Ruger RH. How Prevalent are FTF Issues? Poll.

My Redhawk goes bang every time I pull the trigger.
It gets fed a diet of reloads with Win LP primers or CCI Magnums.

As was stated above, the majority of misfires in these revolvers relate to a lower weight spring being installed to provide a better trigger pull.
Ultimately this leads to less energy imparted to the hammer and "may" lead to light strikes.
One way to help avoid this is to remove things that rob the hammer of energy during it's fall. The easiest way is through the addition of hammer shims. They keep the hammer centered in the frame channel and prevent scrubbing off energy when the hammer rubs the frame.

IMHO futzing around with the spring in the Redhawk is asking for problems. I would prefer to have lots of extra energy to impart to the firing pin than be on the hairy edge of not quite enough. A good polishing of the action and all of the places where there is moving metal to metal contact is one great way to get a much nicer trigger pull without changing the spring out. Throw in a set of trigger shims as well and you can get an exceptionally nice trigger pull where you don't notice the slightly heavier weight, without giving up reliability.

I have 3 RedHawks, 2 45's and one 44. I have had misfires with one 45 only, and it was purchased used after having "custom" work performed. Probably the reason it was priced in can't pass it up range. I did, as had been mentioned, some file work on the hammer making the step for the transfer bar less deep. Problem solved. The 44 has countless thousands of rounds fired with no misfires.

The other stock 45 has not been fired more tha 100 rounds so not really enough to evaluate.

Dan

I have never had a fail to fire in any of my 6 Redhawks. I have a 7.5" 6 shot 357, a 5.5" 357 that was converted to 357 Bain and Davis, an older 41 Mag, 4" 44 Mag, 5.5" 44 Mag and a new 8 shot 357.
Actually, I should mention that I did wear out the timing of the 4" 44 Mag after about 15K rounds, and sometimes it would tail to fire because the primers were not being hit on center.

I have an old blued RH from around 1985. Absolute workhorse. It's shot every load imaginable and never misfired. Thousands of rounds without a hitch. Now my oldest son puts it through the paces. It's still tight like new.

With factory internals, I have never been able to create a misfire in a Redhawk. I have serviced a handful of customer revolvers with misfire problems with lightened springs, but it took a minimal amount of fitting of other parts to get them running properly.

For consideration, one of my Redhawks is an SRH cylinder conversion, running 454casull with rifle primers - and it's still 100% reliable, even with lightened springs.

I have owned 3 and never had any problems with them.

Have a 80's era Redhawk over time {early 2000's} it began to FTF tried everything shaved hammer heavy mainspring still no 100% solution. Sent it to Ruger they pretty much rebuilt it, still occasional FTF, could not have that as it my main hunting revolver. Ended up sending it to Hamilton Bowen to have a extended firing pin installed and extra heavy mainspring. Since then it has been 100% reliable. My reloading records show I have put just under 15K bullets down the bore.

Jeff

I would like to thank all of you for your thoughtful comments. I just placed my order for the 4 inch, 45 LC model (non-convertible) and I'm really looking forward to it.

I had problem of weak primer strike with redhawk about 25 years of so ago. Ruger could not find problem at first, but eventually found it was the relationship of transfer bar to the hammer. You might specifically ask Ruger to check that area. good luck.

I have a new Redhawk 45 colt / 45 acp that is bone stock that is having light primer strikes in DA mode. I know Ruger will fix it but it is frustrating because the last gun I bought just a couple months before this was an sp101 match champion that had to go back to Ruger, could not be fixed so they replaced it. I have owned over 2 dozen rugers for decades and they have been trouble free, but two bad ones in a row has me wonder what is going on w quality control at ruger these days.

My current .45 Colt/ACP is my fifth Redhawk and zero problem with any of them.

Nary a problem with either of mine.......

BPGuy said:

I got one of the Redhawk .45 Colt/ACP revolvers when they were pretty new. Lots of failures to fire, both single and double. I returned it, and received a call informing that it was "irreparable", excessive head space and something wrong with the firing pin channel. They sent me a new revolver, I haven't had any problems with it other than when I had a 12 lb. Wolff main spring installed. Can't blame that on the gun.

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I'm having problems with my convertible as described. After trying a different spring ( Bad idea) I put the original back. It will misfire on single action with CCI primers. I may be contacting Bowen or ? to see if there is a reliable fix

I would (and did) send it back. If you want to fix it yourself, I think the answer may be an extra-length firing pin. I understand someone out there offers them, but can't say exactly who. Bowen would be a good place to start.