Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Single Shots No.1 Accuracy Gamble !!!

How much of an accuracy gamble is a new No.1 ? 50/50?

Bought a #1 S in 45-70 just over a year ago and it puts 5 rounds in one ping pong ball sized hole at 50 and 100 yards. That with factory Hornady FTX stuff.

No matter what style you buy, they are all gambles. Some more than others. Its good we have some tricks to improve on what comes out of the box.

In recent years I would say 50/50--and the incidence of really bad accuracy out of the box is much lower. I have also found the recent No. 1's much easier to fix.

I've owned six #1s I over the years. The oldest dates back to 1968, and the rest date mid 80's or newer. The latest I bought new less than a year ago - although I think it was sitting on a distributor's shelf for a while because the falling block is blued on top instead of stainless. The calibers ranged from a #1V in .223 through to a #1H in .375 H&H. In between was a 25/06, 7x57, 30/06 and .338 Win. Mag.

The worse shooting of the group will do 1 1/2" with most anything, but an inch or better with only a select few handloads. The other five will (or did) shoot an inch or better with 4 of 5 being real barn burners at times.

A sample of six is hardly grounds for an accuracy guarantee, but it's enough to remove any worry from my mind about buying a new #1 and getting it to shoot. Ordering blind, I would personally worry more about getting stuck with power pole looking walnut than a lemon shooter.

Like AZ, my sample group is pretty small, having owned/shot only five No.1's. All were/are of the blue/walnut/Henry forearm variety.

.22 Hornet was a sub minute rifle, and closer to 1/2MOA. Bought it used.

7x57 was bought used, but unfired. It was a dog....minute of hat. The factory re-barreled it for free, and it is now a fine 1-2MOA hunting rifle.

9.3x74R bought NIB. Shoots just about everything you stuff in it, into 1 to 1-1/2 MOA. One of my absolute favorite rifles of all time.

450-400 3" Also new. Only have about a hundred rounds through it, but oh it will shoot! Has already shot sub MOA groups during load workup.

.458 Win Mag(now a 450 #2 project) bought used. A 1 MOA rifle. Great shooter.

I can't count the 22 rimfire project, as I haven't fired it yet.

Their worth the gamble...to me.

Jeff

The worst one I have owned was a .375 H&H, which I think was more a matter of controlling recoil than anything. The last load I worked up for it, was about 1.25" at 100 yards, with 260 Noslers and Varget.

I have owned six over the years, 4 B's, the V .22-250 in my avatar, and the .375.

I'm hankering fer a .270 Weatherby, myself...

Now that the current No 1s don't have weird chambering issues like the long throats in the 7 x57 rifles, etc I'd say you will be fine. The lack of a magazine will allow you to seat bullets out do deal with the freebore in the Weahterby chambers if you must to get the groups tighter.

Barrels are barrels whether they are screw into a No 1 reciever or any bolt action. The barrels respond well to the SAME tuning and bedding techiques one would use on any bolt rifle .Due to the forarm hanger on the No 1 action you have the option of free floating the barrel ,unlike many 19th century Single shot designs.

I guess I have been really lucky with no 1 rifles. I bought my first Ruger No 1 31 years ago. I have owned them from every era of production. IMHO they have been no harder to get to shoot under MOA than an out of the box Winchester m70.


Merely by tuning the barrel bedding a bit and working up decent handloads,I have never had a big came cartridge Chambered No 1 I could not get to consistently put 3 shots into 1 moa. I have never had a varmint chambered no. 1.I could not get down to 1/2 for three shots..


Yes, some of them have been easier to get to shoot than others but all responded with no more than a half dozen load combos tried in them.


It's all pretty simple but folks all seem to be befuddled by the two piece stocks and swayed by the "Rugers are not accurate" BS..

A lot of it is between their ears.

I have 30 or so #1s from .204 Ruger to .375 H&H. (My darkest secret-- I have sold off 3 of them including ... A .243 B early 80s vintage that was a pig in terms of eating copper and spraying bullets. An RSI with nice wood that I sold -- twice -- finally when I just decided to stick with the longer guns. And a 223 B when a Campfire buddy wanted one and I realized I was never going to use mine.

My experiences support MD's point strongly. I'd say that almost all my newer black pad #1s shoot acceptably to great out of the box. (They still all need trigger work IMO, the boomers need a serious recoil pad to boot, and on the wood syocked moels I seal the stocks to assure wood warp in local hunidity shifts doesn't move the POI around.)

The older guns are a crap shoot. But foreend free-floating and finding the right round usually makes them into solid performers.

1B

I'm no expert but here's my experience;

I have three Ruger #1's and was worried before I ever bought the first one 14 years ago because of all I have read about the accuracy problems. Maybe I just got lucky three times but I haven't had a problem with any of them.

Ruger #1B in .223 bought new in 1996 is still the most accurate rifle I have ever fired. I have a four shot group I fired at measured 200 yards that measured 3/8". No it doesn't do this everytime, as a matter of fact I was suprised I could do it even if the rifle could but it will consistently shoot 1/2-3/4" for five shots at 100. Many coyotes fell to this rifle in college.

Ruger #1 Tropical .375 H&H bough about 5 years ago used with red recoil pad if that matters to you. Shoots anything I put through it into 1.5" or better.

