gate open without seeing his membership card, and he suddenly had enough “habla” to understand that. He turned around and left. A recent WEGC email explained that these guys steal brass and other stuff from the range, so I’m guessing that’s what this dirtball wanted.

The three propellants used for this test series: Hodgdon Trail Boss, Hercules Red Dot, and IMR 4227.
The 200-grain cast bullet, the 185-grain Winchester jacketed semiwadcutter, and a loaded .45 Colt cartridge.

The loads used Trail Boss, IMR 4227, and Red Dot powder. I had been loading .45 Colt with Trail Boss because it is what the Cowboy Action Shooters use and it was presumably a low velocity load. To my surprise, the Trail Boss velocities were only very slightly below the other powders’ velocities.  I loaded with two different bullets (Winchester’s 185-grain jacketed semiwadcutter and a 200-grain cast roundness bullet with a truncated ogive).

The results of my testing are in the table below.  The table’s font (as it appears in the blog) is tiny, but if you click on it, the table will open with a larger and more readable display.

Here are the inferences I make from the above data:

There are some large groups sprinkled in the above data (above 3 inches); that’s probably due to the poor shooting conditions and me. My first group was one of the worst; I attribute that to me settling down for subsequent groups.

I used Alco’s target with four mini-silhouettes. Shooting conditions were less than ideal.

I also noticed that one of the cases had split, and the bullet from that case would have been a flyer.  With the exception of the one case that split, none of the cartridges exhibited any pressure signs.  All cases extracted easily (other than the one that split) and none had flattened primers.

It happens. This cartridge case had been loaded one too many times. When this occurs, it results in a flyer.

The Lee cast bullet reloading manual shows the 200-grain truncated roundnose bullet accuracy load to be 5.6 grains of Red Dot, which is at the very bottom end of the range. I went with 5.9 grains because the Red Dot loads don’t occupy much of the case volume and I felt uncomfortable with that. I might try the lower load of Red Dot (i.e., 5.6 grains) next time I’m reloading, but I think I’m going to just stick with 5.9 grains.  It works well enough in all three revolvers.

The Trail Boss spreads and standard deviations were large, which surprised me. I’ve had good accuracy at 50 feet with this powder, but the large standard deviations mean that at longer ranges the accuracy will be poor.  I could feel the difference in recoil with the Trail Boss load; one round would give a sharp crack back, and the next might be much lighter.  The Trail Boss chronograph data supports that subjective assessment.

I have a lot of Red Dot propellant, so I wanted to evaluate it in the .45 Colt. It did well. In general, the Red Dot velocity spreads and standard deviations were lower than those with Trail Boss or IMR 4227.  That was a surprise, too.

Overall average group size (all guns, all loads) with the cast 200-grain bullets was 2.275 inches. Overall average group size (all guns, all loads) with the full metal jacket semi-wadcutter Winchester bullets was 2.125 inches. That’s not much of a difference.

You might be wondering why I didn’t try the IMR 4227 loads in the Uberti SAA. I thought these would be a lot hotter loads because the load data was for Ruger revolvers. Turns out the velocities were in line with the Trail Boss and Red Dot loads. I could have shot the IMR 4227 in the Uberti, but I didn’t realize that when I was on the range. I was very surprised at the huge velocity spreads and standard deviations with IMR 4227.

Recoil for all the loads listed in the table above was not oppressive.   But I wouldn’t characterize the recoil as light, either.  The .45 Colt is a big cartridge.

As expected, the 7 ½ inch Blackhawk velocities were slightly higher than were those for the other two shorter-barreled revolvers. The longer sight radius on the 7 ½ Ruger didn’t make much difference in accuracy.  That’s counterintuitive.  It may just be that the wind and shooting into the sun masked any advantage the longer sight radius offered.

Overall accuracy for the revolvers with all loads was essentially the same (see the last column in the above table).  I could repeat this evaluation under better range conditions, but I think I have enough information to select a good load.  While the groups were not stellar (they were in the 2-inch+ range), the above convinces me that Red Dot is a good powder in .45 Colt. I’ll probably standardize at 5.9 grains of Red Dot with the 200-grain cast bullet.  The velocity is high enough for my purposes and I love that low standard deviation.

I’m a student of the Gatling gun and as you tell from reading this piece, I’m a big fan of the .45 Colt cartridge.  After finishing this blog, I briefly wondered: Were any of the original Gatlings chambered in .45 Colt?   The short answer is no.  Even though the .45 Colt was a prevalent cartridge during the era of the original Gatlings, none were built for this cartridge (they instead used the much more powerful .45 70 rifle cartridge).  That was then, though, and this is now.  You can buy a current reproduction of the Gatling chambered in .45 Colt.  That would be cool, but it would be expensive to keep such a beast fed.

Crusader’s .45 Colt Gatling Gun.  It’s only $8149.99.

If you want to know more about Gatling guns (including their early history, the transition to modern weapon systems, and their current applications), pick up your copy of The Gatling Gun.

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A Great .357 Magnum Load

By Joe Berk

I’ve written about the Ruger .357 Magnum Bisley before, and I’ve written about other Ruger .357 Magnum revolvers.  The .357 Magnum cartridge is one of my all-time favorites, and I wanted to share with you a load that is particularly powerful and accurate.  It’s the one you see below:

Winchester’s 296 propellant has always performed well for me in the magnum handgun cartridges and in .30 Carbine, and the .357 Magnum is no exception.  I had loaded these cartridges with Hornady’s 180-grain jacketed hollow point bullets (a heavier bullet than the normally-used 158-grain bullet).  I like these bullets a lot, and apparently, so does the Bisley.  Here’s a 25-yard target with 50 rounds, shot from the bench, but with no other rests employed:

The average velocity from the Bisley was a cool 1194 feet per second, with a relatively small 18.4 feet per second standard deviation.  This is a good load.  From a metallic silhouette perspective, I can’t tell you if they will reliably take down the 200-meter rolled homogeneous ram, but I’m guessing they will.

We’ve written a lot on the .357 Magnum cartridge, Ruger handguns, and reloading the cartridges they shoot (including the very fine Lee Precision dies and turret press I use).  Links to those articles are listed below.

A .357 Magnum Ruger Bisley
Lee .357 Magnum Dies, Cast vs Jacketed Bullets, and Crimping
Ruger’s .357 Magnum Blackhawk
.357 Ruger Blackhawk Accuracy Loads
Ruger’s .357 Blackhawk
Ponce de León, the Bisley, and 100-Yard Revolver Results
The Bisley Revisited
Restoring an Ugly and Broken 1968 Ruger Blackhawk
The Rimfire Series: An Early Ruger Single-Six
Colt’s Python versus Ruger’s Blackhawk
Ruger Blackhawk Accuracy Testing
The New Model Blackhawk
Catching Up
A 110-grain Python Load
Rifle Primers in Revolver Ammo
Five Favorite Handguns
A TJ Trigger for My New Python
Colt’s New Python Range Tested
Ruger’s Custom Shop Super GP100
A Bullseye Birdseye Blackhawk
A Pair of Prancing Ponies…and that first No. 1
Ruger’s .30 Carbine Blackhawk

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Iron Sights and a .45 70 No. 1

By Joe Berk

There are more than a few .45 70 stories here on the ExNotes blog.  This is another one.  I like the .45 70, and I make no excuses for that. I’ll share a few links on our other .45 70 stories at the end of this blog.

A few years ago Ruger offered a special No. 1 Single Shot rifle in .45 70 with a 26-inch barrel and a Circassian walnut stock.  Most had very plain wood.  Then I found an almost new one in Duarte for cheap. Ruger rifles usually have long throats, but this run of No. 1 rifles had short ones, and conventional 405 grain bullets wouldn’t chamber if the bullet was crimped in the crimping groove (or so the whining on the Internet went).  I’m guessing the original owner either bought or reloaded ammo for my rifle (the one you see above) and it wouldn’t chamber, so he put the rifle up for sale.

