Ruger No. 1's...traded for two nice older Rugers
a .416 Taylor...the caliber mark is in scroll and inlaid in the barrel..the stocks are highly figured wood...monte carlo comb...it has 5 flip up sights and a screw on, screw off muzzle brake...no info on the Ruger website at all...the serial number shows it was made in '76
the other is marked .425 Magnum.
Neither caliber is offered on Ruger's website...what the heck have I traded for??
Any insight is greatly appreciated..apparently I've been biten by the big bore bug...thanks...lazza

Lazza
The 416 Tailor is a fine big bore, just a tad shorter than the 416 Rem Mag.using the 375H&H case. Case length 2.500"

The 425 perhaps some thing like the 423 Van Horn. Don't you may have to make a chamber cast to find out what fits.

The .416 Taylor was origninally, I believe, made on necked up .338 brass, so, you might get a feel for it by considering it a .416/.338. It also was reportedly chambered in a VERY few factory guns by both Winchester & Ruger, though not for general sales by either company (a few WERE shot by gunwriters at some of the special hunts put on for scribes). Neither company ever catalogued the chambering either to my knowledge, though both were at one time on the verge of announcing it as a new factory chambering. The .416 Rem Mag put a stop to that possibility. Personally, I prefer the
Taylor....also known as the .416 Chatfield-Taylor.

There have been a number of .425's developed over the years, many using the same rebated rim as the English round. As Zermal said, also a very fine round. Savage was going to bring one out just a few years ago, but it died aborning.

I think you're a VERY lucky guy. sure wish I had them. BTW, though I obviously have no idea who made up your rifles, it would not surprise me in the least to learn someday that it was the late Paul Marquart of Prescott, AZ and of the A&M company (he was the "M", Bill
Atkinson, later of Ruger was the "A".

He did a lot of top-notch big-bore Ruger No. 1 conversions, and always (at least on all I have) had the chambering scroll engraved on them. He also preferred to mount a special hooded ramp front sight. What sort of front sight does yours have?

Lazza,
How about some photos...please. Sounds like some nice rifles.

Woody

Here's a few pics...the best i could do with the crappy camera

I surely wish those rifles could talk!!

As you likely know, Paul Marquart did little or no stock work. Those rifles both have stocks that look to me very like David Wesbrook's work. He, as you may be aware, worked for a while out of Paul Marquart's shop some years after A&M Barrel Company was no more. Actually, Paul had a building behind his home, in which the entire lower floor was Paul's barreling shop, and the upper floor was both David Wesbrook's apartment and his stock making facility, both of which he rented from Paul. That ended when Dave went "back east" to become a photographer for the American Rifleman.

As I said, the stocks look like something typical of Dave's wood-working, especially the cheekpieces, BUT, Dave Wesbrook never learned to checker. Any checkering on stocks by him were (at least at the time I am speaking of) done by someone else.

As to the metal work, I am not sure from looking at it that it even could be Paul's work. He always fitted better front sights if he could get the customer to pay for them even at wholesale cost and the ones on those rifles appear to me to be original Ruger front sights, perhaps salvaged from some other (orginal?) barrels. Paul did generally save and use original Ruger barrel bands for the front sling swivel, as those rifles have. Are those barrels cut-rifled? All of Paul's barrels were.

Paul also commonly dismounted the 1/4-rib from original barrels and re-mounted them on his new barrels. Though that is not done on your rifles, if the person ordering them insisted on 3-leaf rear sights, he may have very well already had them in hand, and those are not generally of a shape and height which would look right on top of a Ruger 1/4-rib...so Paul could still have done the work without his usual re-mounting of the Ruger rib.

Yes indeedy, wish those rifles could talk. Wish also I had the time to go back through my early copies of "Rifle" magazine. Seems to me they had some of the early articles on the .416 Taylor (along with, I seem to recall, G&A magazine). That might possibly be another clue, as Paul operated out of Prescott, AZ the same place Rifle magazine was published from. (Actually, Rifle moved there about 1970 or so, but I believe was definitely fully there by 1976. Bill Ruger also lived relatively nearby...at least by 1982 when I was living there again.

Did I say enough times how much I wish those rifles could talk?!!

There is somthing good about owning a great rifle that that you know nothing about who made it.
From the photo's I see some real good workmanship. Yes curiosity will drive you crazy but if you never find out that won't take the workmanship away from them.
I bought a sxs 16 bore Holland & Holland about 11 years ago just because I did know who built it. I have yet to shoot that darn gun I just wanted to own a H&H.
I bought a #1 a few years ago that had alot of custom ear marks like the ones you have. I was told that it was the personal rifle of one of the gunmakers employed at Westley Richards and he had done the modifications for himself before selling the rifle. I wondered if that was true or not for a few years but after using the rifle for some time now I really like it and I don't care who made it.