My Imagination?

[roy reali]

I was In Reno today and decided to stop at one of the gun shops. These guys have many of their rifles displayed out on the floor for customers to look at and handle. I was looking through the Ruger Bolt Action Section. I was looking at the sales tags to see the chamberings and the prices. One caught my eye.

The tag said the chambering was a .358 Winchester. When I got home I thumbed through some of my reloading manuals to check out that cartridge. Not too shabby. Then I went to the Ruger website and could not find any of their rifles in that chambering.

Did I misread the tag or did ruger ever chamber their bolt action rifle in .358 Winchester? It was a factory new gun.

Does anyone have any experience with this round?

 

[LaserSpot]

Was it a "scout" rifle? This would be perfect for deer in the woods of Michigan.

Sturm, Ruger & Company, Inc. (NYSE: RGR), is proud to announce two significant additions to the family of Ruger® Target Grey M77 Mark II Frontier rifles. The compact, fast-handling Ruger M77 Mark II Frontier rifle, with its distinct barrel rib for forward-mounting of intermediate-eye-relief scopes, is now available in the new .338 Federal and tried and true .358 Winchester.

The Target Grey Ruger M77 Mark II Frontier rifle features a weather-resistant, glare-reducing stainless steel barrel and action, complemented by a durable, non-warping, grey laminated wood stock. In addition to .338 Federal and .358 Winchester calibers, this model is still offered in .243 Winchester, 7mm-08 Remington, and .308 Winchester.

http://www.chuckhawks.com/ruger_frontier_press_release.htm

 

[Norrick]

http://www.ruger.com/products/m77HawkeyeAfrican/models.html

all I could find was this in .338 win mag. Sometimes a 3 looks alot like a 5 depending on a persons writing. And its also entirely possible that it was chambered in .358, but Ruger changes their offerings. The website would only show the newest products. I wouldnt say they change it "often" but semi-frequently. Usually they just add new chamberings or barrel lengths, but sometimes they do take away.

 

[roklok]

Not your imagination, Ruger has chambered the 77 in .358 Winchester at times through the years. Usually in limited runs. There are numerous ones on Gunbroker right now. The tang safety models in .358 seem to be the rarest.

 

[oneoldsap]

Excellent Deer Rifle !

Snag it , they are hard to come by at a decent price and haven't been made since the 80s !

 

[roy reali]

re:Laserspot

It is not a "Scout" model. It is a standard model with a synthetic stock. I called the shop to confirm what I saw. The gun is still there and it is chambered in .358 Winchester. I might go back there this weekend. If it is still there, I will pick it up.

I have been looking at the ballistics for this round. Pretty impressive!

 

[Gunplummer]

I have one in a lever action and it is not some thing you want to spend a couple of hours at the range with. It shoots O.K. if you reload. I don't remember anyone that told me they got good results with factory ammo.

 

[ARDogman]

My dad has a BLR in .358, it shoots well enough. 1.5-ish MOA. Nice rifle.

 

[HKFan9]

Just another caliber thats hard to find ammo for to me. I have seen the Rugers in .358 but unless there is ammo available at most stores I can walk into, I stay away from them. A .308 will kill a deer just as well IMO, or the .30-06.

 

[Crankylove]

Ruger Hawkeye............Stainless w/synthetic stock in .358 Winchester.

Excellent gun.......I have one, and have yet to be disappointed in it. Got a few odd looks when people found out I had to order one a couple years back, since no one around had one in stock........but it is an excellent short-medium range cartridge. Plenty of oomph, with pretty mild recoil.

As stated above, Ruger will make run every few years, and the brass makers follow along making brass when they happen to feel like it, which makes finding brass a pain sometimes.........but, it is super easy to form from .308, so its not really a big deal.