Then another stroke of good luck:  A guy at the range had some Winchester 300-grain .45 70 ammo, and it chambered in the No. 1.

A Winchester .45 70 cartridge with a .22 Long Rifle cartridge.

That Winchester ammo was noteworthy for two reasons: It chambered, and it was relatively accurate at 100 yards.  I wrote about that before (you’ll see the link below).

The story gets more interesting.  Hornady makes a jacketed 300-grain hollow point bullet, and I picked up a bunch of those years ago.  When I loaded them, they wouldn’t chamber in the Circassian .45 70.  Then I noticed a Hornady illustration of their current 300-grain bullet design, and the bullet profile had changed.  It looked like it might work based on the illustration, so I bought a box of the Hornady bullets and they worked.  I could crimp in the cannelure and they chambered in my Circassian Ruger.

XBR 8208 Propellant. This is good stuff.

Like I said above, I knew from an earlier range session that the Winchester ammo was relatively accurate in my Circassian No. 1, so my objective was to duplicate that load.  I found online that Winchester listed their ammo’s velocity at 1880 feet per second.  I didn’t know what propellant Winchester used, but I had a bottle of XBR 8208 and it was proving to be very accurate in other cartridges (more on that later).  Interpolating from the Hodgdon’s XBR 8208 load data, it looked like what I needed was 54.0 grains, and that’s how I loaded.

It was an overcast Wednesday morning out at the West End Gun Club when I tried the load at 100 yards.  I fired three rounds and took a peek through my spotting scope.  I couldn’t spot the hits in the scope, so either they all went in the black (which would be good), or I missed the target completely (which would be bad).  Good buddies Duane and Walt were on the range that day, and when we walked out to check our targets, it was time for a collective “Whoa!”  I was more than pleased with the results.   Hell, a 0.906-inch group would be good with a scoped rifle.  For a guy like me and open sights at 100 yards, it was spectacular.  I’m really pleased with the load, the rifle, and myself.  I’m even more pleased I had a couple of witnesses out there to see it!

Phenomenal results (at least for me) at 100 yards with open sights.

Those other cartridges I mentioned that work well with XBR 8208?  In my .22 250 rifles, this propellant works very, very well with Hornady’s 52-grain match bullet.  In the .243 No. 1, it pairs very well with Nosler’s 55-grain  bullet, Hornady’s 58-grain V-Max bullet, and Speer’s 75-grain jacketed hollow point bullet.  In 6.5 Creedmoor Browning X-Bolt rifle, XBR 8208 is the cat’s meow with the 123-grain Nosler jacketed hollow point boattail bullet and the 140-grain Hornady jacketed hollow point boattail bullet.  With that last load, you could shoot flies at 100 yards if you could find them in the scope.

More .45 70 stories?  We’ve got a bunch of them!

Ruger No. 3 45 70 Loads
Ruger .45 70 Circassian No. 1
Buffalo Guns
A Wind  River Marlin .45 70 Rifle
A .45 70 Remlin 1895
The 1886 Winchester
Turnbull Guns
Marlin Cowboy Front Sight Installation
Marlin 1895 Cowboy Revisited
Henry Rifles
The Henry Is In California
Developing a Henry .45 70 Load: Part 1
Developing a Henry .45 70 Load: Part 2
Henry’s Home and an Interview with Dan
Henry Accuracy Loads

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Undoing Bubba

By Joe Berk

Back in the mid 1970s, I was in the Army at Fort Bliss, Texas, and I was both a pistolero and a rifle shooter.  It was a great time and a great place to be a shooter and a gun collector.  One of the reasons for that was that Ruger had all their guns manufactured in 1976 stamped with “Made in the 200th Year of American Liberty.”   I especially loved Ruger’s single-shot rifles.  Ruger had the uber-slick and elegant No. 1, and they also offered an econo-version of it called the No. 3.  I guess they skipped No. 2 because they didn’t want anybody calling their guns turds.  Trust me on this:  They were anything but.

In those days, the No. 3 carried an MSRP of $165, but you could buy them all day long for $139.  The No. 3 was offered in three chamberings:  .22 Hornet, .30-40 Krag, and 45-70 Government.  I bought all three, and then I sold them when I left the service.  That decision to sell my No. 3 Rugers bothered me for years.  About 15 years ago I acted to correct my No. 3-less status.

The .45 70 cartridge. It’s one of my favorites to shoot, and it’s one of my favorites to reload. My usual load is 35 grains of IMR 4198 propellant with the Missouri Bullets 405-grain cast bullet.

Like all things, Ruger No. 3 rifles had gone up in value substantially.  Used ones were going for around $650 (today, they are going for anywhere between $1000 and $1500).  I picked up a .22 Hornet, a .30 40 Krag (I paid a lot for it; they were relatively hard to find), and a .45 70.  All were 200th Year Rugers.

The .45 70 No. 3 I bought had been Bubba’d, and the Bubba-ing was done by a clumsy and nearsighted Bubba.  The stock and fore end had scratches all over, the black anodizing on the butt plate and the fore end clamp was worn and scratched, the bluing was well worn, and good buddy Bubba ham-fistedly added sling swivel mounts that weren’t quite centered.  But, it was a 200th year rifle and it shot well.  I know that some folks get off on honestly-acquired patina, and sometimes I’m one of them.  But this wasn’t one of those times.  I wanted the rifle to make up for me selling my .45-70 No. 3 back in the ’70s.  When I was young.  And stupid.  I liked the used .45 70 No. 3 I bought, but its cosmetic condition kept me up at night.

A view of the No. 3 from the starboard side.

The Ruger No. 3 had been out of production for nearly 30 years when I called Ruger 15 years ago to see if they would reblue it.  The guy I spoke to had to check, so I waited on the phone.  He was back in minute, the answer was yes, and the price was right:  $130.  While I had the guy on the phone I described the other cosmetic defects, and asked if they had any higher quality wood laying around.  That answer was no.  I figured that would be okay; I could refinish the stock and fore end myself.

So I sent the rifle to Ruger and it was back in about 10 days.  That was fast.  When I took the rifle out of the box, I was blown away at how nice the bluing turned out.  All the lines and letters were crisp, nothing was blurred, and the bluing was way nicer than the No. 3 rifles had originally been finished.  My No. 3 Ruger’s bluing is like the high-polish bluing that Ruger used to provide on the Super Blackhawk.   It’s really nice.

The No. 3 actipn. These are great rifles.
A .45 70 cartridge in the trough. You load these one at a time. When the lever below is pulled up, as block behind the cartridge rises and the rifle is ready to fire.
The re-anodized metal buttplate. In later production, Ruger started using plastic buttplates. The metal ones are cooler.

As I stared at the rifle, there was something else about it that was different.  It took me a few seconds before I realized that contrary to what they said on the phone, they had indeed replaced all the lumber (as well as the black anodized buttplate and fore end clamp).  My 1976 No. 3 had become a new rifle.  I looked at the invoice, and Ruger hadn’t charged anything for the new wood and metal bits.  Somebody back there is an enthusiast, I realized.  They did have a stock set laying around, and he (or she; I have no idea) didn’t think it was right for a freshly (and nicely) reblued No. 3 to leave the factory with lumber by Bubba.

The “Made in the 200th Anniversary of American Liberty” inscription. Note the new fore end and the re-anodized fore end clamp.
Back in ’76, there were no warnings on the barrel. I like the simpler labeling you see here much better. It’s classier.

The pictures you see here are what came back from Ruger, all for $130 plus shipping.  It was a hell of a deal.

A big hole.  The .22 Hornet, .30-40 Krag, and .45 70 No. 3 rifles all have the same external dimensions. The bigger bore of the .45 70 makes it the lightest of the three chamberings.
The Ruger No. 3. It is a classy logo. I almost never see another one of these rifles on the range these days.

Okay, that’s enough for now.  You’re probably wondering how the rifle shoots.  So am I.  I’m going to get out to the range soon, and you’ll read about it right here.  Stay tuned.

Do you like No. 1 and No. 3 Rugers?   Me, too.  Read our other No. 3 stories here.

