Ruger .44 mag carbine

[mike28w]

I had one of the older ones made from cast metal of some sort ( not a good quality metal).
If it never breaks, you'll have a nice little gun. If it ever breaks....heaven help you.
Ruger will treat you like a bastard stepchild. They won't work on it. They won't sell parts for it. They won't suggest someone who might have parts or work on it. They won't offer any suggestions at all, other than to offer to sell you another Ruger......
Numrich Arms is your friend , or at least was my friend back when I had mine. I traded it a couple of years ago for an AR.
The gun is a great concept but Ruger did a mediocre job, in my opinion.

 

[Blacksmoke]

I bought a "Deerfield" as soon as they became available. It has proven to be all it is cracked up to be with one limitation. The rotary magazine will not handle cartridges much larger than 240 grains. They just do not fit. I recall there was one 265 grain cartridge that would fit and chamber but I do not recall who made it. I doubt the longer Spitzer style Hornady Leverevolution will load in the magazine. I will sometimes load a larger weight bullet in the chamber and carry the small rounds in the magazine. I do worry about the gas system and heavy weight bullets with hot loads. The opposite is also true. Low powered .44 mag ammo such as "Cowboy Action" ammo sometimes does not have sufficient power to operate as a semi-auto and so manual operation of the bolt is necessary. That is still a quick action but not semi-automatic.

Naturally, I wish someone made a high capacity magazine for this carbine and am ever watchfull for some innovative tinkerer. The four plus one is fine for hunting and plinking, but limited for defense.

It is sad that Ruger discontinued this gem. With the right ammo it is about as handy a fast firing carbine as one would want.

 

[ElToro]

I have an older no warning barrel. It's dead on at 50ish yards with winchester white box 240 grains. I have a fixed leupold 3 power on it. As noted It's a bear to take apart and clean and God forbid you break a part ruger quit making parts years ago.

 

[Captcurt]

The fake word "boolits" makes my skin crawl.

Boolits translates to a lead bullet as opposed to a jacketed.

 

[CraigC]

Maybe the semi-auto is different, but I had 96/44 for a little while that was miserable with full power loads. Between the light weight of the gun and the crescent stock, it was unpleasant.

Ruger has never used a crescent butt on anything. The rifles in question have a carbine style buttplate. I'm surprised it's a complaint considering the soft recoil of a .44Mag rifle.

Boolits translates to a lead bullet as opposed to a jacketed.

"Boolit" is a silly, made-up term used by casters to differentiate their home grown cast bullets from commercial bullets and to exude some level of superiority over those who do not cast.

 

[Jason_W]

Ruger has never used a crescent butt on anything. The rifles in question have a carbine style buttplate. I'm surprised it's a complaint considering the soft recoil of a .44Mag rifle.

Terminology aside the buttstock is still hard, curved, and miserable.

http://www.gunbroker.com/Auction/ViewItem.aspx?Item=470771392

I had a similar gripe about a Rossi M92 I had for a little bit. After that I resolved to never again own a gun that had anything except a nice flat buttstock.


I wouldn't exactly call a full power .44 mag a soft kicker out of a 5-1/4 lb carbine, but felt recoil is fairly subjective.

 

[tech30528]

I thought about one on those for hunting too. I'm a big fan of the 10 22 so thought it would be a nice addition. Sight lines here in the north Georgia mountains are typically short and we hunt deer, wild hog and coyotes. Ballistically there is little difference between 44mag from a carbine and a 30 30 so I saved a bunch of money and went with the later.

 

[kBob]

All words are made up words and languages are in flux.....outside of France.

Back to the topic. I once came across some commercial reloads made fairly locally at a police supply house in Central Florida that were basically .44 Magnum loads in .44 Special cases. Because of the heavy recoil, gap splash and muzzle flash I did not even finish one cylinder full of that ammo that was sold as .44 Special. There was appearently supposed to be a warning sticker on the box warning it was only for use in the Ruger carbine. I was told using these loads the rifle held one more round than normal and that it cycled fine with it.......I am just glad it did not damage my .44 SPL revolver. I pulled the bullets dumped the powder and reloaded the cases with my normal middle of the road .44 SPL load for use in my revolver.

When the .44 Auto Mag came out I wondered if the older tube fed Ruger might be modified to use that in say the 18 round Thompson riot control magazine (yeah like those were growing on trees!) or even AutoMag magazines.

Something Mini-14-ish in .44 or .357 Auto Mag might be interesting as well.....

It is sometimes difficult to keep track of whether folks are writing about the tube fed earlier guns or the more recent rotary mag guns and even whether lever guns or semi auto and some folks toss in the bolt guns.

-kBob

 

[TexasPatriot.308]

I am a Ruger fanatic and own several, actually owned by God and loaned to me, got several M77s mainly longer range rifles, here lately the .44 mag 77/44 has become my favorite...love it, right now it goes in my jeep or pickup when I go check cows, overrun with hogs and it works great in the brush and creek bottoms when I go in looking for calves, always walk up on hogs. it does a helluva job, other rifles that go with me areusually .308s or 7mm-08 or whatever looks good in the safe, but always, always take a sidearm usually .44 mag or .45 colt, that's what made me want a pistol caliber carbine. gonna go out tomorrow, feed cows and kill a few more hogs.

 

[CraigC]

I had one of the older ones made from cast metal of some sort ( not a good quality metal).

That's curious, the original .44 carbine receivers were machined from a solid billet of steel.

I wouldn't exactly call a full power .44 mag a soft kicker out of a 5-1/4 lb carbine, but felt recoil is fairly subjective.

I've been shooting .44 leverguns for nearly 20yrs and one of the things I noticed first was how softly it recoiled, as well as the moderate muzzle blast. Much more pleasant than the .30-30.

Terminology aside the buttstock is still hard, curved, and miserable.

Terminology matters. In this case, it's matters a lot.

Carbine:


Crescent: