Having found the responses to the previous thread I started on the subject of hunting rifles that proved to be unexpected pleasures to be interesting reading, I thought I'd try the flip-side of that coin.
I'll start with one of my biggest all-time gun buying disappointments -my first Ruger No,1B....
The first rifle I have any independent recollection of having any desire to own was the Ruger No.1, As a little boy, I would practically drool over the advertisements for them in my father's American Rifleman magazines.
I started saving for one when I was seven years old. It would be the No 1B -a compromise between heavy barrel accuracy and light barrel portability, and it would be in .30-'06, to serve any hunting I might want to do, and perform well in the recreational target rifle role.
My "Ruger No.1 Savings Plan" got tapped in to and side-tracked along the way. First with a .20 caliber Beeman R-1 pellet rifle; then with a 20 gauge Ugartechea Shotgun and arranging a payment plan to buy a Griffin and Howe on a 1903 Springfield barreled action from the childless widow of my pediatric dentist -a man who became a mentor and shooting buddy in my late teens.
When I was 19, I finally had my funds built up to get my "dream rifle."
The first disappointment was that I couldn't find one in .30-'06 anyhwere in Southern California. I couldn't find anyone willing to order me one, either. I did find a No.1B in .270. I figured that might be as close as I would get, so I bought it and a Leupold to top it off with.
The second disappoint was discovered in shooting the thing. It was as accurate as I hoped it would be, for the first ten shots or so. After that, any semblance of accuracy vanished.
The third disappointment was allied to the second -the thing took an insane amount of scrubbing and the use of some pretty strong copper solvent to get the bore clean.
That's when I noticed something my much younger and slightly stupider self should have paid attention to before any money changed hands -the bore was a mess of chatter-marks. My heart sank. If all I wanted the rifle for was to shoot a few rounds to confirm zero, and a couple more in fall to collect game, it would have been fine even with the rough internal bore finish. But I wanted my "dream rifle" to be a "range toy," too. And the barrel, as it was, wasn't going to get 'er done.
My fourth disappointment was Ruger's renowned customer service after the sale. In this one instance, I was definitely not impressed. After over two years of back and forth with Ruger, they finally replaced the rifle.
The happy ending to this story is that during the period that I was trying rather unsuccessfully to get Ruger to fix my first No.1 to my satisfaction, I found what I really wanted in the first place -a Nol1B in .30-'06. That rifle exceeded expectations, shooting a .770" group on the first try. I still have that one, and it's been a joy for the last 28 years. More "happy ending" is that Ruger ultimately sent me a new No.1 to replace the first one. It was excellent, too. I traded it to a personal friend for a "known good" No.1 Tropical in .375 H&H -a rifle that I still own today.
That first one, though -the rifle of my childhood dreams- was a dud.
Anybody else buy what they thought was going to be "the one" only to be supremely disappointed when it didn't meet expectations?