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El Puerco Times Two: Part 2

By Joe Berk

An upfront warning:  If you’re squeamish, you should skip this blog.  

It rained hard after Tom, John, and I returned from our first day’s hunt, but that was okay.  The Dunton Ranch has nice accommodations.  Heat, hot water, cooking gear, refrigerator, shower, comfortable bunks, and more.  Just bring food and ammo.  It’s a gentlemanly way to hunt, and if nothing else, John and I are gentlemen. No more pitching tents and sleeping on the ground for us.

Subaru Outbacks, parked in front of our Dunton Ranch cabin.  John and I are both Subie fans.

When Tom picked us up the next morning, he told me my hog weighed 219 pounds, and that he recovered the bullet.  It had come to rest just inside the hog’s hide on the opposite side of where I shot it.  I was very interested in seeing that bullet.  Tom had prepped the hog and two sides of pork were hanging in the Ranch’s freezer.  Tom told us he had stood outside in the rain the previous night skinning and dressing it.  My pig weighed 219 pounds.

Tom showed me the bullet.  My hog was a clean kill, but the bullet had failed.  Its lead core separated from the cupper cup.  Not that it made any difference to the pig.

My bullet, post impact. The copper jacket should the bullet had mushroomed nicely (which is what you want), but when I turned it over, I was disappointed (see below).
My bullet’s copper jacket. The jacket peeled back nicely. The lead core was gone. It should have still been in the jacket. John’s bullet would behave the way it was supposed to, but mine had not.

Tom told me the bullet had cleanly impacted the hog’s spine and taken out a fist-sized chunk of it.  The hog was dead before it hit the ground, but the bullet had separated.  It bothered me enough that I called Hornady when I returned home, and I’ll tell you about that later in this blog.

Tom, our guide, and Baja John checking the zero on John’s .25 06 Browning. The zero was exactly where it needed to be. We were good to go.

John’s rifle is a beautiful curly maple Browning A-Bolt chambered in .25 06.  That’s a cartridge I had never owned, but not because I didn’t like it.  Everything I’ve ever read about the .25 06 has been positive.  Flat shooting, accurate, easy to find ammo and brass for…it has all the right things going for it and it rings all the bells.  And I love A-Bolt Brownings.  John’s rifle is all stainless steel, it has an octagonal barrel, and it wears a Nikon 3×9 telescopic sight finished in silver to match the rest of the rifle.  It’s a beautiful firearm.

When John first bought his Browning several years ago, he visited us and we spent some time at the West End Gun Club zeroing it.  John hadn’t shot the rifle too much since then, and he wanted to check the rifle’s zero before we hunted.  Tom took us to a place where we could do so by firing at a pile of large boulders he knew to be a hundred yards away.  John fired two shots and both hit exactly where he intended.

I took my Ruger with me again, but I already had my pig.  I didn’t intend to shoot my rifle again unless we encountered a Russian boar.

Yakkety Yak! Yaks on the Dunton Ranch. Shooting a yak is not something that’s made my bucket list. Your mileage may vary.

Although we had seen several Ossabaw hogs yesterday, none were around that second morning.  Tom said he had been out earlier (before retrieving us) and he hadn’t seen any pigs, either.  He said the previous night’s downpour most likely had driven them away.  We did see several yaks and a bison.  Dunton keeps a lot of game on his ranch.  Neither John nor I had any desire to shoot one of these large animals.

A Dunton Ranch bison. These are too cool to shoot, in my opinion. Your opinion may be different.  I respect your right to be wrong.

After riding around in the truck and walking most of the morning, we finally spotted several hogs.  Tom scoped them and put the distance at 77 yards.  It was John’s turn at bat and he took but a single swing.  Just as had occurred the day before, all it took was one shot and it was game over.  The .25 06 did its job.

John and his Ossabaw. We both had our pigs for this trip. Our hunt was a success.

When we walked up to the pig, we grabbed a few more photos, including the one of John and I posing behind his pig.  It’s the photo you see at the top of this blog.

Tom asked if we’d like to go to one of the blinds and sit around waiting for a Russian to possibly stroll by while he dressed John’s pig.  I asked if they would enter this part of the ranch with the Ossabaws present.  “Yep, they will,” Tom said.  “They’ll mate with the  female Ossabaws.”

“I guess they’re not too particular,” I said.  John, Tom, and I had a good laugh.

John said he’d like to go back and watch Tom dress his hog.  Neither of us had seen that before.  I realized I wanted to see it, too.  We went back to the ranch proper, and wow, we really had our eyes opened.  It’s not like you see meat at the supermarket, all neatly packaged and ready to go.

The first thing Tom showed us was my hog, all dressed out, with both sides hanging in the refrigerator.  Tom pointed to where my bullet had hit the hog’s spine.   The damage was staggering.

We went back outside and Tom used a Bobcat tractor to lift John’s hog out of the trailer.  The hooks had a scale attached, and John’s hog came in at 225 pounds.  He outdid me by 6 pounds (not that we were competing).

John and his Ossabaw. The little thing on the chain (it looks like an iPhone) is a digital scale.

Tom went to work on the pig and what followed was amazing.  I had no idea dressing out a hog was so labor intensive.  It took Tom a good hour and a half, maybe more, to complete the job.  It probably would have taken Tom less time if John and I hadn’t asked so many questions and taken so many pictures.  All the while, chickens wandered into the area and were eating bits and pieces that fell off the hog as Tom worked on it.  They’re carnivores, you know.  There were turkeys strutting around, too, but they kept their distance (but not their silence).  It was hard not to laugh as the turkeys gobbled up a storm at each other.  It reminded me of what passes for political discussion these days.

Carniv0rous chickens. Who knew?

Speaking of storms, while Tom worked on John’s hog it started raining again.  Hard.  John and I stepped into the metal building and watched Tom work from under cover.  When the rain turned to hail, Tom took a break and joined us in there.

I looked around inside the metal building and realized again that the Dunton Ranch offers all kinds of hunting.  It really is an impressive operation.  I felt lucky being able to experience it.

The dressing room. Not the kind of dressing room I’d been in before.

Tom finished up his chores on John’s hog and as he neared completion, he found John’s .25-caliber bullet.  John used Federal factory ammo with 120-grain jacketed softpoint bullets.  Unlike my Hornady bullet, the Federal bullet performed exactly as it was supposed to, mushrooming in a manner worthy of a bullet ad.  It was located just under the skin on the opposite side of the hog.

The bottom side of John’s .25-caliber bullet. Note how the copper jacket had flowered out, and the lead adhered to the jacket petals.
The business end of the John’s .25 06 bullet. It mushroomed to more than twice its original diamter and remained intact. This is stellar bullet performance.

That night (which was only the second day we’d been on the Dunton Ranch), John and I decided to head into Kingman for dinner.  We could have cooked in our cabin, but we were reveling in our pig-hunting success and we wanted to celebrate.  Tom recommended a Mexican restaurant in town (El Palacio) and his recommendation was a home run.

My Mexican plate at El Palacio. It was great!
On Interstate 40, headed back to California, just west of Kingman. It was clear sailing all the way home.

The ride home was enjoyable.  It rained hard all night Tuesday and it rained as I was leaving Wednesday morning, but as soon as I passed Kingman I could see the skies clearing.  It was an easy ride back to California.  I stopped at Del Taco in Barstow and had a taco (they’re the best Del Taco anywhere).

Once I was home, I unpacked, ran a patch soaked in Patch-Out (my preferred rifle solvent) through the No. 1’s barrel, and then I called Hornady.  I spoke with a nice guy there and told him what happened with my .30 06 bullet.  “It happens,” he said.  It’s more likely to happen, he went on, if the bullet is traveling at extremely high velocities or if the game was too close (before the bullet had a chance to slow).  I explained that my .30 06 load’s muzzle velocity was just below 2900 feet per second (I knew this because I had chronographed the load, I explained) and the hog was a measured 117 yards away (and I knew this because our guide had a rangefinder).  The Hornady man was impressed that I knew all that, and then mentioned that if a bullet strikes bone, it is also more likely to separate.  Ding ding ding!  That was exactly what happened on my hog.

