New Ruger 416 Guide rifle, right out of the box
fires about 10% of the time with factory ammo or reloads with new Hornady brass, light firing pin strikes.

Anyone else have issues with their rifles?

Waiting to hear back from Ruger CS to get a call tag
to return for repair.

I soak the bolt down good with a very strong light cleaner. See if you can wash out any machining residue like oil grease chips ect. then try it again.

IMO the M77, all variations, has the weakest firing pin strike on the market. When combined with the off-center firing pin hole, it causes misfires that only a trip to the factory will fix.
A stronger spring is not a cure. If it will fire with a stronger spring, it would fire with a standard weight spring. I have had striker springs quit on me, but a standard spring restored proper function.

I removed the striker assembly from the bolt body and cleaned the hole in the bolt body, no metal chips or crud, re-assembled, still no joy.

The firing pin indentations on the primers are well centered but very light. I suspect dimensional issues and/or a too light spring

My Ruger curse continues.

make sure the wood stock is not keeping the bolt from completely closing

it is hard to notice- easy to miss - not that common- but can happen

a bit of wood may need to be relieved to fully close and lock up the bolt

that can be it if the wood is to proud around the bolt

simple fix if that's it

when one fires like that
then it won't just light primer hits

first thing to inspect

take it out of the stock

load some primers no powder no bullet

load um pull the trigger

I bet they all pop

if so grind out some wood

a 98 mauser quite sensitive to that problem

people don't always realize you need to fully close and lock down the bolt to get a clean strike
a key discovery when learning to run your gun



a partially closing bolt aint the best for 416 cal. bear guns

once you sort that out it will most likely be the most dependable gun you got

the mauser 98 is quite susceptible to this issue

people don't always realize that to get a clean strike on the primer you must fully close and lock down the bolt

all part of the learning to run that gun

The issue may have resolved itself.

I popped off a couple of primed cases after I got home from the range. These all went off and had much deeper indentations than before.

I will make another trip to the range tomorrow and see what happens.

Post range trip #3, reliability has improved (!) to about 30%, issue is completely random.

POS goes back to Ruger.

Update

My rifle is being replaced with a new one.

Research on the interwebs has indicated that light firing pin strikes are an issue on some Ruger Hawkeye rifles (not only Guide rifles).

What the extent of the issue ( if any) is I cannot say, I am a sample of one.

It seems replacing the factory 21# firing pin spring with a Wolff 24# spring resolves the issue.

When I get my new rifle I will try it with the factory spring and see how it goes. I have a Wolff replacement spring to install if necessary.


Stay tuned

Received my replacement rifle, replaced the factory
FP spring with the Wolff 24# spring, issue is resolved, rifle works fine.

7 lbs 10 oz for the rifle alone, 8 lbs 8 oz with a
Leupold 1.5x5 and Alaskan Arms QD rings.

Off the bench with the muzzle brake recoil is very manageable, pretty hateful without it, OK on the sticks with no muzzle brake. I had someone shoot it with the muzzle brake while I stood behind/ off to the side; not pleasant.

The muzzle brake for the shooter does not produce a lot of concussion but but you get a delayed wash of warm air/muzzle gas upon firing.

One caution: when the mag rails were milled the tops of the right and left rails were left with a tiny curl of metal at the edge down their length that is razor sharp;be careful. Use some sandpaper to smooth this down before use.

Initial range outing had poor results with 2 test loads using moly coated Barnes 350 TSX, may have to play with the seating depth, will also test some moly coated NF 370 SS next time.

Rifle #1 would not feed NF 400gr FP solids from the right side of the magazine. Rifle #2 feeds them just fine.

77gr Varget 350gr moly coated Barnes TSX av 2341 fps
75gr RL15 moly coated Barnes 350gr TSX av 2379 fps

Both loads mildly compressed.

Glad they replaced it. I just got one and have not had any ignition problems but ra dom feeding issues.

