Hating my Ruger Mk III Hunter

There's a reason there was a third party that made an Allen wrenches setup for it and Ruger now has the Mark IV.
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DId the recall help or hinder things?

The gun worked as was for those willing to learn to take it apart and put it back together ..... then they reworked it.....and it stopped working ....
 
Thanks for the feedback guys. The gun I got is incredibly tight. I’ve got to get a real dowel, but I made do with a wooden chopstick. I’m not sure I want the gun to loosen up to the point I can disassemble it in seconds, but the receiver assembly is pretty darn tight. I was able to get all of the Volquartsen pieces in including the new firing pin, extractor, adjustable trigger, sear, and trigger connecting rod. The trigger is very light and I dialed out most of the take up and most of the over travel. Now I just have to figure out what I did wrong since it doesn’t reset reliably. I know it isn’t the trigger take up since I backed off to the point I heard the trigger reset.
 
When I first bought mine and found out about it's personality, it was a youtube video that helped me make sense of it all. I wish I still had the link to give but that is long gone. Once I realized it was all about making the hammer, hammer strut, and main spring come together....everything finally clicked. With the hammer sitting in the right position, the hammer strut gets placed into the 'cup' (for lack of a better way of saying it) at the top of the main spring (part of the mainspring housing). When the hammer strut sits on the spring properly, you should feel a small amount of tension as the mainspring housing is re-inserted into the grip. If there is no tension felt, the hammer strut isn't positioned correctly.

Ruger might have over-engineered the Marks, but That's ok. I love mine. Every firearm has it's own unique character and charm. Like people.

You shouldn't worry about 'looseness'. That should be looked at more like 'break-in'.
 
The Volquartsen parts should do away with teh whole,"You put teh mag in an' you take the mag out", you do the HOKEY POKEY and you turn yourself about ......... or am I mistaken?
 
“The Volquartsen parts should do away with teh whole,"You put teh mag in an' you take the mag out", you do the HOKEY POKEY and you turn yourself about ......... or am I mistaken?”

The Volquartsen kit comes in two versions one is the MKII and the other is the MKIII. The MKII kit includes a hammer bushing which was how the MKII came and this kit will work just fine in a MKIII you just have to ditch all the magazine disconnect garbage. The MKIII kit doesn’t come with the bushing because it’s not part of a tune and you need to order a new hammer bushing to replace the garbage. If you didn’t replace the disconnect garbage with the bushing then you still have to fight the lawyers. But if your gun was so ill fitting you should have called Ruger and had them give you a shipper to return the gun to make it right. But if you have all the new stuff in it without addressing the problems at hand they will remove all the non OME parts with OME parts before it goes out the door back to you. To them your after market parts are just broken parts.
 
rep1954,

I’m not claiming the gun is ill fitting, just very tight and a pain to disassemble. Accuracy seemed fine when I shot it the first few times. Trigger could certainly be improved, which is why I ordered the Volquartsen parts. I hope I get this thing figured out. If not, I may sell it. It won’t be the first time a gun and I just didn’t get along. I got rid of a Sig P 245 and SA XDs. Don’t miss them at all.
 
Thanks Jimbob,

I’m waiting for my next door neighbor to back from vacation. I’m sure can help me get things sorted out. I’m not sure what version he has, but he showed me his before the MK4s were released. Maybe there are some tricks he can show me that I’m not getting from the videos.
 
From a post about 5 years ago where someone suggested that re-assembly of the Ruger MkIII would cause some bad words to be uttered ....
..... and then you learn to do it.

Riding a bike is difficult at first, too.......

..... and then you can amaze the un-intiated!

"There's two kinds of people: Them that Can, and them that Can't. You may substitute 'Will' and 'Won't', if time is not short."
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In short, go back and read the manual, and understand what each part is called so you know what it's referring to ...... take it a step at a time and follow the instructions ..... and it will go back together like it's supposed to .... and then I suggest taking it back apart and putting it back together several times .... get the drill down pat.
 
Don't bother..................just trade it in for a IV.
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How much more cash will that cost?

Also, the IV's have a recall going on..... the III's work well .... it just takes a willingness to learn field stripping ...
 
My MKIII was extremely tight, both in the removing the mainspring and the barrel from the receiver. Took disassembling it about five time to loosen it up - use white lithium grease on the mainspring pin will help.

As to any potential installation issues, I found the following video and write up for assembling the VQ upgrade kit to be some of the best information available.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXe_Cv3QZaM
https://www.realguns.com/archives/171.htm

As to the trigger reset issue, the following thread has some good information that might help.
http://www.guntalk-online.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=1266
 
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III OR IV

My daughters MK III has had a boat load of issues and sent back to Ruger twice.

I removed the loaded cartridge indicator which did help but FTF and FTE creep up now and then.

On the other hand, my ancient MK I with Volquartsen LLV upper and trigger job has more competition wins then I can count.

Dump the MK III!
 
Tandemkross.com makes and excellent tool for taking out the Mainspring Housing. It's delron and lasts forever. I use it in place of a punch. I need to use it and a hammer to take out my Mainspring Housing. It also has a pin so that you can take out your extractor for replacement.

I love my Mark III. It's highly modified and shoots great. I recently bought a Mark IV and have taken it to the limits with modifications.

Here's the Mark III.

nGVGaVi.jpg
 
jimbob86 said:
Also, the IV's have a recall going on..... the III's work well .... it just takes a willingness to learn field stripping ...
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I don't want to derail this thread too much, but . . . . Yes, the Mk IV's do have a recall going on. You can learn more here: https://ruger.com/dataProcess/markIVRecall/, and see the bulletin here: http://ruger-hosted.s3.amazonaws.com/email/MarkIV-Recall-Bf28Cz9s46H8.pdf

You can also: (a) punch in a serial number on the Ruger recall page to tell if the pistol is affected or has had the work done, or (b) examine the safety to determine if the recall work has been performed.
 
Thanks for the replies guys. I will watch those video when I get a chance and grease up the main spring housing as well. I looked at the manual when I was disassembling it, but maybe I started on it too late at night and was tired. With 2 little munchkins running around, late night seems to be the only time to myself. I've been traveling like crazy, so I need to catch up on some time with the kiddos. Oh well, seems like I need to put in some work to learn the intricacies of the Ruger Mark 3. 1911's had a bit of a learning curve for me as well when I first started, but even then it was a lot easier than the Ruger Mark 3. I'm sure I'll figure it out. I like the looks of the gun too much to give up that easily. Also, the freaking Volquartsen trigger is amazing.
 
My mark lll comp target is the best .22 auto I ever owned. I just wished I had bought two when they were available.
 
As was mentioned by a couple posters above, get the Majestic Arms kit. After buying my kit, I got another for my brothers MK III as well as the oldest sons. The Majestic kit takes all the headache out of taking the MK III apart for cleaning.
The MK IV is a huge improvement for cleaning the Ruger.
The Majestic kit will probably be cheaper than trading for a Mk IV.

Bob R
 
Tandemkross.com makes and excellent tool for taking out the Mainspring Housing. It's delron and lasts forever. I use it in place of a punch. I need to use it and a hammer to take out my Mainspring Housing. It also has a pin so that you can take out your extractor for replacement.
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I can not for the life of me figure out why one would need a hammer (nor any other tool, for that matter) to take the Mark III apart.

Someone PLEASE explain!
 
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