The Hornady engineer told me that one way to avoid cup and core separation is to use a monolithic bullet (they are made of solid copper, with no lead core).  He was almost apologetic when he explained that monolithic bullets are more expensive than lead bullets because copper costs more than lead.  That may be my next step at some point in the future.

We are not allowed to hunt with lead bullets in California (the folks in our legislature are afraid that we might kill an animal, leave it, and then a California condor might eat it and get lead poisoning).  You know, the California Condor, the super rare endangered species (that there are almost none of) might ingest an animal carcass with the remnants of a lead bullet fragment in it and die of lead poisoning.  I’m serious; that’s what our politicians here in California are worried about.  I shouldn’t be too hard on them, I suppose, because we have something in common.  I and the rest of the TDS loonies here in California can both make this statement: None of us ever found any Russians.  For the TDS-afflicted, it is imaginary secret agents in Moscow.  For me, it is a Russian boar.  My Russians are real, though, and on one of these trips, I’ll get one.

Anyway, it might be time to start experimenting with monolithic bullets.  Maybe it’s a good thing we have that no lead law here in LooneyLand.

To get back on topic:  Our hunt was a rousing success.  The Dunton Ranch showed us a great time, and John and I each got our pigs.  I can’t wait to do it again.

Missed Part 1 of the El Puerco story?  It’s right here.

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The Bisley Revisited

By Joe Berk

One thing about Ruger:  Nobody can top their customer service.    Ruger may not explicitly state their firearms come with a lifetime warranty, but in effect, they do.

You may remember my story on the Ruger Bisley I won in a Rock Island Auction (I wrote about it several months ago).  I had wanted a .357 Magnum Bisley for its heavy construction and longer barrel and, truth be told, I was surprised that my bid prevailed.  When I won the Rock Island Auction, I ponied up all the nutty fees that come with such an undertaking (they are significant), and then when I received the Bisley I was disappointed.  It wasn’t particularly accurate (the group sizes were mediocre), and it shot so far to the left the rear sight had to be adjusted all the way to the right to get the shots on paper.

I figured I was kind of stuck with the Bisley and my initial thought was I’d look at the gun for a while, stick it in the safe, and then maybe sell it somewhere down the line.  But it bothered me.  Owning a firearm that doesn’t meet my expectations doesn’t set easy.  If there’s such a thing as having an obsessive-compulsive disorder with firearms that are less than perfect, I’d make for a good clinical study.

I wrote to Ruger and told them what I wanted, which was an accurate Bisley  that didn’t shoot to the left.  I told them the revolver left their plant in 1986, so I was more than willing to pay whatever it took to make me happy.  I also mentioned that I wanted to buy new grip frame screws and a new ejector rod shroud (cosmetically, they looked beat up).  And finally, I mentioned that extraction was difficult with hotter loads.  I asked the Ruger folks to hone the chamber walls so the fired cases would extract easily.

Ruger charged me $45 for a Fedex mailer (which they emailed to me), told me how to package my revolver (a plain brown box, with nothing on the outside to indicate its contents), and advised it could be 4 to 6 weeks before I saw the gun again.  Four days later, it was on its way back to me, with no additional charges other than the initial $45 I paid for the Fedex mailer.

A new ejector shroud on the Bisley.
New grip screws all the way around.
The rear sight, approximately centered. This is way better than what it was when I returned the Ruger.
Ruger honed the chamber walls to prevent sticky extraction. The gun extracts flawlessly.

Ruger mentioned in the paperwork returned with the gun that they retorqued the barrel, installed a new ejector shroud, honed the chambers,  replaced all the grip screws, test fired it, and sent it home.  The first thing I looked at was the rear sight.  Comfortingly, it was a lot closer to being centered than it was when I sent the gun to them.

So how did it do?

Yessiree, that’s what I’m talking about!

Just fine, thanks.  The day I received it, I hopped in the Subie, motored over to my indoor range, and fired three different .357 loads at 10 meters.   Now, I know 10 meters is only 30 feet, but I wanted to get an idea how the revolver was working.   One load was a relatively mild Bullseye-powered concoction with cast 158-grain bullets, another was a gonzo 158-grain Hornady jacketed bullet load with a max charge of Unique, and the third was an even more energetic load with the same 158-grain jacketed hollow point Hornady bullet and a max load of Winchester 296 propellant.  On that indoor range, even with my Walker electronic earmuffs, the concussion of the big Bisley and its full throated .357 loads was starting to give me a headache.  But the targets?   Oh, boy…the Bisley and I were back in business.  I ran another target out to 50 feet (the longest range available at the indoor range), and that group was just as good as the ones at 30 feet.

Winchester’s 296, Unique, a finished .357 Magnum cartridge, the 158-grain Hornady XTP bullet, and the 180-grain Hornady XTP bullet.
A macro shot of the Hornady 159-grain and 180-grain XTP bullets. Viewed from outside the cartridge case, the bullets appear identical. The difference is in their length below the cannelure.
A couple of loaded .357 Magnum cartridges. I’ve always liked the .357 Magnum cartridge.

The day after that, I took the Bisley to our Wednesday morning Geezer get-together at the West End Gun Club.  I had three things in mind: I wanted to show off a bit to my friends, I wanted to chronograph the two balls-out .357 loads I mentioned above, and I wanted to see how the revolver would do at 100 yards.   Yes, you read that right:  100 yards.

100 yards with the Bisley. The first 30 shots or so were with the Unique load. When i switched over to the 296 load, the group tightened. Next time I’m out I’ll try the 180-grain bullets with 296 and dial in a little windage.

My buddy Kevin spotted for me with his spotting scope, and he was amazed with the first load (8.0 grains of Unique and the 158-grain Hornady jacketed hollow points).  Kevin gave a hearty “whoa!” and I suspected things were looking good.

Kevin said several of the shots (after I had warmed up a bit and got into my long-range groove) grouped like I was shooting a rifle.  I sure didn’t mind hearing that.  I checked the chronograph and the velocities were respectable, too.  The bullets were hitting to the left a bit, but I had room to adjust the rear sight to bring that in.  And where a gun prints on target is a function of how it is held.  I wasn’t consistent with the Bisley yet (I actually haven’t shot it that much).

The 158-grain Hornady bullet with 8.0 grains of Unique. It’s a max load and velocities were respectable, but not like what I attained with Winchester 295.

Then I switched to the heavier-duty 296 load (with the same Hornady XTP bullet), and wowee, I was keeping them in the black on that same 100-yard rifle target.  And those loads were smoking hot.  Winchester;s 296 propellant is good stuff.  Check this out.

Whoa, baby! 1500 fps plus! 296 is a dynamite powder in the .357 Magnum.

All the cartridge cases extracted easily and even with the 1500 feet per second 296 load above, there were no pressure signs (other than a hellacious muzzle blast). As mentioned above, Ruger honed the chambers for me and the prior extraction issues had evaporated.

With replacement of the grip frame screws and the ejector shroud, the Bisley looks like a new revolver.  And other than me paying for the initial shipping to Ruger, it was all on the house (Ruger’s house, that is).  Bear in mind what I said earlier in this blog:  The Bisley, purchased used, is a 38-year-old revolver.

The Bisley went from being a regret to a gun I’m excited about owning.  You probably know that Ruger also made these guns in other chamberings, to include .44 Magnum and .45 Colt, and you might be wondering why I wanted the .357 Magnum.  Back in the 1970s when I was a handgun metallic silhouette shooter, I competed with a .357 Magnum and I was a rarity.  While everyone else was shooting a .44 Magnum or a .45 Colt, or custom-built bolt-action handguns shooting what were essentially rifle cartridges, I was one of the very few people (in fact, the only one I knew of) who shot a .357 Magnum in that game.  With the right loads, the .357 would topple the 200-meter rams (the toughest target to knock over) more reliably than either the .44 Magnum or the .45 Colt, so there was a certain coolness (and a bit of smugness) on my part associated with that.  The other reason is weight.  When Ruger chambers different cartridges in the same firearm, the gun’s external dimensions remain the same, so the .357 Magnum Bisley weighs more than the .44 Magnum or the .45 Colt versions.  More weight means the gun holds steadier and that means greater accuracy.

