Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Ruger M77’s

Brownell not only designed the stocks after about 1966 but he also designed the furniture- grip caps pads etc and the sight bases ribs and scope mounts. The horizontal Ruger rings WERE NOT his first choice of design. The first Ruger rings were vertically split and looked a lot like the single top screw Talley vertical split rings.

The original Ruger no 1 and M77 stocks made up until the early 1970s had lines and detailing like custom stocks- gracefully rounded contours ,deep comb fluting and cut lines behind the grips. Unfortunately, during those years of rampant inflation and Bill Rugers desire to keep costs down, those subtle details were taken out by the production engineers to make the guns easier to build.

The Hawkeye stocks are much slimmer than the old standards, more like the ULs. I like the one I put on my AW very much, but the comb is still a bit too low to be ideal.

Paid $150 for it from the Classifieds; sold the synthetic for $75. Major upgrade, appearance-wise; shoots the same as before without any work. Might float it someday just because.

Ruger finally slimmed the 77 forearm on the tang model in the later years. It was also about the time they lightened up the barrel contours in some calibers. I had a 7 mag with the fat barrel & forearm & when the slimmer, lighter ones came out I immediately traded. It felt so much better.

Kept my eyes peeled for a barrel contour change in the 25-06, but that never happened.

Have had about a dozen 77's, mostly tangers, about a third MkII's. The most accurate of all of them was a tang in 270. The least, a 243 MKII.

I've owned 4 M77 rifles. The 2 .270's were shooters, but a little on the porky side. A B&C stock knocks off 6 oz or so of weight. The .30-06 shot well, but went away when I decided I didn't need so many 06's.
I had a M77V in .243 that did not shoot varmint bullets well. It wasn't too bad with 100 gr bullets, but that's not what varmint rifles were for.

I like the tang safeties a bit better. Just saw a nice 7mm rem mag in nice shape in the local shop with tang safety and red pad. I think those were the best M77's

The tang is very handy for clicking off the safety as you bring the rifle to shoulder - all in one movement.

Teal- I agree!

Just like a good shotgun. It's also more user friendly for a left handed shooter...

I had three tangers, a .243, a .270, and later, a .30/06. All of them shot well enough to kill deer, the first two had locking bolts when the safety was "on", but the .30/06's bolt did NOT lock the bolt handle down. Somewhere in between making the .270 and .30/06 (about eight years), they changed them up a bit. The '06 also had a much trimmer stock on it, although I'd switched to an aftermarket stock on the .270 by then.

I was really pleased with all three rifles, I wish I could get a new tanger, I really thought highly of them.

I love tang safety model 77s especially the the RLs. You’re right

I think my 270 RL gave me aids.

I have only owned three Ruger 77's but have shot a few dozen. I have glass bedded, re-barreled, re-stocked, and repaired, a few hundred. I have seen very few which could not be made to shoot very well. The early tang safety models, with the flat bolt handles, had nicely shaped stocks. With the advent of the heavy barreled varmint models, they made the fore arm fatter to accommodate the fatter barrel. They decided to make all the stocks the same after that and kind of spoiled the design.
The tang safety trigger was fully adjustable and could be set up fairly well. The MKII trigger was non-adjustable but was simpler and more foolproof. Neither is a great trigger. The trigger on the newer varminters is a very good trigger. GD

Yes, greydog ALL my 77s including the UL in 308 had EASILY adjustable triggers.
EDIT > external , inside trigger guard.

I didn't know Ruger changed those later. POOR choice.

Jerry

Now that I know the terminology, I can say that my M77 .338 Win Mag is a Tanger . Bought it from my older brother and it has been to RSA and made mostly one shot kills including a big Eland Bull.
It was Magna Ported, glass bedded and had the trigger pull adjusted down to 4 pounds. After taking a departing Bull Elk with a Texas Heart Shot, I gave it to my son to keep my son from blowing big bucks on another rifle and he shoots it now.
Fortunately, it was not my only big game rifle.

I currently own 6 tang safety Ruger 77s, 3 Savage 99s with tang safety and a Savage 16 Weather Warrior with a tang safety. I am loyal to the safety.

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Shot my first deer with a m77 tanger in .300wm. The straight stock still fits me like a glove. The rifle has a heavy barrel. It hurt carrying it up sheep and goat mountains when I was younger.. Dad bought it for me about 1980. It always shot decent but seems to l UK e heavy grand slams. I'd like to find a modern bullet that it shoots as well.
.

Was at Brownells today. The prices were astonishing, however, they had new 77s, SS compacts in 223, 243, (awesome kid gun, or adult gun) walnut and blue in 7rm, 7-08, 270, Hawkeye Pred in 223 and another. All looked excellently put together.

RARs should be $350 max. Junk that is accurate. Like dating a chunky redhead that's a good lay, hard to love. LOL

Mtn Boomer

Hit the nail on the HEAD for me about RARs.

Jerry

I have two tangers right now, a red pad 270 I got off the classifieds here and a 257 Roberts I picked up at a gunshow this one a UL model. Getting the 257 to shoot was a project but all is well with it now. The 270 shot great right from the start. I do like the tang safety and the actions feed/function perfectly.

Hey, I have a used Hawkeye on the way actually. Yahoo.