PM sent

i bought my 416 guide gun almost 3 years ago ,out of the box it had feeding issues i send it back and it has been fine. i just bought the m77 ftw hunter in 3006 and so far so good put about 150 rounds and no issues at all i love ruger rifles but i once had an ultra light 06 that also had problems out of the box went back and they replaced the barrel. (you could see a mar in the barrel at the chamber and was getting scratches on the brass). Thats two out of about 10 rugers that had to go back,turn around was fast and never a problem afterwards

quote:

Originally posted by Head Trauma: --- My rifle is being replaced with a new one. Research on the interwebs has indicated that light firing pin strikes are an issue on some Ruger Hawkeye rifles (not only Guide rifles).

quote:

Originally posted by HWhit585: --- I just got one and have not had any ignition problems but random feeding issues.

quote:

Originally posted by Tanoose: --- i bought my 416 guide gun almost 3 years ago ,out of the box it had feeding issues i send it back and it has been fine. .....i once had an ultra light 06 that also had problems out of the box went back and they replaced the barrel. (you could see a mar in the barrel at the chamber and was getting scratches on the brass). Thats two out of about 10 rugers that had to go back....

The thread speaks volumes. What's more, all the problems discussed could have, should have, been discovered in test firing before leaving the factory. It seems that over the past several years Ruger quality has gone down the toilet.

My point Exactly !!!

Really makes me appreciate my old M70 Winchester and old Model 77 Ruger.- both old and well worn and well broken in.

quote:

It seems that over the past several years Ruger quality has gone down the toilet.

I don't know about Ruger but Remington does not test fire them anymore.

The failure rate was so low they figured on the few odd ones coming back was cheaper.

quote:

Originally posted by p dog shooter:

quote:

It seems that over the past several years Ruger quality has gone down the toilet.

I don't know about Ruger but Remington does not test fire them anymore.

The failure rate was so low they figured on the few odd ones coming back was cheaper.

But look at how bad their quality control has become.

quote:

Originally posted by Grenadier:

quote:

Originally posted by Head Trauma: --- My rifle is being replaced with a new one. Research on the interwebs has indicated that light firing pin strikes are an issue on some Ruger Hawkeye rifles (not only Guide rifles).

quote:

Originally posted by HWhit585: --- I just got one and have not had any ignition problems but random feeding issues.

quote:

Originally posted by Tanoose: --- i bought my 416 guide gun almost 3 years ago ,out of the box it had feeding issues i send it back and it has been fine. .....i once had an ultra light 06 that also had problems out of the box went back and they replaced the barrel. (you could see a mar in the barrel at the chamber and was getting scratches on the brass). Thats two out of about 10 rugers that had to go back....

The thread speaks volumes. What's more, all the problems discussed could have, should have, been discovered in test firing before leaving the factory. It seems that over the past several years Ruger quality has gone down the toilet.

Some people say Americans should buy American but if a manufactures quality has slipped so much than why? All your doing is rewarding them for bad performance.

Much better to put your money where the value is, no matter who produces it. Sad to see yet another well established manufacturer who has apparently cut every corner to maximize their profits at the cost of their customer base.

https://imgur.com/hYpjC1e



Top target was 76gr Varget, Barnes 350 moly TSX
COL 3.315" average 2396 fps

Bottom target was 76 Varget NF 370SS moly
COL 3.300" average was 2448, flier was me
https://imgur.com/fJw1qIR


This was the unfortunately discontinued CEB
350 HP with 71.5gr Varget

Next up for testing is the CEB 370HP. Since this
bullet projects really far into the case and eats up a lot of capacity, BL(C)-2 and H414 look good as potential powders, stay tuned.

As you can see from the bottom 2 notes, RL 15
just did not work out in this case.

Range results from today, 416 Ruger Guide gun

https://imgur.com/hqNvptp

76 gr BL(C)-2
370 CEB HP
COL 3.32
Very slightly compressed

2386,2375,2402,2356 Average 2379fps

Easy bolt lift and extraction, plenty of radius left on the fired primers, feeds just fine.

Excellent working load

https://imgur.com/ULR7E3H

370 CEB HP

COL 3.320"

77gr H335, mildly compressed

2501 2466 2544 2515 Average 2506

Easy bolt lift and extraction

Plenty of radius left on the fired primers

Excellent working load