What’s next for this revolver is working up a load with Hornady’s 180-grain jacketed hollow point bullet and 296 powder and getting the sights dialed in at 50, 100, 150, and 200 yards (the four stages of a handgun metallic silhouette competition).  When I used to compete in metallic silhouette competition, I used a cast 200-grain bullet, but nobody makes that bullet commercially.   Well, almost nobody.  I previously found a guy who sold a 200-grain bullet for the .357, but his bullets leaded terribly and accuracy fell off after the first three or four rounds (and cleaning the bore was a pain).  If I can get the 180-grain jacketed bullets to group well, I think the metallic silhouette rams at 200 yards won’t know the difference between a 200-grain cast bullet and a 180-grain jacketed bullet, and I may get back in the game.  We’ll see.

That term:  Balls out.  You might think it’s a crude anatomical and testicular reference, but it’s not.  Engine governors used to use lever-suspended rotating metal balls that moved further away from their axis of rotation as rpm increased.  When the engine speed reached a preset maximum value allowed by the governor, the centrifugal outward movement of the balls operated a lever that prohibit engine speed from going any higher.  At that point, the engine was running “balls out.”

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Restoring an Ugly and Broken 1968 Ruger Blackhawk

By  Joe Cota

This is my tale about restoring a very ugly and broken vintage 1968 Ruger Blackhawk that had the safety conversion done by the Ruger factory.  I think Skeeter Skelton would have approved! (Skeeter Skelton was an American lawman and prolific gunwriter well known to firearm enthusiasts.)

First, a little background on the single action revolver, or “sixgun” as they are called. In 1872 the US government was looking for a new service revolver to replace its older Colt and Remington cap-and-ball revolvers used in the Civil War.  Colt developed a sixgun that utilized the then new technology metallic cartridge. Colt was the successful contractor and their cartridge gun was adopted by the government in 1873 as the 1873 Colt Single Action Army. The 1873 Colt SAA was shortly thereafter offered to the civilian market and became very popular with ranchers, lawmen, cowboys and bad guys alike. The “Peacemaker” (as Colt’s SAA became known) was priced around $15, which was most of a drover’s wages for a month.

After WWII a new-fangled gizmo called television started to become affordable. In 1948 about 1% of American households owned a television, and by 1955, 75% of American households owned at least one television set (black and white with “rabbit ears” antenna, of course). The TV set became the center of the living room, and the entire family would gather around the “set” after dinner. Hollywood’s golden age of TV westerns from the mid-1950’s through the 1960’s produced an astounding number of instant hits with shows like Have Gun Will Travel, Rawhide, Wanted Dead or Alive, and The Rifleman. All of them featured the Colt SAA and Winchester repeating rifles, or the “lever gun.” Every red-blooded American boy and his father and his uncles and even some moms wanted to own and shoot their very own Peacemaker.  But there was a problem: The Colt sixguns were expensive and often not available.

My beautiful all original 1969 Ruger Single Six (top), the ugly vent ribbed 1968 Ruger Blackhawk “parts gun” (bottom).  The Single Six is Ruger’s .22 Long Rifle sixgun; the Blackhawk is the larger centerfire cartridge sixgun. Note the three screws on both sixguns and the square-faced, non-notched hammer on the Single Six in the half-cocked position. This Single Six was my first handgun given to me by Mom & Dad brand new for Christmas as a young man 13 years of age. It has a fair amount of holster wear from hunting, backpacking, camping, etc. over many years of honest use. I own up to evey scratch and ding on this well-used sixgun, and I’d never want to refinish or change a thing. When Ruger’s free retrofit advertising campaign first appeared in 1975 issues of Guns & Ammo magazine, I was tempted to send mine in to make it like the New Model but didn’t want to part with the gun for a few weeks. In hindsight, I’m sure glad that I didn’t fall for it.

That’s when Bill Ruger decided to give the public what they wanted. In 1953 Ruger introduced the Single Six revolver chambered in .22 Long Rifle.  It was a sixgun for every boy! Two years later in 1955 Ruger introduced its Blackhawk in .357 Magnum.  This was a sixgun for every man!  They were and still are wildly popular. About 700,000 of the pre-1973 Ruger Single Six .22 revolvers were made, and well over a million New Model Single Six .22 revolvers were made after 1973. I’ll defer the exact number manufactured to the Ruger historians.

Ruger’s Single Six and the original Blackhawk single action revolvers were patterned after Colt’s SAA. The Ruger has a similar shape, size, look and feel as the Colt on the outside. But on the inside Ruger made some improvements. Ruger’s guns used modern high-strength carbon steel. Colt’s action ran on leaf springs prone to breakage. Ruger replaced the brittle leaf springs with much tougher coil springs made from piano wire. The Ruger guns are much tougher than the Colt.

One of the infamous traits both Ruger’s initial guns and the Colts share is the first small hammer cock position called the “safety” is not safe. A gun with all six cylinders loaded, if accidently dropped, is prone to the safety failing (resulting in a negligent discharge). Therefore both the Colt and pre-1973 Rugers should only be carried with five rounds loaded and the hammer down over an empty chamber. These pre-1973 Ruger sixguns are known as the “three-screw” Rugers, as identified by the three plainly visible screws on the left side of the frame, just as the Colts have three screws.   The original Rugers are also called Old Models, for reasons that become clear in a minute.

As the story goes, someone who didn’t follow what is clearly stated in Ruger’s owner manual to carry only with the hammer over an empty chamber, dropped their Old Model Ruger, fully loaded with six rounds, and shot himself in the leg. Apparently, there were other negligent discharges and expensive lawsuits. This prompted Ruger’s engineers to develop a safer design Ruger sixgun.  This newer design is called the New Model Blackhawk.  New Model Rugers can safely be carried with all six chambers loaded. Beginning in 1973 all the New Model Rugers have what’s called the “transfer bar safety.” It basically works by making a mill cut in the front (or face) of the hammer so that in the down position the hammer face can’t possibly touch the frame-mounted firing pin. When cocked back in the shooting position, a steel bar (the transfer bar) attached to the trigger mechanism is raised. When the trigger is depressed, the transfer bar fills the gap between the milled cutout on the hammer face and the firing pin, effectively “transferring” the hammer’s impact to the firing pin.

The 1973 and later New Model Rugers are easily identified because they do not have the three screws.  They have instead two pins. Another difference is that there is no “half cock” position for loading the gun. The cylinder freely rotates for loading simply by opening the loading gate. The New Model Rugers work well enough but do not have the distinctive feel and clicking sound while cocking the hammer as do the Colts and old three screw Rugers. The New Model trigger is not quite as smooth as the older designs because of increased drag and the friction of the transfer bar as it moves into position. Some shooters claim they don’t notice the differences between the two, but I own both and I can feel the difference.

In 1975, Ruger engineers devised a method of retrofitting all of the “unsafe” pre-1973 sixguns with a makeshift transfer bar. They ran a campaign in the gun periodicals that prompted owners to ship their old guns to Ruger and they would “upgrade” the older guns to make them safe to carry with all six chambers loaded.

It remains unknown how many owners sent their guns back to Ruger, but apparently there were thousands because we see many of these retrofitted guns on the used gun market today. They are three screw guns that function similar to the New Model two pin guns, but unfortunately the trigger pull on the converted guns is absolutely terrible. The retrofit-style transfer bar scrapes up along the back side of the frame causing an awful, gritty, jerky feel. To make matters worse, the retrofit cylinder base pin is fitted with a small spring-loaded pin that also drags against the transfer bar to push it out and over the firing pin on its upward travel. If the retracting pin gets stuck, the transfer bar pushes into the firing pin, locking up the gun. The retrofitted three screw Rugers are pretty bad, taking all the smoothness from the action.

