It is troubling that Ruger is shipping guns with such glaringly visible defects. I will be holding onto my older Ruger sixguns, and if I buy new, will do it at a large local dealer, where I can inspect before buying.
Picked it up yesterday. Broke it down this morning, lubed the bejesus out of it, dryfiring like crazy now. It was pretty good out of the box, but we'll see what some exercise will do. Spray it down tonight, get the bits out, reassemble and ready tomorrow.
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Well, shoot. As a long time 44 Special fan, I had been very tempted to buy a used S&W 696 on several occasions. I never 'pulled the trigger' because prices were quite high, approaching $1k on the last one I saw on auction a few years ago IIRC. (I don't know if anyone paid that.) I have several 44 Special wheel-guns and use my 329PD for launching 44 Specials, so thought that was the end of that. But now this new Ruger . . and under $600 from one local dealer. Hmmmm . . . I look forward to reading more on this thread.
Ran out of time to shoot it this last group of days off. Life happened. Maybe next week. This is my first big bore revolver. I have a couple of .45acp's but to be honest, they've never done much for me. The trigger smoothed out very nice after an evening of dry fire and another cleaning and lube. Green tubes never were my preference. I have some extra red pipes in the spares box, maybe swap those out...
Its been a few years, but IIRC people were warned against shooting 'vigorous' loads in the 696 because of the forcing cone not having all that much meat to it. I like a ~ 255gr Keith bullet doing 1000fps, myself. A good, solid general purpose field load that will do the job in 80% of the places I go to outdoors.
I'm not a fan of the unfluted cylinder, but its not a big deal. Except in J-frames, personal preference is for at least a 4" barrel - but 3" is fine.
I think I'll wait and see what others experiences are with this new Ruger. Its not like I 'need' another wheel-gun immediately.
Finally got to shoot it a bit today. All loads were 240gr Acme coated using Unique and 2400. Best loads were using Unique in the 7.5gr range. I as geting about 2"-2.5" at 15yds at my home range. Not the best, but conditions werent the best either. Clocked them at an average of 885fps. So befins the journey of finding the best load. I appreaciate all the previous write ups and will pick up some of the listed to experiment. First large bore handgun (besides the .45acp). Yes...it was fun.