Slugged some Rugers

[Thumbcocker]

Shot a new model flat top .44 special the other day and noticed lead in the forcing cone. Got to thinking; seems like most of my Ruger single actions have a little lead in the forcing cone after a trip to the range. Exceptions being .44's with full snort h110 loads.

Pulled 4 Rugers out of the safe. One limited run 2000 accusport Bisley 2 new flat top .44 specials and an older Red Hawk. Procedure was run oily patch down bore, oil a .457 pure lead ball and tap through bore. All three SA's had the ball stop dead right at the thread area. The new .44 Specials were the worst the accusport has been shot a lot more and still had detectable resistance. Red Hawk had almost no resistance. To check my technique I slugged an Uberti 1858 cap and ball. No detectable constriction.


All 3 single actions have shot well. The accuspot is VERY accurate as is one of the specials. All will have some amount of lead at the forcing cone unless soot fulls of slow powder are used. Not especially hard to get out but annoying. All loads are with boolits of acww sized .431 and libed with lithibee.


Am I expecting too much of is just the way of the Ruger?

[DougGuy]

Par for the course, if they aren't -too- badly choked you can firelap them out and gain quite a bit of improvement. What do your cylinder throats slug at and what do you size to? If you do firelap, it always works better to do the cylinder throats first, as you will present a larger lapping boolit to the bore.

[dubber123]

Even on good shooters, I have always seen an improvement from firelapping. Dougs advice on ironing out any throat issues first is good.

[Thumbcocker]

I'm just annoyed that Ruger refuses to address this issue. Is thread choke this common?

[DougGuy]

It's 50/50 whether it is choked or not. The larger the caliber the more noticeable it is since all the barrels are the same O.D. and the large calibers have thinner wall thickness = more choke.

The New Vaquero and New Model Flattop since about 2005 have been the least amount of choked of any Rugers that I have seen.

The one good thing about their production, they leave a generous amount of metal that can be removed, a far cry better than building guns with a generous amount of metal already removed.

[dubber123]

I'm just annoyed that Ruger refuses to address this issue. Is thread choke this common?

Very common, and not just on Rugers. I have a lot more S&W's, and more often than not now that I am aware of the issue, when I pull one from the safe and check it, I find some thread choke. One at a time, they are getting lapped, and I have never been disappointed with the end result.

[butch2570]

It's 50/50 whether it is choked or not. The larger the caliber the more noticeable it is since all the barrels are the same O.D. and the large calibers have thinner wall thickness = more choke.

The New Vaquero and New Model Flattop since about 2005 have been the least amount of choked of any Rugers that I have seen.

The one good thing about their production, they leave a generous amount of metal that can be removed, a far cry better than building guns with a generous amount of metal already removed. This also.... Super Blackhawk Hunter 44mag -choked, New model Vaquero 45 colt - not choked. Ran pin gauges in the SBHH it was .001 tight at the threads , but it was leading.

[Fishman]

I had some of the same experience, but upon thorough cleaning I determined it was fouling that was the hangup. These were guns that had been cleaned but not well enough obviously. I wonder how many thread choke issues are really hardened fouling or copper?