The MKII was the best of the series, though I don't own a MKIV. A bud who has one is very happy with his. He is a Bullseye shooter. I have shot my MKII's in Bullseye competition and I do better with with my M46/M41. I think it is due to ergonomics and the trigger. I really hate cleaning the Ruger as each time I have to relearn how to put the thing back together. It is not intuitive, the parts are blind, and the hammer strut and mainspring never line up the first time. Sure, once I figure it out, it is all obvious. Everything is obvious in hindsight. But then, I forget all the little tricks inbetween cleanings. The S&W M41 design is simple and straight forward to disassemble and reassemble.
I do see a lot of Rugers on the Bullseye firing line, some with a lot of Volquartsen parts. The guys shooting stock box and Volquartsen often kick my butt in competition, so, I think it is a good pistol. It is highly reliable, can shoot an enormous amount of ammunition before anything wears out. Based on my rifle ammunition tests, you don't need a match barrel in a pistol. The factory barrel is good enough. The greatest source of error is the person shooting the gun, ammunition makes a difference, but it is more important to have ammunition that reliably functions the mechanism as alibis will ruin your score. I have been using CCI Std Velocity, the stuff shoots well enough for me and I only have the occasional malfunction. Really good shooters show up with Lapua, Eley Red Box, stuff that you can see accuracy differences in a rifle, but in a pistol, I doubt it. The ten ring is four inches at fifty yards in Bullseye Pistol. I think it is less than an inch in Smallbore Prone. That is a huge difference and few pistol shooters clean the fifty yard target.
The Mk II Target:- 6-7/8" - was the only one manufactured w/ polygon rifling.
I agree that the Mark IV is the best, if you are willing to do a bit of tweaking. In particular, the magazine disconnect has to go.No reason to buy any of the previous versions with the Mark IV out.
No reason to buy any of the previous versions with the Mark IV out.
1. Slingshot enabled
2. No ridiculous button slide stop/safety selector
3. No loaded chamber indicator
4. Last round bolt hold open
5. Breeze of a takedown and reassembly (even if one has it figured out on the older models, the ability of switching uppers around in 5 seconds is a rather nice feature.
Give me a Mark IV with a stainless lower, threaded barrel, no magazine disconnect, Tandemkross victory trigger with pre/post travel adjustments, with Volquartsen internals, doesn't get any better currently.
I'm with the others that have said, in order of preference: IV, II, I, III
Well...
My Mk II Target 6-7/8" has:
- Slingshot bolt release.
- Conventional slide-stop.
- No loaded chamber indicator.
- Last round bolt hold-open.
- No magazine disconnect.
It is also bone stock, polygon rifled, and cloverleaf accurate.
And, unless you are afraid of breakin' a nail, or you ride to school in a little yellow school bus?
...a snap to field-strip/reassemble.
GR
Same here...Never heard that before; learn something every day I guess. My MKII "Government" model has conventional rifling.
I can change uppers in 10 seconds.
And I can do it without breaking a nail, I did ride a bus but it was full length.
Never heard that before; learn something every day I guess. My MKII "Government" model has conventional rifling.
Same here...
Gotcha. My Govt target is the 6 7/8” bull barrel version.As it is a tapered Bbl, would suspect it was to increase velocity for field use.
GR
The Mark II’s are the second best in my book. I don’t know what Ruger was thinking with the Mark III’s.
Never heard that before; learn something every day I guess. My MKII "Government" model has conventional rifling.[/QUOTE]
Mine does too. And...........my KMK 678 Target also has a conventional button rifled bore.
I have never heard of, nor seen a Ruger Mark II MK678, or KMK 678 that was produced with "polygonal" rifling, in the 49 years I've been working with and on these pistols. I'd like to see where that information came from. I currently have all of the reference books available on the Ruger Mark pistols and those have no reference to what was posted above. Please enlighten us.
I'd like to see where that information came from.
The Ruger MKII variant was produced between the years 1982 to 2004. Because it seems so odd that Ruger might have made a polygonal bore for just one model (the MKII KMK 678) and because I have all the Ruger catalogs for those 22 years (except the years 1985 and 1995), I took the time to peruse the catalogs, looking for some verification of any Ruger .22 auto pistol having polygon rifling. My search revealed no mention whatsoever of any of these pistols ever having polygon rifling barrels; all were described as having "button rifled" bores.
So, at the risk of appearing presumptuous or argumentative (I'm neither), I have to ask Garandimal if he's ever actually examined the bore of his Model KMK-678 target pistol?