Ruger was kind of "Proud" of this 50th DU

Hard to believe they would have shipped this special gun with the real engraving. Notice how proud the receiver wood is. If anyone else has one, how does their's compare

http://s263.photobucket.com/albums/ii122/golferboy426/Ruger%2050th%20DU/

Was the engraving done by Ruger? A lot of anniversary type guns are not factory done. Whatever corpration buys a lot of guns and then commision someone to do the engraving.The type of wood fit in the pics is not too uncommon with standard redlabels. My brother had a Gold Label that was similar. Cannot tell from the pics but what is the wood like? If factory I would expect higher grade wood and without question better fit.

This is one of the famous factory order of Ken Hurst engraved series guns with the nickle plated receiver. The wood is not great either for this special of a gun.

So it is one of those "collectibles" that ain't very special. Maybe they figured they could pretty up some ugly guns with the engraving so they could get rid of them. Or they were trying to meet a certain price point. Bill was the king of the penny pinching bean counters. Better fit and wood might of cost him a couple bucks profit.

mike7mm08 said:

So it is one of those "collectibles" that ain't very special. Maybe they figured they could pretty up some ugly guns with the engraving so they could get rid of them. Or they were trying to meet a certain price point. Bill was the king of the penny pinching bean counters. Better fit and wood might of cost him a couple bucks profit.

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It is suprising that the wood is "proud", but you may have a point there with the thought that Ruger wanted to get rid of them. Those Duck stamp 50th Anniversary DU Editions were chrome moly receivers. Ruger had problems with those receivers (I've heard they had cracking issues), so Ruger could very well have wanted to use them up on such a project.
Chet15

So it is one of those "collectibles" that ain't very special.

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That real hand engraving. Bet just the engraving couldn't be duplicated today for $2000

Nice engraving.

Engravers typically don't get the wood when they do the work, and since its all outsourced it really doesn't surprise me that much. All of my Red Labels and No. 1s have 'proud' wood. I hand fitted my 12 gauge Red Label that I use for Trap and it took about 3 hours to do. I will agree they should have spent the time on a special gun, but it doesn't surprise me that they didn't.

The engraving is nice and I am sure very expensive. But it is just lipstick on a pig. I would rather have toned down engraving and quality to match in other components of the gun. Of course if some one was willing to give it to me I would not complain. You want my address so you don't have to look at that sorry wood fit anymore :lol: :lol: :lol:

But it is just lipstick on a pig.

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Boy that's kind of harsh. For under 200 bucks I can have the stock fitted and you'd never know.

I've always thought Ruger should offer an upgraded wood & fit option but you need to remember Bill Sr business plan on shotguns.. they were made to be hunted except the sporting clays models which seem to have better wood.

My trap gun has nice fit but very ordinary wood.

Only the Gold Labels seem to have consistant good fit but that was Bill's baby

I have two sporting clays models, one had decent wood, the other was plain. I picked up a new stock from Numrich that was nicer than the original stock. Both of my No. 1s have nicer wood and fit.

They don't compare much to my Krieghoff, but thats to be expected!

golferboy426 said:

But it is just lipstick on a pig.

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Boy that's kind of harsh. For under 200 bucks I can have the stock fitted and you'd never know.

I've always thought Ruger should offer an upgraded wood & fit option but you need to remember Bill Sr business plan on shotguns.. they were made to be hunted except the sporting clays models which seem to have better wood.

My trap gun has nice fit but very ordinary wood.

Only the Gold Labels seem to have consistant good fit but that was Bill's baby

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I know a bite harsh but you gotta admit I am not too far off base. All the time and money was put into that engraving you would think there would of been at least an attempt to fit the wood a little better. As for the gold labels I have only seen two. My brother owned both of them, still has one. Wood fit was not as bad as your gun but was noticeable proud. The one he kept has nice tiger strip type grain. The one he sold had as much character and grain as a 2x4