Ruger reportedly returned the retrofitted guns back to their owners with the original parts sealed a small plastic bag. Many of these plastic parts bags have been separated from the converted guns (they were either lost or thrown away). Ruger doesn’t offer any of these old parts for sale to the public, as they consider them unsafe. If an old unconverted three screw is sent in Ruger for any type of repair, they will return it to its owner with the transfer bar conversion installed, whether the owner asks for it or not. In fact, Ruger will not work on an unconverted old model gun without doing the conversion.

Unconverted three screw models (i.e., unaltered Old Model Rugers) today command premium prices among collectors. Even with the parts bag, the converted Old Models will never realize their true collector value because Ruger has permanently marked the converted guns with an “R” on the frame. The stamp is concealed underneath the grip frame to prove that the factory had done the conversion even if an owner wished to restore it back to its unaltered condition. Ruger will install the Old Model conversions but only if the owner sends the gun to them for installation, and Ruger will stamp the frame showing that they did the conversion.

Converted Old Model Rugers having the afterthought safety conversion are generally not very good shooters. However, restored back to original, these guns make very nice non-collectible shooters for those able to locate the original parts. The Old Model unconverted guns handle much better than the New Model guns, provided a most important safety rule is strictly adhered to.  That rule is to never carry the restored-to-original Old Model Ruger with the hammer over a loaded cylinder. This brings us to the point of this story.

Six years ago I stumbled upon an Old Model 1968 three-screw Blackhawk being sold as a parts gun at the Ventura Crossroads gun show. The cylinder was totally locked up due to the transfer bar conversion (as described above).  However, the asking price was so low that I won’t tell you the cost because you wouldn’t believe me.  Besides being broken it had a ventilated rib that I had never seen before on any Blackhawk. It was truly an ugly duckling Ruger Old Model Blackhawk!  But it had a great finish and the original factory grips, so I went for it without haggling over the price. Man, I’m not kidding.  This gun’s price was so low it was almost free.

The Poly Choke fake ventilated rib glued onto a Blackhawk barrel is just about the ugliest thing somebody could do to a Ruger. Trying to make it look like a Colt Python? Well, you failed!
Close up of the Poly Choke fake rib. It does absolutely NOTHING to improve the gun

After the 10-day cooling off period, I brought the ugly little Old Model sixgun home, along with a brand-new, high-quality gunsmith screwdriver set. After disassembling the Ruger, I found that the cylinder was frozen because of the factory safety conversion. After cleaning it up and freeing the cylinder, the gun had the absolute worst sandy, gritty, heavy sticky trigger I’ve ever experienced.  It now worked but it had a terrible action, and it was still the ugliest Blackhawk I had ever seen.

After more research I found that Ruger never made a Blackhawk with a ventilated rib. This gun had a phony aftermarket glued-on rib made by the Poly Choke company. I guess the owner wanted something that looked like a Colt Python and decided to dress up the Ruger for Halloween.  I managed to pull the fake ventilated rib off without causing any damage to the barrel, but it wasn’t easy.  The Poly Choke adhesive was pretty tough. After pulling the rib off, the remaining glue was removed using brake cleaner spray. By now the gun was looking pretty good again, but the action still sucked.

With the Poly Choke rib removed, the “parts gun” is beginning to look like a Blackhawk again. Note the flat hammer face. This photo was taken after the transfer bar conversion had been removed and factory original parts installed.

To smooth up the action, I removed the transfer bar conversion and replaced it with factory original parts to restore it to the original, classic “5-shooter” configuration. Unfortunately, the gun didn’t come with the old parts bag but I was determined to restore it.  Now before any of the do-gooder Ralph Nader safety types out there proclaim “how irresponsible of you,” allow me to ask if you’ve ever seen an original Colt SAA with a safety conversion? Well, no, you have not because Colt had the good sense to not ruin their guns with an ill-designed stopgap transfer bar safety.

Finding the original parts for an Old Model Ruger is very difficult. Each part had to be purchased separately. It took several months to find all the parts and there were some hiccups along the way. Upon receiving some parts advertised as original Blackhawk parts, such as the hammer, I found that they were original parts for a Single Six model and were not compatible with the Blackhawk. Eventually all the original parts were acquired. The parts included a new hammer, trigger, base pin, cylinder stop, spring, screw, and pawl. The photos and captions tell the story about what it takes to restore converted guns and illustrates the differences between the original and retrofit parts.

Factory transfer bar safety conversion parts. Note that this is not the same parts set as the transfer bar parts that come installed with New Model Blackhawks. These transfer bar safety conversion parts were specially designed to fit on the old three screw models and are not interchangeable with the two pin new models. In this photo the transfer bar appears to be connected to the trigger, but that’s not the case. The transfer bar has a hole that aligns with the trigger pivot bolt.
Original Old Model unconverted parts. This is an image that shows the contents of a returned parts bag that was offered for sale on the internet many years ago. Unfortunately, it was not available when I restored by Blackhawk and I had to locate the parts individually.
Comparison of the original flat-faced hammer (right) and the conversion hammer (left). Note that the conversion hammer has been milled on the face to create a space between the frame-mounted firing pin and hammer while the hammer is down and the transfer bar retracted. The side of the conversion hammer is also recessed for clearance of the long arm of the transfer bar. The transfer bar has friction along this part of the hammer. The front face of the transfer bar also rubs against the back of the frame. All of this creates unwanted friction that gives the converted gun a gritty feel. Also note the three notches on the original hammer for the safe, half-cock, and full-cock trigger positions. The conversion hammer lacks the three clicks that give the Old Model Ruger and Colt SAA their classic feel and sound.
When mixing and matching parts as you can find them, the trigger is not likely to be the same as the one that came with the hammer as a matched set and will likely need minor honing of the sear and hammer notches for proper fit.  This is an opportunity to make the trigger pull better.
One of the pitfalls of buying used gun parts on the internet is that the seller doesn’t always know what he is selling. The Ruger Single Six and Blackhawk trigger groups are not the same. Here’s an example of some of the Single Six parts that were sold to me as Blackhawk parts. The Single Six’s hammer and pawl are both shorter than those of the Blackhawk.

To make a long story short, all the original parts cost more than what I paid for the gun. But it was worth it. This is the smoothest Blackhawk trigger ever, and the accuracy is awesome. Only hand loaded, home cast Elmer Keith style bullets have been fired through it since acquired by me.

This Old Model Ruger has become one of my favorite .357 Magnum sixguns and I think that Skeeter would have approved of how this “parts gun” was salvaged.

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A .357 Magnum Ruger Bisley

In a prior blog I described bidding on a Ruger .357 Blackhawk that had been owned by Hank Williams, Jr.  The Rock Island Auction folks predicted the gun would sell for between $900 and $1,600, and I wanted it so I put in a bid at $2,000 (which I thought was ridiculously high).  That gun sold for $5,000.  There are evidently guys out there who have the disease worse than me.

The Hank Williams, Jr., Ruger .357 Magnum Blackhawk. It sold for $5,000. The buyer’s premium on top of that would have been nearly a thousand bucks!

Then last month another Rock Island auction rolled around, and this one had a Ruger .357 Bisley.   The concept and history of the Bisley is interesting.  Bisley is the name of a target range in England, and when Colt introduced a target variant of its famed Single Action Army revolver in 1894, they named it the Colt Bisley.  The most obvious differences between the Bisley and a standard Single Action Army is the Bisley’s longer grip with a more pronounced hump.  Colt’s Bisley also had a rear sight that is adjustable for windage and interchangeable front sight posts for elevation adjustment.

Ruger introduced a modern Bisley version of its Blackhawk revolver line in 1985 (with revolvers chambered in .357 Magnum, .41 Magnum, .44 Magnum, and .45 Colt).  I always thought the Ruger Bisley was a marketing thing and I thought the Bisley’s odd-shaped handle was visually unappealing, so I never felt the need for one.  But needs and wants can change.   A friend of mine let me try his .357 Magnum Ruger Bisley a few years ago.  I liked its heft and slightly longer barrel (7 1/2 inches versus the standard Blackhawk’s 6 1/2 inches).  Ruger stopped making the .357 Magnum Bisley a few years after it was introduced, and they are hard to find now.

