Have they fixed Ruger American Ranch Rifle's feeding problem???

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jrf
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Re: Have they fixed Ruger American Ranch Rifle's feeding problem???

Post by jrf »

300black wrote: When I bought mine the AR mag version wasn't available or I would have bought that for sure.
I can only say that in hindsight..as I should have researched a bit more on the RAR...who would have thought that a simple flush box mag would have been such a problem. 4 Rounds perfect for hunting for him, but not feeding reliably is not good. Otherwise the rifle is amazing. With my Barnes 110 reloads it's 1/2" groups at 100.

I bit the bullet and ordered a Lucky 13 mag. Based on how it comes apart, I'm kind of hoping I'll be able to remove the bottom half and use the follower and spring in the top half and see if I can use just the top half to hold 3-4 rounds. It won't stick out as much and as long as it feeds reliably...that will be my solution.
300black
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Re: Have they fixed Ruger American Ranch Rifle's feeding problem???

Post by 300black »

jrf wrote:
300black wrote: When I bought mine the AR mag version wasn't available or I would have bought that for sure.
I can only say that in hindsight..as I should have researched a bit more on the RAR...who would have thought that a simple flush box mag would have been such a problem. 4 Rounds perfect for hunting for him, but not feeding reliably is not good. Otherwise the rifle is amazing. With my Barnes 110 reloads it's 1/2" groups at 100.

I bit the bullet and ordered a Lucky 13 mag. Based on how it comes apart, I'm kind of hoping I'll be able to remove the bottom half and use the follower and spring in the top half and see if I can use just the top half to hold 3-4 rounds. It won't stick out as much and as long as it feeds reliably...that will be my solution.

Mine was having so many problems chambering a round and 2 magazines broke I got tired of it and sent it in. I told them if it can't be fixed to please send me the same rifle with the AR mag version. We'll see how Ruger's customer service is.
exexex
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Re: Have they fixed Ruger American Ranch Rifle's feeding problem???

Post by exexex »

Nimrod has what fixed one of my mags. WARNING: Doing what I describe might stop Ruger from sending you a replacement, but I like experimenting, so it doesn't matter to me that much.

I had same thing on one of my RAR 300 BO mags. The original mag never hung up bad and smoothed out to working just fine after about 100 rounds. However, I bought a 2nd mag and, even after 200 rounds, the first of fully loaded rounds would almost always jam nose-up into the chamber (oddly, running the bolt SLOWLY from open bolt after inserting mag with open bolt seemed to help: I think it allowed the round to pop out of the 'mag hang' with enough lag to get centered by the bolt and chambered, instead of overrun by the bolt and jammed).

So I messed with it. Could not figure out what was going on until I ran a test a few dozen times which led me to what seems to have fixed it. The test is to take the mag and load it up (test will work with just 1 round, but more pronounced with 5). Start pushing the round forward with a thumb or finger on the rim end of the round. Mine would get noticeably stuck just as the nose was starting to rise over the mag front. I really had to shove it to get it to move and then it popped out.

I've not shot with the fix yet, but the rounds no longer get stuck during my manual testing like they used to.

FIX (like Nimrod said):
As I was trying to figure this out, I compared it to my mag that works. I noticed that working mag's lips were slightly wider for the first half inch or so near the front (about to the 'o' in 'load' of the 'Top Load' stamped in the side of the mag). It's very slight (like posterboard thickness), but that's the spot on the bad mag where the base of the case was when it got stuck. So I got out a small, fine flat file (nail file or emery cloth would probably work in a pinch) and gently took off very small amount of the first part of both feed lips as described.

Now it no longer hangs the bullet during my manual test. Another improvement is that loading the rounds got instantly easier: more than just from exercising the spring.

The roughness you describe may well have something to do with the feed lips dragging. But this RAR and a 762x39 RAR I've had for a while are not as smooth as an older Savage 223 rifle I have. May have something to do with having 3 locking lugs vs. 2 and the shorter bolt throw. But given the price and accuracy I've seen with both RAR's, I'm happy.

I got the flush mag version of the RAR BO because I liked it for the bench shooting I do and as gun-grabber mag-silliness insurance.
jrf
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Re: Have they fixed Ruger American Ranch Rifle's feeding problem???

Post by jrf »

300black wrote: Mine was having so many problems chambering a round and 2 magazines broke I got tired of it and sent it in. I told them if it can't be fixed to please send me the same rifle with the AR mag version. We'll see how Ruger's customer service is.
If you don't mind please report back here with how that goes. Got my replacement mag yesterday...same issues. Won't feed 220SMKs or 110tac-tx...basically the two loads I use.
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svh
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Re: Have they fixed Ruger American Ranch Rifle's feeding problem???

Post by svh »

I purchased a RAR about 3 or 4 years ago, before the AR mag model came out, and musta got a good one ….. I have about 1000 rounds through it, using 2 different factory mags, with very few malfs. All factory loads I've tried have fed very reliably.

The only feeding problems I have had were with extremely short OAL rounds, such as the 90gn XTP subs I was experimenting with, (never could get the shorty's to feed) and some 245gn RNFP coated subs, but got these heavy weights to feed pretty reliably by tweaking the OAL.
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TRshootem
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Re: Have they fixed Ruger American Ranch Rifle's feeding problem???

Post by TRshootem »

I had one mag out of 3-4 that caused the round to point too high, causing the same feeding issue described. I used a conical sanding stone from my Dremel kit to relieve the front of this mag slightly...carefully. Works much better with cast and coated flat nose subs. The other mags I have purchased all feed well, with a occasional bolt pause to finish chambering a round.
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thisguysguns
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Re: Have they fixed Ruger American Ranch Rifle's feeding problem???

Post by thisguysguns »

From what I can tell, looking at the new ranch rifle design that takes AR mags, the bolt itself has relief cuts milled into it for proper function. Such cuts are not present on the original ranch rifles. So no dice getting a new stock and bottom metal for the AR mags.
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jrf
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Re: Have they fixed Ruger American Ranch Rifle's feeding problem???

Post by jrf »

Got my Lucky 13 mag....works perfectly. Honestly, Ruger just needs to make a better quality flush fit mag. This one was pricey..but it works. I really only need one that works. Would be nice to have a flush fit that worked though.
ironhead7544
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Re: Have they fixed Ruger American Ranch Rifle's feeding problem???

Post by ironhead7544 »

I have the Lucky 13 10 round mag and it works just fine. I think they make a 5 shot conversion.

I have 2 Ruger mags and they will only feed when loaded with 3 rounds. Tried the mods posted on Youtube with negative results.

The AR-15 version was not available when I bought the rifle. Wish it had been.
exexex
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Re: Have they fixed Ruger American Ranch Rifle's feeding problem???

Post by exexex »

ironhead7544 wrote:I have the Lucky 13 10 round mag and it works just fine. I think they make a 5 shot conversion.

I have 2 Ruger mags and they will only feed when loaded with 3 rounds. Tried the mods posted on Youtube with negative results.

The AR-15 version was not available when I bought the rifle. Wish it had been.
Ironhead: How much did it cost (I was seeing $125 on their site, assume Australian)? What site did you order it from? Did not see any U.S. distributors listed and quick search of a few sites here did not find any listed for sale.

FOLLOW UP:
As a follow-up to my previous post in this thread. I test-fired my fix (feed-lip filing). It was much better. Out of 80 rounds, only 4 hung up and all only on initial round when mag was fully loaded with 5. Not great, but much better. This time, the ones that hung up were when I slow-cycled the bolt. Go figure.

Not sure if further tweaking of the feed-lip relief will help. May experiment later.
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