Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Opinions on Ruger american

I love when you post pics Stumpy. I am especially impressed how neat and organized your rifles and reloading area always are.

you are quite the organized housekeeper... Kudoes.

you'll make some Gay Guy a great house husband some day....

Suzy HomeMaker?

Since you are crossed eyed there Stumpy, I thought I'd post it twice, then you can read it twice...
once with each eyeball....especially if its 9 AM and you're already Sloshed....

I just picked up another one, an older stainless 308 compact that walmart had from like 2015. I have a 7mm-08 GoWild as well, which I got because it has the faster 8.5" twist.

To me they’re a niche rifle for somebody just getting into hunting rifles or maybe a backup in your preferred caliber.

Bought one in 30-06 several years ago when Wal-Mart was closing them out for $200. Liked the weight, hated the gritty action and flimsy stock. Replaced the stock with a laminate giving it a much more solid feel, but then it became a heavy SOB. Also, with 2 stocks, 2 scopes, and multiple bullet/powder combos, I never found a load that was consistently better than 1.5 MOA. I started out on M77s and I decided I'll just stick with them. As for budget rifles, I've got 3 Marlin X rifles in the safe to cover all scenarios. If the need ever arises for another budget rifle, I'd probably go with a Howa.

Sorry for the poor picture. American Ranch in 300 BLK with 16.5" barrel in a Boyd's Spike Camp stock. Not mine anymore (new owner replaced the stock). I really liked it in both configurations. Accurate lil cuss.

My wife hunted with a Thompson Center Encore in 7mm-08 for several years. What could be better. Single shot, break open, hammer gun? The answer? Almost anything. NOTHING but troubles with that gun. Converted it into a pro-hunter. Even WORSE. My son and I were in a LGS and he saw a Ruger American in 7MM-08. I grabbed it immediately. I was happy as a clam to find it. NOT SO with my wife. She HATED the trigger. I bought her a Timney trigger and installed it. She went from a single shot, to a bolt gun repeater. The gun is lightweight, compact, and fits her perfectly. She has had it now for over 5 years and killed over a dozen whitetails with it. NEVER ANY ISSUES WHATSOEVER.

I've also had good luck with RARs, but I have a friend who bought a 243 for a ranch rifle and says that he has sent the rifle back to Ruger twice for warranty work. Any manufacturing process is likely to have a small percentage of imbedded errors, often at a rate of less than 1%.

I have 4.

Ranch in 5.56
Predator in 308 with 18" bbl
and two of the Predator in 358(not rebores-the Grice special of a few years back.)

All work just fine with no issues and very accurate.

I am not a huge Timney fan but Timney nailed it perfectly with the trigger they made for the RAR, I hated the factory glock style trigger......a spring kit helped, taking off the blade helped but was still a POS trigger. The Timney trigger transformed my RAR's to great rifles. best money you could ever spend

I have a Ranch in 6.5 Grendel & .223 that are ridiculously accurate for their price - which others have shared. I like the unique configurations that Ruger offers. I’m not sure how much punch & accuracy a sportsman can pack into a full size rifle with a 16” +/- bbl. in 6.5 Grendel

I like them. I’ll be ordering more.

It made my wife happy. She got her confidence back. Happy wife, happy life. She has killed oved a dozen deer with it.

I have the same rifle in 7.62x39. I wanted a 7.26x39 bolt action to get some trigger time and use up the excessive amount of chinese 7.62x39 that I have had laying around for the last 20 plus years. There are basically 3 bolt actions on the market in 7.62x39. They are Ruger, CZ, and Howa. I wanted the Howa but the Ruger was the only one available. My nephew has the CZ. The CZ is much better than the Ruger but it retails for $200 more. The action on the Ruger isn't the smoothest especially with Russian ammo. Luckily, the chinese I have is allot better. It is smoother in the action and seems to be more accurate. I have been wanting to try some brass PPU but I am cheap and the PPU is twice the price if not more than the Russian and I have allot of Chinese. I would trade the Ruger for the Howa in a heartbeat.

Thats a pretty stock. The new owner replaced it? If so, is it for sale?

Agree.

Not that pretty, plastic parts, but they do shoot.

For what they cost, strictly on a utilitarian basis, they're hard to beat.

DF

I've got the 22" standard model in 308.

Groups are 1-1.5 MOA with cheap factory ammo and a 4x Leupold in Weaver rings. It's light and it balances well. I have very little confidence in the rotary magazine.

It would be a good starter or loaner but once you learn anything about rifles, you'll want something else.


Okie John

Bubba,

I bought the Ranch 7.62x39 for cheap ammo practice and a compact lite recoiling deer rifle. If you want to try brass cased ammo, the best deal I've found was Norma 124gr. FMJ Tactical. I was able to get a 500 ct. case of it for $9.25 box. You can easily find it for less the $11.00 box.

My Ranch rifle shoots the factory fmj into about 1.5 inch groups and loading the once fired brass with 123gr. Hornady SP and RL 7 I've been able to get 1 inch groups.

As, you said, it's not the smoothest or well finished rifle out there. For what it is, I'm happy with it.

I have one in 22 magnum and it is the most accurate 22 magnum I have ever owned. I had some feeding issues at first, but disassembly the magazine and putting a few more turns on the spring to tighten fixed the problem.

They do at least slick up with use!

The russian is the worst. I would bash it against a tree if I were deer hunting and it cycled that poorly on a followup shot. Like I said, the chinese isn't as bad. I need to break down and get some Norma and maybe some PPU. They don't allow fmj where I hunt but I would still like to try the Norma. One thing I did do to improve it was I installed the ruger american trigger spring kit from mcarbo. It has made a difference and is well worth the $12.95 it costs. Pretty easy to install. It works on all ruger americans.

https://www.mcarbo.com/ruger-american-rifle-trigger-spring-kit.aspx