A sense of scale: Ruger .357 Bisley, Ruger .357 Blackhawk, Ruger .44 Super Blackhawk, and Uberti Colt Walker.  They are all big guns.

The modern Ruger Bisley has a massive appearance, and that’s kind of cool.  At 7 1/2 inches, the barrel is an inch longer than the .357 Blackhawk and the Bisley has the larger grip frame.  The Bisley grip frame feels awkward to me, but it is easier on the hand under heavy recoil. I’m probably just used to the standard Blackhawk grip frame.  For me, the larger Super Blackhawk grip frame is the best of all.

Some might call these big guns horse pistols, which have been defined as handguns usually carried in a holster while riding a horse.  The Bisley is smaller than a Colt Walker (a monster of a handgun), but by any other measure the Bisley is a huge revolver.  It is heavier than the regular .357 Magnum Blackhawk for four reasons:  The unfluted cylinder, the longer barrel, the grip is larger, and the gripframe is made of steel instead of aluminum.

Ruger’s .357 Magnum Blackhawk (on the left) and their .357 Bisley (on the right). Note the difference in the grip shape and length.

The Rock Island folks guessed that the Ruger Bisley would go for between $600 and $900 on their website before the auction.  I bid $600.  I wanted it, but not so badly that I was willing to go crazy, which is kind of what my previous results told me you had to be to win in the Rock Island crazy competition.  To my great surprise, I won the Bisley with my $600 bid.  Then I received the emailed invoice and I was even more surprised.  There was a 17.5% buyer premium, which tacked another $105 to the price.  There was a 3.5% credit card fee, so that was $21.  The gun had to ship 2nd day air to my FFL, and that was $46.  There was insurance, and that added $7.05.  And of course, the Peoples Republik of Kalifornia sales tax for another $60.39.  My $600 Bisley suddenly became an $839.44 toy and it hadn’t even arrived.  When it did, there was the California DOJ fee and the FFL transfer fee ($74.90).  My $600 Bisley was now up to $914.34.  I guess that’s okay, though.  If I had seen a .357 Ruger Bisley in new condition for a thousand bucks, I would have pulled the trigger (literally and figuratively) and felt good about it.  In that sense, I was $85.66 ahead of the game.

Another difference between Ruger’s standard .357 Magnum Blackhawk and the Bisley is the cylinder. The standard Blackhawk has a fluted cylinder; the Bisley has an unfluted and roll-engraved cylinder.

When I saw the gun in person (the day I started my 1o-day waiting period), I was blown away (figuratively speaking, of course).  I could see that it was in excellent condition.  The quality, fit, and finish are light years ahead of what Ruger is producing these days.  You’ll recall that when I lost the Hank Williams Auction I bought a new Ruger .357 Blackhawk and its quality was terrible.  The Ruger Bisley’s quality appears to be much better in both fit and finish.  I looked up the Bisley’s serial number on Ruger’s website and learned that my gun was manufactured in 1986; I guess Ruger cared more about what was leaving the factory back then.

I’ve been to the range a couple of times with my Bisley.  On my first day out with the new-to-me Ruger, one of my friends (a bench rest shooter) came over to watch.  There was an old bowling pin laying on its side on the 100-yard line. You know the situation…like the bad guy in an old western movie, it was just begging to be shot. I asked my friend to spot for me.  The first shot went high, kicking up a dust cloud about three feet above the pin.  I held lower and my second shot sent up another dust cloud two feet below the pin.  Okay, I had the elevation dialed in (I wasn’t actually adjusting the Bisley’s sights; I was just holding the front post at different heights).  My third shot hit just to the right.  On my fourth shot I nailed it, sharply kicking the bowling pin back 10 yards and spinning it violently.  Now, just the pin base was facing me, presenting a 3-inch diameter circle.  “Okay, let’s see you make that shot,” my friend said.  I did, and the pin was kicked back another 10 yards.  I looked back and smiled.  “Piece of cake,” I said, and we both had a good laugh.

25-yard targets shot with the .357 Magnum Ruger Blackhawk (left) and the .357 Magnum Ruger Bisley (right).

On a subsequent range outing I compared the Bisley’s accuracy to the regular Blackhawk using the same heavy .357 Magnum load in both revolvers (8.0 grains of Unique and the Hornady 158-grain XTP jacketed hollow point bullet).  They both shoot groups that were about the same size, and both are biased with the sights adjusted as far as they will go.  The regular Blackhawk shoots high at 25 yards with the rear sight all the way down (the front sight is not tall enough).  The Blackhawk prints about 3 inches high at 25 yards with the rear sight adjusted as low as it will go.  I’ve contacted Ruger and they sent me their shortest rear sight blade for the Blackhawk, but that’s the one the revolver already had in it.  Custom gunsmiths offer a taller front sight (Fermin Garza comes to mind), but I don’t know if I want to do that.  It’s custom work I shouldn’t have to pay for.

The Bisley’s elevation is okay at 25 yards, but it shoots to about one inch to the left at 25 yards.  When I received the revolver from Rock Island Auctions, the rear sight had been cranked almost all the way to the right by the former owner.   He ran out of adjustment range and the gun still shoots to the left of my aim point.  I thought that the leftward bias could be due to a poor ejector rod shroud fit, or it may just be due to the fact that I was shooting max loads and it’s how the gun reacts in my hand.  I fired a few rounds of .38 Special wadcutters and the gun still shot to the left, so I don’t think it is a function of how hot a load I’m shooting or how it reacts to my grip.  Then I took the ejector rod shroud off to see if that would make a difference.  The ejector rod shroud was very poorly fit to the Bisley and it was pulling the barrel to the right, but when I took it off, the point of impact did not change.  You would think the manufacturer would deliver a gun that shot to a point that was within the gun’s adjustable sight range.  I’ve been inside a revolver manufacturing facility (not Ruger), and all they do is proof each gun with a high pressure load; that other manufacturer did not check where the gun printed.  Ruger evidently does not, either.

The regular Ruger Blackhawk ejects all cases easily (even with the max loads I was using).   The Bisley does not.  With the max loads I shot in the Bisley, one chamber wants to hang on to the cartridge case.   Less than max loads (38 Special and mid-range .357 mag loads) eject satisfactorily from the Bisley.   The Bisley has a sloppy surface finish inside its chambers (there are machine marks from the chamber reaming operation).  It shouldn’t have left the factory back in 1986 like that, but it did.

There’s one other quality-related observation on the Bisley I should mention.  The Bisley makes a firing pin primer indentation in the primer that is bigger and deeper than any I have ever seen.  Looking at the firing pin after it has been hit by the hammer, it looks bigger and sticks out of the breech face more than I am used to seeing.  I had a bunch of max load .357 rounds with Aventuras primers I had assembled earlier, and Bisley pierced the primers on the first five (so I didn’t shoot any more of those).  The firing pin is smooth and round (there are no sharp edges on it); it’s just taking the primer cup material near enough to its yield point that the pressure takes it the rest of the way.   These same cartridges worked fine in my regular (i.e., non-Bisley) Blackhawk with no pierced primers, and the same .357 load with CCI primers and Winchester primers worked fine in the Bisley.  Note to self:  Don’t use Aventuras primers for hot .357 loads in the Bisley.

The Bisley’s firing pin in the extended position. It’s smooth, but big.
Pierced primers on .357 Magnum cartridges loaded with 8.0 grains of Unique, the 158-grain Hornady XTP jacketed hollow point bullet, and Aventuras primers.

So there you have it.  My knowledge base on the Ruger .357 revolvers continues to grow (and yours does, too, if you’re reading this).  I’m still looking for that perfect .357 Magnum revolver.   I’ve owned a bunch over the last 50+ years, and I’ll keep looking.  I still dream about wandering into a rural pawnshop somewhere and finding a brass grip Blackhawk like that Hank Williams, Jr., Ruger for $200.  You never know.

