Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles New to me Ruger M77R .25-06 - red pad, tang safety

I just made an impulse buy on a one owner 1975 M77R in .25-06 Rem with a 22" sporter barrel. The rifle appears to be in excellent condition based on the mediocre pics in the listing. I paid $475 including the rings, dies, and some brass.

I think I did pretty good. I've read about barrel accuracy issues with the early rifles, but I figured for the price I'd take the chance and see how it shoots! I'll post some photos as soon as it gets here.

FYI, this will be my first go with .25-06. I'm excited.

You'll love the 25-06. It's one of my favorites. Haven't killed a large number of deer, but I've never had one take a step after the hit by my 25-06 or the AI version.

Also, tough to beat a Ruger.

Here are some pics from the seller. Not the best quality, but the rifle looks to be in great shape. Listed as only having light handling marks and been fired ~40rnds.









I have a VX3 2.5-8x36 with a M1 turret being put together by Leupold now. It'll look mighty fine on top of this thing.

Sweet rig. Good luck with it.

Nice!

You will like it. My buddy has a 25-06 in a heavy barrel version and it bugholes 117 sst's with imr4350. He also bought a pristine heavy barrel in .243 and it shoots just as well with several loads. Just last month he came dragging in a sporter barrel .270 and a box of 130 hornady factory ammo. He proceeded to shoot a 3/4" 3 shot group and then let me shoot 3 it touched 2 of them and put the other one a 1/4" out. He is lucky like that. I need to buy a few of them myself.

Enjoy the old classic.

I love the old Tang safety Rugers i have three 30-06 257 and 338 the only one that did not shoot well was the 338 i had a new barrel put on it now it is all good.

Ok will give you the big secret with these old Redbutt guns it is the way you tighten the screws when you put the stock on.
I think the Stock sequence and tightening specs are on you tube but pretty much the angle screw you really want it tight, as tight as you can tighten it by hand with a large screwdriver.
The middle one just normal tight the rear one a little tighter.
This is the biggest thing i see people do wrong with these rifles.
To many times people have a old Ruger and thinks it is a bad barrel and it is the Big angle screw.

If this is all good and you are still having it shoot not as good as you want try this shim the barrel right infront of the lug when you pull stock you will see the lug. I use a beer can cut the can and make your own shims you can stack them until they are making good contact.
There are a few tricks b4 re-barrel but if screws are tightened properly i bet it will be a shooter good luck.

I picked the rifle up today and it is in fantastic shape! The blueing is perfect and the bolt is slick as well. The PO has already free-floated the barrel, but it is not bedded. It is a 79 prefix serial which dates it to 1985, not 1975 as PO stated. Suits me just as well. The trigger feels light and crisp, but I do not have a gauge to check it. The barrel is actually 24" and measures .600 at the muzzle, rifling bright and shiny.

I got it all cleaned up and mounted my new VX3 2.5-8x that also came this week. I'll take some pics out in the daylight tomorrow. I feel like I'm going to get attached to this gun. I hope she shoots!

I've had three tangers, all of them shot plenty well enough to make me happy. .243, .270, and .30/06, about as plain vanilla as you can get.

In truth, I shoulda kept them all and just rebarreled them when I wore them out. Instead, I went "Winchester", no issues with them, but I miss those Rugers. The tang safety location is a gem.

Here she is, all cleaned up and ready to go! I found out the ejector was stuck, but some oil and a few taps with a punch freed it right up. The gun balances nice but is on the heavy side... 9lb-9oz all up.

Looks great!! Take it to the range and report back.

I'll Take it.

Just kidding. Looks very nice. The older Ruger 77 really smooth out with a little bit of use.

Very nice!

I picked one of those up used in '82, so it was a bit older than yours. But the same configuration with the 24 in barrel. I always thought the barrel was the same contour as used on their magnum chamberings.

My 25-06 shot well with any bullet I wanted to feed it. I used a lot of 117 Hornady btsp with a max load of H4831 and a CCI 250. I also shot a few hundred 90 gr bullets through it, but fail to remember if Speer or Sierra.

As a new husband and father I needed to raise some cash and offered the Ruger to a friend. He took the rifle out with some of my handloads and started breaking eggs at 200 yds with it.

28 years later, my friend allowed my to bring the rifle home for a couple weeks. I cleaned it, diagnosed a faulty scope, replaced the scope, built a 100 rnds of ammo for it, and took it back to him.

I hope youy Ruger shoots as well as mine did, and you enjoy it as much as I did mine.

Thanks for the info Idaho,

I have a buddy working up a few test loads for this weekend with 117 SSTs, and 117 game kings. I did a little research and you are correct on the magnum contour. This thing is heavy. 9.5lbs all up, but recoil should keep the recoil down. Perfect for what I want to do with it.

You got a deal and a half. Congrats!

I have two 1980's tangers, 1982 7mm RM and a 1989 .257 Roberts. both shoot great.