Ruger #1AH 25-06 Lipsey's Exclusive. Just got it used recently from DaveH on here. I actually haven't shot it yet and it's killing me but gotta get some brass soon. Dave told me that it shot real well when he shot it and he seems like a straight up guy so I'm sure it will shoot good too.

Just my .02 cents but I think like many things your read on forums or even in gun mags, the "experts" that say Ruger #1's aren't accurate have never shot one and are just rambling about something they heard someone else say. I'm sure there are inaccurate #1's out there as there are with anything but I personally don't think it's the norm. Maybe I'm just lucky.

On the other hand, everyone rants about how accurate Remington 700's are and the first one I bought is the most inaccurate big game rifle I have and I've done everything short of rebarreling it with no improvement. Just goes to show that you can get a lemon with anything.

Now I want a #1RSI....love em

mnimrod

Oh yeah, forgot to add that I haven't done anything to my rifles, no forearm mods or hanger screws. Just tighten and shoot.

mnimrod45

Maybe I am just lucky but I never ever had a #1 (1v 1b 1h etc) that did not shoot under 1 MOA

For me it is 3 good out of 4. A .338 was excellent, 45-70 is good, a .270 I-A is pretty good (1.25 to 1.5 inch with several loads) but the 30-06 I-A failed everything I tried, forend bedding and Hicks accurizer too. It finally went down the road. The number 1's are so appealing that I think they are worth the risk.

I've only had my first NO 1 for a couple weeks now and still am working on loads for it. Its a 22-250 Varminter and seems to like H-380.

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4 of those 5 are about as tight as I had w/two 700 VS 220 Swifts in the past, they would drill 1/2-5/8" 5shot groups w/boring monotony using 38.5 4064 and 55 Sierra's IIRC. A VSSF Swift did a .297 for me.....

Nothing wrong w/that 22-250. NUTHIN!

Agree w/you Jim, many who knock No. 1's have no/little experience.

I had a 270 B model, shot 1.5" after bedding the hanger and adjusting the trigger. Since, a 25-06 B, an 243 A model, and 243 RSI all shot sub moa out the box. The 1a desired a Pac-Nor 3 groove Poly 6BR bbl and one morning I shot a sub half inch group thanks in part to the Kepplinger trigger, and a crystal clear 4-16x40 4200....... at 330 yds. The 105s were like laser guided missiles Maybe I got lucky....or maybe all the components did their job well inc. the lowly No. 1 action!

I laugh at those who knock the No. 1's, as I have outshot full blow custom bolts when you look at groups. Indeed, having a group sub 1/2" at 330 yds put that #1 in the 1's that day, and all I could do was SMILE!

They can/do/will hold their own, unless you have a bedding issue IMHO. That 270 I might add was mfg. PRIOR to Ruger's now 'in-house' hammer forged bbl mfg. FWIW.

OH, btw, fwiw, my latest, a 6.5x55 K1-A put 3 130 ABs in 1.1" at 200 yds w/a 6x42 that had a #4 reticle....covered .7 at 100 if I remember the specs....but point is the latest Rugers are doing fine for hunting accuracy IME. As good and often better than I hold/squeeze. YMMV

6.5 BR et al...

Affer pondering it a bit.. I did not want to sound TOO dismissive of anyone who has atually had accuracy problems with the no.1 in the past.

Early no 1 barrels were sourced from Douglas and Wilson and the quality varied -mostly the Wilsons of the 1970s and 1980s.

Some no 1 rifles also had funky chambers with long throsts in some calibers like the 7x57.

The third thing was/is the quarter rib models sometimes had VERY tight tolerances between the recoil posts and mounting screws . When the barrel would get hot under long shot strings the barrel expansion would "pinch" the rib and it sometimes did weird things to accuracy.

Also, the pressure points in the No1 forend also created a lot of vertical stringing unless it was corrected. Many Ruger No 1 rifles are consistent "two shot groupers" right out of the box. They will poke the First to rounds in a VERY tight group, often touching and then the 3rd,4th and 5th shots are all over the place.

I think the pressure points in those forends are part of that, but other things like the rib consrtiction and other things may be to blame as well.

And finally , the Ruger buttstock , like ALL throughbolt two peice stocks, accentuates recoil. There is NO flex in the stocks at all. They are under compresion due to the through- bolt and very rigid. Along with the brick like factory recoil pads that means in larger calibers, they are not easy to shoot well for some due to the recoil. A good recoild pad helps a lot, though..


Like I said, most of those problems are no harder to correct than any average bolt gun, but it seems that many folks get bambozzled by the old wives tales about "innaccurate two peice stocks", or the "bad no 1 triggers" or the "Slow lock time" etc etc . Going in, they simply DO NOT have a postive mind set to allow the gun to shoot well by working through any tuning as they would with any bolt gun.

And that DOES matter. A lot of our shooting results on the target AND how we interpret them are much more controlled by our own concerns and prejudises than we would like to believe.

Jim62,

Nice post.

1B

Thank you 1B..

I have found my posts are generally "nicer" when I try to BE NICE...LOL

Doesn't everyone?

1B

Al but one!

Doc