Abused Ruger Old Army

If it was priced right I think you'll be fine. Project base gun in the worse case scenario. Keep us posted and let us know how it shoots.

Is it an option to rebarrel it if needed? Forcing cone would concern me more than the barrel but I'm not an expect in this space.

Maybe the forcing cone can be honed, and the muzzle end shortened, coned, ventilated or made into a false muzzle.
I would contact an expert like Clements Custom Guns and get an estimate, and shoot it until you can afford to fix it.
If you need to send him photos then send him some.
Maybe fitting a replacement barrel of some sort isn't too expensive.
I know Clements is not cheap, but people have said that he is the best.
You can always try another gunsmith if you can find someone else who is qualified.
If you can locate a spare barrel somewhere, that would go a long way toward saving yourself some money.
Maybe it will shoot "OK as is", you never know.
Make an inquiry with Clements to see what he says, look for a barrel and play it by ear.


Clements Custom Guns:--->>> http://www.clementscustomguns.com

Dragoon.45 here on this site is also a C&B gunsmith but I don't know if he works on ROA's. --->>> http://www.goonsgunworks.com

well you really have nothing left to lose by shooting it. I know ive seen bp rifles with some pretty bad looking bores shoot just fine. agreed the forcing cone is a pretty important part of a revolver.

Have you gone in with a good pick tool to see if it will remove some of the roughness?
I had one a bit like this and was able to remove some of it this way.
Once I removed all I could I made a tool out of a drill bit that fit the groove and used lapping compound to smooth the grooves. Then another tool tappered to fit the cone angle and lapped the surface.
Takes some time but should work. Even if you extend the angle a little it won't hurt it. Main thing is to get the path as smooth as you can. Work the groove equally. The tappered tool for the surface will take care of itself.
On a walker I have the cone was just a bit out of symmetry and was shooting off. I used a 1/4-1/2 inch multifaceted carbide rotary file. Turning it in reverse by hand and straightened it out and at the same time extended the angle just a bit. Polished it up by lapping and now it shoot at 0 windage.

4v50 Gary said:

Even a pitted bore can be a good shooter. The rifling near the muzzle is far more important. Range time!

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True. As long as the roughness doesn't reduce the diameter too much or causes a lop side.

Shoot it and see! Also just wanted to see how the thread turned out...

I bought a beater ROA myself, recrowned the barrel and it's one of my go to guns for hunting. The forcing cone is a concern. You should be able to polish it and improve things, it's important not to facet it or change the angle by much.

some one believed the crap that stainless steel will not rust, or was just lazy. a shame for a fine firearm.

noelf2 said:

I picked up a ROA on Armslist locally. I saw a few dark marks in the barrel a couple inches down from the muzzle, which I was pretty sure was pitting, but it wasn't too bad. Decided to get it anyway, and the price was very good for a stainless. When I got it home, I cleaned the gun thoroughly and found some more trouble at the forcing cone end. Some pretty bad pitting. Hope my pictures show it. The rest of the gun is great. Anyway, I'm going to try it out and see if it's a good shooter anyway. Any suggestions? Kinda bummed. View attachment 846921 View attachment 846922 View attachment 846923

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Quit looking in there.

Jackrabbit1957 said:

... it's important not to facet it or change the angle by much.

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My first thought was to wonder what would happen if the cone was turned down or reamed to a pristine surface.
Then you said this.
So why is it so important and what ramifications would there be that would be worse than the hard to clean pitting?
I have some guesses but don't really know for sure.

If the forcing cone is off center or a mutiple angle put on it will affect accuracy quite a bit. 11degrees seems to be the magic number but I don't believe it's set in stone. The main job of the forcing cone is to guide a slightly oversized bullet it a smaller hole. If the shape of the bullet is changed the accuracy goes away.

noelf2 said:

Thanks for all the replies! I think I'll take some time to smooth the rifling grooves at the forcing cone first, then use the end of a mop (in a drill) with some flitz polish to try to smooth the lands a bit, just at the forcing cone. I think I can make this a shooter.

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I picked up A SS ROA on Gunbroker a few yrs back, that looked fairly good, but upon getting it, I found that it had a fairly heavy pitted area about 1 1/2" back from the muzzle, apparently a squib left in too long, surprisingly it shot as well as my other primo ROA with a polished bore. I eventually found a frame with barrel on Ebay and now have 2 primo guns. The pitted gun also had some pitting on the cylinder, hammer, and forcing cone area, but as I said; it shot fine, but I'm a perfectionist when it comes to my ROA's so I had to correct it.

noelf2 said:

Thanks for all the replies! I think I'll take some time to smooth the rifling grooves at the forcing cone first, then use the end of a mop (in a drill) with some flitz polish to try to smooth the lands a bit, just at the forcing cone. I think I can make this a shooter.

