Another long-throated Ruger

[Coyote Hunter]

Last November I picked up a used 1984 Ruger in .30-06.  I was temporarily in Houston and just got back home last Saturday.  Today I took some time to polish up the trigger (it was pretty good before ,now it is very good) and to build some dummy loads for A-MAX, TSX, MRX and North Fork bullets.

Using a Stoney Point tool I started with the MRX and calculated the COL I would need.  Forget it.  The standard maximum COL for the .30-06 is 3.340" and I ended up building all of my cartridges to that length due to magazine restrictions.  They couldn't touch the lands with a stick...

Oh, well, the thing shot pretty well in Houston (1-1/4" with several factory loads in gusty conditions).  Can't wait to get it to my home range (and out of the wind) and see how it does with the improved trigger and some handloads.

[Luckyducker]

I have had a few M77 M-II's and they all had a decent length chamber, but a young man/kid my daughter was dating bought a new left hand LSS chambered in 300WinMag and the chamber was so long on it that a dummy round loaded with a 180SP bullet seated as far out as possible without falling out of case mouth wouldn't reach the lands.  I didn't get to do much testing on it (they parted company) but what I did was sorry accuracy, though I suspect with more load developement it would have delivered decent groups.  I tend to like a chamber that is cut to standard length or even a little on the short side like my Tikka T3 300WSM unless shooting the longest of bullets for caliber.

[Coyote Hunter]

One thing for sure - I don't have to worry about jamming the bullets into the lands!  Makes selecting COl easy - just make them short enough to fit the magazine...

This is not my only long-throated Ruger, but accuracy has never been much of an issue.  We'll see with this one.

[Coyote Hunter]

Well, I took that piece of junk to the range yesterday with some development loads using 168g A-MAX bullets and H4350, BL(C)-2, Varget and Benchmark powder.  There was one loaded cartridge at each powder charge and charges varied by 0.5g one to the next.

H4350 was up first, 10 loaded rounds.  All 10 went into one ragged hole an inch wide.  BL(C)-2 was next, 8 loaded rounds.  They also went into an inch, but I think there was 2 holes.  (The target is at home, I'm not.)  I left the Varget and Benchmark for another day as I had what I needed for the short term.


The H4350 loads will get used as the basis for developing hunting loads with individually weighed powder charges.  The BL(C)-2, which meters very well, will be used for target loads.  In the near term I hope to build a bunch and go to Whittington Center and work on the 500-meter rams.  (The Remington .308 Win will be used for the same purpose.)


The long throat didn't seem to hurt accuracy to any great degree.  Its another keeper.

[Hairtrigger]

The long throat didn't seem to hurt accuracy to any great degree.  Its another keeper.

Amazing how that works.... sometimes.
I have a No.1V that has a long throat but shoots well also.