44mag ruger rifles

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ccSnoopycc

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Anyone on here shot or owned a Ruger 44r semi auto carbine or the new Ruger 77/44 bolt action carbine? If so how did you like them? I know the semi auto 44 has been around and out of production for a while but the 77/44 is brand new to the market.
 
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two

I've got two Ruger .44 carbines, they are the old "tube feed" models. One wears a set of XS sights, the other has a USA Redfield 2-3/4x widefield.

Mine shoot (group) best with the lighter end of the spectrum slugs, ie, 180 and 200 gr XTP Hornady's. Heavier slugs are minute of pie plate. I attribute that to the slow 1-38" twist that Ruger put in the old rifles. Other users report that the traditional 240 gr weight shoot fine in their old style rifles but neither of mine do. On whitetails I feel I don't give anything up to the heavier slugs, the 180-200 expand dramatically (the 180's are a bit fragile at carbine velocity up close) and occasionally do not exit, but I have not lost a deer and their wounding effect is significant.

I hunt the scoped rifle regularly, and once I found a load, sufficiently accurate. I feel they are 100 yrd rifles, about 3MOA at that range. Both have been reliable in function. They are light and portable. Recoil is mild. The triggers on both mine are coarse.

The new Ruger .44s have a 1-20" twist and should handle all the .44 bullet weights well, which would add to their versatility on tougher game like hogs and bears.

The bolt .44's do nothing for me. The demise of the "new" .44 auto, and the slick lever model 96 is a pity.
 
my BIL owned one, and liked it. I thought it was a fine little niche weapon. His accuracy was 4 inches or so at 100.

Yes, he harvested a few deer with it.
 
Perfect gun for the mountain foothills here in SE OH yet illegal for use lol.

The Deerfield waits patiently for the laws to change.
 
Not a Ruger but I have owned a Marlin .44 mag. lever gun.
Shortly after getting it I began to wonder....why?
In addition to the Marlin being a hunka junka, the pistol round in a rifle makes no sense at all.
My pistol, a Ruger Redhawk, was easier to carry....duh....it's a pistol. Very accurate, I could hit as well at pistol ranges with it as with the scoped Marlin.
Do wat you like, this is still America, but IMHO, your money can be spent better elsewhere.
 
Regarding pistol rounds in rifles, there are lot of reasons these make sense. Related: the .357 out of an 18" carbine is really close to .30-30 ballistics, but can also be fired in a pistol.

To the OP: Check out the capacity of these guns. That was always the deal breaker for me. Food for thought: A ruger blackhawk hunter with the longest barrel available and a scope offers you more capacity, and within 150-275 yards is still pretty effective.
 
I have a deerfield. I have had it for several years. I have killed a few white tails with it. The longest was right at 120 yards. Definitely not a long range rifle, but a great little rifle that I like alot right now.
 
I have a Ruger .44 carbine on long term loan. It can be finicky but if the barrel band is set right I get 2" five shot groups at 50 yards. This is with 240 grain JHP.

I got this rifle because I noticed most of my hunting shots were inside of 100 yards and my 30-06 was shooting through deer without expanding and were causing a lot of hydrostatic damage to the meat. I felt a bigger, slower moving bullet might be just the medicine I needed. I'll tell you by January how that works out for me.
 
I have a 1971 vintage Ruger
Carbine 44.Very nice
trigger and shoots quite
well with a 240gr JHP on
top of a pile of H110.
Great to carry,I have
a 2.5x scope on it and all
other rifles are put on hold
until this one dissappoints me.
 
Had a couple (one burned in a house-fire) of the tube magazine .44 Carbines over the years. Fun to shoot, easy to carry. Neat gun to use on deer. There were complaints on the tube magazine models in regard to firing a high primer, but I never had a problem with either of mine.
 
Cool stuff

Thanks for the link Ozzie and thanks everyone for the responses. How do the two Rugers hold up accuracy wise compared to the lever action guns? I thought they might be more accurate due to the one peace stocks and the bold action on the 77/44. I’m actually a little surprised the accuracy is only good to around 100 yards. With the new ballistic tipped bullets I was hoping for something closer to 120 yards accuracy.
 
I've admired the handy Ruger semi-autos for carrying and shooting for many years, but have stopped short of buying one.

Here in Maine (the most forested state) the .44 magnum is not a particularly popular deer cartridge. The most popular seems to be the .30-06, followed by .270 Win and .308 Win, .30-30 Win and .35 Rem.

