Another Savage 1899, about as close to a Winchester 1894 from the era as one can get…|Page 3|What's New!|Forum|Winchester Collector

I’ll be blunt and say the Ruger line is not collectible, as far as I’m concerned. Some do but I believe they simply accumulate Ruger products because they like them and use them.  

The Ruger 77 is capable of excellent varmint accuracy in its heavy barreled version. I had one in 25-06 that was a half minute rifle. It was never designed nor intended for benchrest competition. Neither was the pre-64 Winchester Model 70 even in its target versions. Both were and still can be competitive in traditional High Power competition because there a shooter’s relative skill is paramount.  Both were and are primarily hunting rifles. 

The same is true to an even greater degree of the #1.  It is a hunter’s rifle, more than adequately accurate for that purpose. The heavy barreled Swift and 22-250 versions can be made to shoot with sufficient accuracy to kill varmints at extended ranges but varmint hunters who buy them do so because they like the rifle, not because it’s the instrument best suited to the purpose. 

Bill Ruger was far more concerned with style amd functionality than making tiny groups on paper. He saw his rifles from a hunter’s perspective but with a connoisseurs eye for tradition, line and beauty. 

I’m not sure all of you really get how outrageous and unconventional WBR was in hiring an outsider to design his stocks. The industry took it as an insult. And 1966 industry pundits laughed behind his back at the notion of a single shot rifle selling at all. 

Sturm Ruger is the now the largest American maker of firearms. It has in the past been given and declined the opportunity to buy the gunmaking operations of Winchester, Remington, Savage, Colt, and Smith &Wesson. Of course it has bought Marlin. 

That the company doesn’t hang its head in shame for not fielding contraptions whose sole purpose is to shoot 1000 yard targets off a tripod, is unsurprising. Those who delight in such creations should not wonder at Ruger’s absence from their games. 

What Sturm Ruger did do is lead mythe way back to handsome hunting rifles by showing its competitors how to make them profitably. It’s my opinion the current Winchester Model 70 Super Grade, for all its reported manufacturing flaws, would not exist today in the absence of Bill Ruger. Nor would the 9422 or any of the Browning reproductions of the Models 1886, 1892, 1894, 1895, 52 Sporting, 53, 65, 12 and 42. Browning and FN were encouraged by Sturm Ruger’s success and profited from it. Large corporations are not innovators, although they may have once been when smaller. 

So, I don’t collect Rugers.but the #1 and 77 African I own are not for sale. 

I bought a new stainless/synthetic M77 in 30-06 20+ years ago from a mom & pop gun shop going out of business. It had been hiding in the back room for some time. I figured I “needed” a hunting rifle for bad weather hunts. Unfortunately it needed a trigger job and best I could do was a Timney trigger/sear set. It shot well enough but I decided my brother needed a bad weather gun to keep his beautiful Model 70’s cased up when things got nasty. His bride gave him a M70 nearly 50 years ago and it’s an honest 95% gun after dozens of S. and E. Texas hunts. I gave him a beautiful new Super Grade over 15 years ago and it still looks like new.

The question comes to mind; why build MOA hunting rifles when very few hunters are capable of true MOA groups? The 77 above consistently shoots 2″ or a little over with ammo it likes but my brother has killed more deer and hogs with it than with both his M70’s combined due to a run of bad weather last several years. He has a Kawasaki Mule and rain gear and he isn’t afraid to use them. This ugly M77 handles and shoots better than most folks can shoot and it keeps a couple of beautiful Winchesters looking new. It also likes the same ammo the Winchesters like and has similar optics so it’s an easy switch when Mother Nature has a hissy on a hunt weekend. 

Mike