Click to expand...

I picked up A SS ROA on Gunbroker a few yrs back, that looked fairly good, but upon getting it, I found that it had a fairly heavy pitted area about 1 1/2" back from the muzzle, apparently a squib left in too long, surprisingly it shot as well as my other primo ROA with a polished bore. I eventually found a frame with barrel on Ebay and now have 2 primo guns. The pitted gun also had some pitting on the cylinder, hammer, and forcing cone area, but as I said; it shot fine, but I'm a perfectionist when it comes to my ROA's so I had to correct it.

noelf2 said:

Thanks for all the replies! I think I'll take some time to smooth the rifling grooves at the forcing cone first, then use the end of a mop (in a drill) with some flitz polish to try to smooth the lands a bit, just at the forcing cone. I think I can make this a shooter.

Click to expand...

I picked up A SS ROA on Gunbroker a few yrs back, that looked fairly good, but upon getting it, I found that it had a fairly heavy pitted area about 1 1/2" back from the muzzle, apparently a squib left in too long, surprisingly it shot as well as my other primo ROA with a polished bore. I eventually found a frame with barrel on Ebay and now have 2 primo guns. The pitted gun also had some pitting on the cylinder, hammer,View attachment 847028 and forcing cone area, but as I said; it shot fine, but I'm a perfectionist when it comes to my ROA's so I had to correct it. Sorry for duplicate reply, we had a power fluctuation, didn't know it made it through>

noelf2 said:

So I called David Clements (Clements Custom Guns, right here in Virginia), and he's sending me one of his take off barrels (good price too!). Just need to find a gunsmith to do the remove and install. I wonder how much that'll set be back?

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You're lucky!
I read an old post by someone who also bought a take off from him that he had left over from doing his conversion projects.
Did you ask him how much to do the install?
I realize that shipping the ROA would be an extra cost, but at least he's within your state and has the experience.

The only pitting I'd say isn't great is the forcing cone area, but that can be removed by refinishing it and lengthening the cone some. What's in the bore is fine and nowhere near as bad as the pitting I got in a used Uberti 1862 I got last year. I ended up chopping that barrel down to 2 inches, so whatever little bit of pitting that still remained I'm not gonna care about given the range with that short barrel is 10 or 15 yards at most. I'm lucky tho as the Colt's had removable barrels and I figured before I bought it if the bore was bad in any way, I'd just chop the barrel and buy a brand new one and have two barrels.

You don't have that option with ROA's and what's worse is they're not made anymore, spare parts are going to be increasingly tough to find as time goes by. That and the high price for them is why I just don't bother with them, the 1858 repros are my go to solid frame percussion revolvers.

TTv2 said:

... spare parts are going to be increasingly tough to find as time goes by. That and the high price for them is why I just don't bother with them...

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Which parts are you worried about?
All the parts are pretty simple, so even a less than average skilled Joe could make or adapt most of them.
Several of the parts are the same as the Blackhawk and still available from Ruger NEW.
There are several folks out there making aftermarket parts as well.

Have you shot it yet? If not, then maybe thinking about a new barrel is premature.

Malachi Leviticus Blue said:

Which parts are you worried about?
All the parts are pretty simple, so even a less than average skilled Joe could make or adapt most of them.
Several of the parts are the same as the Blackhawk and still available from Ruger NEW.
There are several folks out there making aftermarket parts as well.

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Springs, hands, cylinders (in the event one is damaged from mishandling or gets rusted). So, not many parts, but they will be difficult to source 10+ years from now unless Ruger decides at some point to bring the ROA back.

TTv2 said:

Springs, hands, cylinders (in the event one is damaged from mishandling or gets rusted). So, not many parts, but they will be difficult to source 10+ years from now unless Ruger decides at some point to bring the ROA back.

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Parts for anything 10+ years from now might be a problem, but I wouldn't worry about an ROA.
The ROA utilizes coil springs which would be safe to say could be easily sourced for the foreseeable future.

The hand is an incredibly simple part that could be built by anyone capable of building any parts with the most rudimentary tools.

There are multiple sources for replacement cylinders. A spare could be acquired today with ease if it was a concern.

don't let any of these concerns keep you from enjoying the work of art that is the Ruger Old Army.