Below is a photo of my NEW Ruger Bisley Hunter, 44 mag. Notice the (machining) mark on the underside of the topstrap just above the cylinder gap.

I called Ruger about it, they told me to send it in so they could look at it. They returned it as is saying "mark on topstrap is normal".

This would be fine, except that I cannot find ANY Rugers at any of the local gunshops that have this mark, nor do any of my other Ruger revolvers have this mark. Is this "normal" or are they just shanking me?

Please tell me if any of your Ruger revlover experiences involve marks of this kind. Thanks very much.

My Bisley .45 Colt doesn't have that 'dish'.

George

Posted response in Handgun Hunting Forum.

David

I have your exact same gun. I have no marks or dishes under my backstrap....

MKane160 aka BigDogMK

I think what they mean is it will not cause a problem and they don't intend to do anything about it, NOT that every other Ruger has such a cut! None of mine ever had it!

My Super Blackhawk wasn't made with a cutout like that, but developed a smaller one from gas erosion.

No Picture!

I would return it to Ruger. None of my Rugers have the cut shown in your picture. My friend bought a new Bisley when they put the ejector housing on they drilled through the barrel and taped it. It was very noticeable when looking down the barrel. Ruger repaired his gun (he had never shot) free of charge it only took them a couple of weeks

Why return it to Ruger? It certainly isn't going to affect the functioning or safety of the gun, and it doesn't look bad. It's just different. A little extra feature. Wouldn't bother me.

Years ago when the 357 Maximum first came out it developed such a bad reputation for gas cutting topstraps that a couple of makers precut grooves in them so that people wouldn't complain about it.

Here's what happened.

I called Ruger up after I noticed it (which was about 1 week after I bought it). I described it to two people (a phone lady and her manager), and they said "send it in, we'll take care of it".

So I sent it in with a detailed note.

I got it back with a note stating "mark on topstrap is normal". They did nothing but look at it, and send it back to me. This puzzled me on two levels: 1) they knew the nature of the mark before I even sent it to them and 2) I could not find any other Ruger revolvers in any shop I looked that had this mark.

So "normal" must mean that the gun won't blow up, not that it is common on a lot of revolvers. Anyway, then I posted a pic of it to ask all you guys if you had such a mark - again, trying to get a feel for if this was "normal" or not.

So I was a bit annoyed by Ruger's response, as were the folks at the gunshop where I bought it - none of whom had ever seen a Ruger with the mark either. In fact, when we got it back, we went through the display case of Ruger revolvers they had - not a single one had this mark.

Anyway, I have heard that Ruger's service is top drawer. I've also heard many anecdotes about Ruger fixing stuff for free that the owner fully expected to pay for, and so on.

The gunshop (where I buy stuff pretty often) wouldn't have any of it. They insisted on ordering me a brand new revolver, which they did, and which I now have, and which is mark-free.

As for the mark itself, I expect it probably would not have been a problem in terms of functioning. However, after paying $500 for something new, I expect it to be free of obvious machining errors, especially in an item that I may well sell or trade later.

Ironically, the guys at the shop told me, if I waited for about 2000 rounds until the edges of the mark would have rounded over from the cylinder blast, and then sent it back to Ruger claiming gas cutting, they probably would have fixed it without a question.

I appreciate all your input. Thanks.

I doubt that the tech support people you talked to on the phone ever saw your gun. It was looked at by one of Ruger's repair gunsmiths, who saw that it didn't hurt the functioning of the gun and so simply sent it back to you without any repairs. Maybe if you had included a note saying that you knew the gun worked okay, but didn't like the poor machining and the support manager had agreed to have it fixed you would have received a new frame to repair the gun. (The original manufacturer can replace a frame by stamping a new one with the old serial number and destroying the old frame. ATF really isn't happy if a gunsmith does this though since a frame would have to leave the factory either without a serial number or with a duplicate serial number. Often a manufacturer will simply replace the gun if replacing the frame (receiver) is necessary since it's less paperwork for them.)
Ruger isn't really big on cosmetics like machine markings. Scratches in bluing etc they will often fix for free (re-blue the part or the entire gun) without asking, but not machine marks unless they are so bad they interfere with the proper operation of the gun.