I've had buddies who have used the .44 Mag in Rugers and Marlins with some success, but all have switched to one or more of the above rifle calibers due to flexiblity to handle a wider range of deer hunting situations encountered here.

We find ourselves walking through tight woods, jumping deer with little or no chance of making a good shot with any rifle, only to come to a woods road, field, or powerline and the opportunity to make a 200+/- shot at a standing deer. At unknown, longer distances, a flatter-shooting cartridge makes it quicker and easier to make good hits in the kill zone. A cartridge that can place bullets within 3" of the point of aim from 20 to 300 yards is a big advantage!!!

Even running deer are more easily hit when bullet velocity is higher, reducing the amount of lead necessary. I've shot running deer at ranges out to 200 yards and appreciated both better trajectory and energy available in rifle calibers, namely the .30-06 and .270 Win.
 
I totally agree with Picher but, many states like mine (Indiana) do not allow rifle caliber guns to be used for hunting deer. “The bullets travel too far” (But it’s ok for me to use a 6mm Rem for groundhogs).
And it’s only been a couple of years we have been able to use pistol caliber rifles.
For accuracy my Marlin is more accurate out to 100 yards for shooting groups but the 7744 is good enough that I would take on a deer out to 120 maybe 150 if I kept the bullet energy high enough.
The big advantage of the 77/44 is that it is a very fast gun to get on target due to its shorter length and for me the balance with a scope is way better than the lever action.
On my 77/44 the ballistic tipped bullets had problems because they were reloads. The Hornady XTP is the only one I have tried and I gave up trying to get it to work. The reason is that trying to reload the XTP it takes a special bullet seater that no one at this time makes (that I know of). You could flare the case out so much that it would slide in but I want tight seating for a bullet like that to get the most velocity.
With a tight case the plastic tip would hit the seater first and would deform the entire front end of the bullet. Hornady suggested that I buy another seater and have a machine shop build me one.:rolleyes:
For me they are just too expensive. They may make a great factory round for lever actions but my favorite for hunting is the big Penn bullet (320GR)
I had one of the magazine fed Ruger autos back in the 80’s and never was very fond of it. But I can’t really fault the gun that much. I wasn’t reloading at that time and could only shoot factory which was way too expensive for me at the time so I didn’t put that many rounds through it.
Several years later I bought a beat up Marlin that was full of rust and had a 20$ scope on it that had spent much of its life behind the seat of a pickup truck.
Threw the scope away totally dissembled the gun. Scrubbed the barrel for about a week. The thing still shoots very well and has taken several ground hogs out to 75 yards with iron sights.
If you like the lever action, go with a Marlin.
If you like bolt actions go with the Ruger.
If you want an auto, shoot a Ruger before you buy it.


http://www.hornady.com/store/search...9&categoryid[]=407&categoryid[]=381&x=44&y=12
 
.44 Mag Hunting Rifle

I have been using a Ruger Deerfield almost exclusively for about 6 or 7 years now and; if I had found this rifle when I first started deer hunting about 40 years ago, I could have saved myself several thousand dollars hunting for the "perfect" deer rifle. I use the term "perfect" loosely because every situation varies. However, most of my deer hunting is done at ranges of 125 yards or less and most shots are under 50 yards. At those ranges I have found the Magtech 240 grain JSP to be more than adequate and have not taken a single deer within those ranges that ran more than 50 yards after being shot - and most were downed within 10 yards or less.

I had to do some experimenting with ammunition, both factory and hand loads, but settled on the Magtech 240 gr JSP because I am getting 1 1/2" - 2" groups at 100 yards - which I consider to be quite remarkable for a short barreled semi-auto carbine. Additionally, there is very little recoil and the over-all-length of the .44 Deerfield makes it the "perfect" tree stand rifle.
 
best gun ever.

i have a 1963 ruger 44 carbine, let me tell you... ive shot so many guns. assault rifles autos, everything. that still remains my favorite for so many reasons, reliable, target shooting since 64'. last year i shot a quarter at 100 yards three times with a bushnell scope, plenty of power. low kick, perfect for brush, just ammo doesnt grow on trees. the older the better, im from maine the pine state and have shot about 2 dozen deer with this, they didnt stand a chance, its of coarse its a low to med range gun, here in maine thats perfect. id really look into it.
 
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