Ruger Old Army
I have 4 Ruger OA's. One 7 1/2" Adj. sights SS, two 7 1/2" fixed sights SS, and one 5 1/2" fixed sights SS. All showed the red coloration in the bores. After receiving them, as with any of the firearms I own, I cleaned them with a good bore solvent. Took them out to my shooting bench and fired them to see how they grouped. To my supprise, all 4 shot very good groups. The 5 1/2" fixed and the 7 1/2" adj. sights models shot the best. The two 7 1/2" fixed were not far off from the others. I used 777 FFFg with a 30 gr load, under the Speer .457..swagged round ball. Under the ball, I used a .462 dia. .30 thick veg.wad. At 15 yds, the OA's shot as good as or better than my 2 Ruger SS 44 mags. shooting 44 spc. loads at 850-900 fps! The only thing that I can see even close to being at fault with these OA's are that the diameters of chambers could be more uniform. On production pieces however, this is too costly and would only add to the cost of an already expensive to manufacture revolver. Take a look at all the other manufacturer's offerings, and there are good ones out there, but if you are going to get the best.........in my eyes, you can not come close to the strength and design of Bill Ruger's Old Army! I agree to the fact that some say this revolver is the greatest design Mr Ruger had developed. I own several other Ruger firearms, they are also very good also, but the OA.......wins in my book. I am glad to have these OA's in my collection. And with them getting harder to find, would suggest to anyone that wants the best BP revolver ever made, to get one. Ruger also has a good track record with me, of getting things fixed and back to you very quickly. I once broke the front sight off my 5 1/2" Vaquero 44 mag. This was 100% my fault!!!! I explained to them that I had taken a small hammer and tried to tap the front fixed blade sight to shift windage.This is when I learned that the correct way to do this is to index the BBL, and is a little more involved than taking a hammer to the blade. I shipped it to them. They fixed it and shipped it back within a week. I paid for the shipping,which was fine with me.