More Tales of the Gun!

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A Tale of Two Rugers

By Joe Berk

Rifles, that is…two Ruger rifles.  I’ve written about them before, but it’s been a while since I shot either one and with the stream crossing to the West End Gun Club almost manageable these days (more on that later), I thought I would take them out to the 100-yard range.  I shoot handguns regularly (at least a couple of times a week) on the indoor 50-foot pistol range closer to home, but there are times when the high-powered-rifle-on-a-football-field-length-range itch needs to be scratched.

The two Ruger rifles in this article are two of my favorites:  A Davidson’s Circassian-stocked Mini 14 (the one in the photo above) and the Ruger GSR (GSR stands for Gunsite Scout Rifle).  The Davidson’s Mini 14 1was a 2009 offering with (as the name implies) a Circassian walnut stock.  Back then the Circassian Mini’s $700 price seemed high, but I’ve been at this for a while and I know that when a gun’s price seems high it only means I’m buying too soon.  The price will always catch up with the calendar, and that’s certainly been the case with this rifle.  It originally came with two 30-round mags and a flash suppressor.  California being what it is meant I couldn’t own the rifle as Ruger built it.  I had to leave the 30-round mags with the out-of-state dealer, and because of the flash suppressor, it had to ship to the Class III dealer here in La La Land.

Circassian walnut from the port side. It sure looks good.
The California-legal muzzle brake. I wonder what the California legislators were smoking when they passed that law.

The California Class III dealer replaced the flash suppressor with a muzzle brake (which I think looks even more intimidating and I had to buy a 10-round La-La-Land-legal magazine for my Mini.

Circassian walnut from starboard side. This is the fanciest Mini 14 I’ve ever seen.

You might be wondering:  Where can I get a Mini with a stock like this one?
The short answer is:  You can’t.  I watched the gun sale websites for months looking for a Davidson’s Circassian Mini 14 until I found one with nice wood (most had straight-grained, broomstick grade wood).  When I saw the one you see here, I pounded (and I’m glad I did).    You just don’t see Mini 14 rifles with wood like this one.  It’s all mostly black plastic stuff on the range these days, which is almost a crime against nature.

The Techsites rear sight on my Mini 14. It has a slightly smaller aperture and better adjustability than the stock Mini 14 rear site.

I’ve done a few mods to my Mini 14 to improve its accuracy, and I’ve detailed this in prior blogs (I’ve provide a link at the end of this article).  The Reader’s Digest version is I’ve added a Techsites rear aperture sight to replace the Ruger sight, I’ve glass-bedded the action, and I’ve done a fair amount of experimentation to find the right load.

So how does the Circassian Mini 14 shoot?  It does very well.  I grabbed two loads:  A full metal jacketed load with Hornady’s 62-grain bullet, and another with Hornady’s 55-grain V-Max bullets.  You can see the results below.

A bunch of shots at 100 yards with one of my favorite loads:  The 62-grain Hornady full metal jacket boattail bullet and 25.0 grains of XBR 8208 propellant.   This ammo was necked sized only, which usually is more accurate in my Mini 14.  I held at 6:00 on all targets shown here.
Another 100-yard Mini 14 target with two different loads, both using the 55-grain Hornady VMax bullet and 24.5 grains of ARComp propellant.  The very tight 5-shot group was shot with bullets that were not crimped.  The larger group was the same load, but the bullets were crimped.   Surprisingly, both loads were full length resized.  As mentioned in the photo above, neck-sizing usually provides better accuracy in this rifle.

The second rifle in this Tale of Two Rugers story is the Ruger GSR in .308 Winchester.   This is an amazing (and amazingly accurate) rifle, but it didn’t start out that way.

How I purchased this rifle is kind of a funny story.  I had oral surgery to start the process of installing two fake teeth, and the doc knocked me out with anesthetics.   They warned me I would be in no shape to drive home, so good buddy Jim Wile volunteered to do the driving.  Jim’s gone on to his reward (RIP, Jim).  On the ride home, in a drugged but conscious state, I told Jim about this new GSR rifle Ruger had introduced, and we somehow managed to convince ourselves we each needed one.  They say you should not buy guns when you’re under the influence.   Like Hunter Biden, though, I didn’t heed that advice and Jim followed my lead.

The Ruger GSR on the range at the West End Gun Club.

The GSR is Ruger’s interpretation of the Scout rifle concept first put forth by a gun writer named Jeff Cooper.  Cooper’s concept was a short-barreled rifle that would hold a scope in a forward location and make for a sort of do-anything long gun.  Steyr built the first commercially available Cooper-inspired Scout rifle, and then about a decade later Ruger followed suit.  Mossberg has one now, too (good buddy Johnny G has one).  The Steyr is crazy expensive, the Ruger started out at a reasonable price but has since gone kind of crazy (along with everything else), and (in my opinion) the Mossberg is the best value (it’s a fine rifle and one I’ll probably own some day).

The left side of the Ruger GSR. Note the laminated stock, which provides a very stable bed for the barreled action.
The GSR as seen from the right.
A Ruger .308 selfie.
The Ruger’s aperture rear sight. It’s similar to the original Mini 14 site. Techsites doesn’t offer a replacement rear site for the GSR; if they did, I would have a Techsites rear sight on this rifle.
The Ruger GSR flash suppressor. It’s the same type that originally came on the Mini 14. On a bolt action rifle, it’s legal in Calilornia; on a semi-auto, it is not.

When I first took delivery of the GSR, it was a real disappointment.  As had been the case with half the guns I bought in the last couple of decades, it had to go back to the manufacturer.  The problem was that the rifle printed way to the right, and there wasn’t enough adjustment in the rear aperture to get it back to the point of aim.   I returned it to Ruger, they greatly relieved the stock around the barrel, and I had it back in about a week.  When I took it out to the range the same week it was returned, I was astonished by its accuracy.

A target I shot a few years ago. The GSR can be amazingly accurate. The difference between the two groups is probably due to how I held the rifle. The upper group is one of the best I’ve ever shot with open sights.

But that group above was then and this is now.  I had not fired the GSR in a few years.  I grabbed two loads for this rifle (a load I had developed for my M1A Springfield, and a box of Federal factory ammo with full metal jacket 150-grain bullets).

Federal American Eagle .308 ammo. I bought a bunch of this a few years ago for the brass; this ammo was about the same price as .308 brass.
My reloaded ammo. This load shoots extremely well in my Springfield Armory M1A.

I only fired a couple of 5-shot groups at 100 yards with the GSR.  It was getting late in the day, I was getting tired, I had not fired the rifle in a long time (shooting is a perishable skill), and I realized I wasn’t giving the rifle a fair shake.

With the same rear sight adjustment used for the previous GSR target shown a couple of paragraphs above, the Federal factory 150 grain load shot high and to the left.  The group is considerably larger than the load with 180-grain Noslers and Varget propellant.
Another 5-shot group, this time with 168-grain Sierra hollowpoint bullets and IMR 4064 propellant (the accuracy load for my Springfield M1A).   The load doesn’t perform as well in my GSR as it does in the M1A, but it’s still substantially better than the Federal factory ammo.   It’s why I reload.

That stream crossing I mentioned at the start of this blog?  Lytle Creek flows across the dirt road going into Meyers Canyon, and it can be a real challenge at times.   With all the rain and snow we’ve had this past winter, the reservoirs are full and the snow up in the San Gabriels is still melting.  You may remember the blog I wrote about the time I high sided my Subie attempting a crossing.   The stream is down a scosh since then, but it’s still not an easy crossing.  Here’s a video I made on the way out on this trip after visiting the range with the Mini 14 and the Ruger GSR.

I’ll be shooting the GSR more in the coming weeks now that I’m back into the swing of shooting a .308 off the bench, so watch for more stories on it.  I think I can do better than the groups you see above.

More stories on good times at the West End Gun Club are here.