Gold Label Shotgun

[ceadermtnboy]

Who owns a Gold Label? I have read a lot of negative posts regarding the GL, but also quite a bit of positive by actual owners. I think it is a very slick looking gun and shot a sporting clays course with one I used to own. The recoil was brutal (100 shots) but it handled nicely and was awesome on fast rising clays. I have started hunting quail and have long since sold my GL for a little profit. Thinking about trying to find another, but thought I would see what other owners opinions are?

Do they hunt well?
Thoughts on long term durability?
Long Term value? Today's range $2800.00 - $3500.00

Thanks!

 

[WMB30]

I have a GL of the U persuasion

Bill

 

[ceadermtnboy]

Bill, what is U persuasion? Do you shoot it much? If so , do you like it?
Art

 

[wwb]

Shotguns are a very personal thing.... you don't AIM a shotgun, you POINT it. If it fits you properly, it shoots where you're looking; otherwise.... well..... it doesn't. Hence the adjustable comb and adjustable buttplate on serious trap, skeet, and sporting clays guns (except for the guys who have a $$$$$ custom fit Wenig stock).

I tried a Gold Label once, and couldn't hit a barn at 10 paces with it. As you mentioned, the recoil was pretty snappy - a result of too much drop at the heel.

If you're a quail hunter, a 20 gauge would be preferable to a 12 - lighter weight means a lot after a few miles, and a 20 packs all the punch you need for grouse and quail. A good stout 20 gauge load will even work for pheasants. For a lot less than the money you're looking at for a Gold Label, you could get a Beretta or Browning over/under... or find a used SKB 85.

 

[Rick Courtright]

For a lot less than the money you're looking at for a Gold Label, you could get a Beretta or Browning over/under... or find a used SKB 85.

Hi,

Good advice!

Even putting aside my bias toward Browning shotguns, any of those three brands have parts and service readily available, and none of them has a reputation for being a "buy it, take it out of the box, put it back in the box, return it to the factory and they'll make it right" kind of piece, a special feature Ruger's convinced people equates to good customer service. To me, good customer service means never having to say "I sent it back." I got the impression Ruger pretty much disowned the GL as for support just about the time the last one came off the line. If that's true--I dunno, or really care--it's a serious consideration. Doing some homework there is a good idea.

Rick C

 

[eastbank]

I have a older 1978 browning 20ga bss sporter that has shot many thousands of shell thru three generations of hunters with out a bobble, other than cleaning over the years. that I would put up against any ruger GL.

 

[DGW1949]

$2800-$3500 for a Ruger SG which when ya get right down to it, was/is a failed design.?...You got to be kidding me.
No thanks, I'll just keep my old Remington 1100's and call it good. :lol:

DGW

 

[wwb]

Forgot to mention.... any mid-priced to high-dollar shotgun (about $1500 or more) will also have cast-on or cast-off for a right handed or left handed shooter, while the Gold Label, despite the price, has a neutral stock.

It's your money, and your choice, but my 2 cents worth is that, aside from a collectible that you hope to return a profit on, the Gold Label is a waste of money. This comes from somebody who is a serious shotgunner and has a fair number of older Rugers, and used to have a good deal of brand loyalty (not so much any more).

 

[ceadermtnboy]

Good points made! 20 gauge may be something to look in to. I also must have a SST as I don't do well using double triggers. anyone with positive GL experience?

 

[WMB30]

ceadermtnboy--- The U is a prefix to the serial number. My understanding is Ruger does this if the gun was displayed at a show,convention etc. There may be other reasons I am not aware of. When I purchased the gun several years ago it looked as NIB as it does today. Yes I fired gun on a round of sporting clays,94X100. I am not felt recoil sensitive and nothing unusual noted. In years past (getn' old) shot sporting clays competitively with a ported Browning O/U. Will say the GL has much less muzzle blast. I like the GL, excellent wood, a nice light handling SXS. Cleaned it and it sits in the safe.

Bill

 

[steveodtw]

I am not a great shotgunner, but I love my Gold Label. It is absolutely the finest gun I own. I've hunted pheasant and partridge with it and its a dream to carry at 6.5 lbs. I've shot sporting clays and a pheasant tower shoot and it performed perfectly. Even scored some doubles on that tower shoot. On those high-round outings I wear a strap-on shoulder recoil pad with no problems. I knew when I bought it it would not be a safe queen.

My understanding of Bill Ruger's last pet project was that they could not get the final hand-fitting of the barrels down to a reasonably economical manufacturing process. I figure the only "defect" is that I got a hand-fitted shotgun from Ruger at their unprofitable price.

 

[egl52]

I have one and love it also. I wouldn't say that I've used it a lot - maybe 500 rounds through it so far - but it has been reliable to this point. You buy a 6.5 lb side by side 12 gauge with no recoil pad for hunting, not for high-volume clay shooting, and for hunting it's about perfect.

 

[The Norseman]

I have one of the Circa 2004, Rare Ruger Gold Label
"Dickinson Style Action" Side by Side Lever Action
Shotgun with two Right and Left Charge Holes for
12 gauge shotgun shells.

English style straight grip. Paper thin changeable
choke tubes (skeet, improved cylinder, modified,
full). Extremely light weight shotgun.

Mine is basically used only used during the Pheasant Season,
here in South Dakota.

I'm not a Shotgun type person, but when I first seen it
in the Ruger Catalog, I think 2001, I had to have it.

I really like the Gold Label, and it is treated with the utmost
care. I shoot Store bought Clay Pigeons with my Thrower
once in awhile. I can hit the targets pretty good with the
Skeet/Imp Cyl choke tubes (so I leave them in).

 

[ceadermtnboy]

Nice, Finally some owners showed up. Looks like there are good and bad points. I can say that I do wish I had kept mine as they are harder to find and more $$$ now. Not that the 2200.00 I paid for mine was cheap back in 2005. I put only 250 or so rounds through the one I had, and other than stout recoil it handled nice and functioned perfectly. I wish they had made a real go with it and produced a 20 gauge example. Ill have to keep my eyes open and maybe a reasonable one will show up. In the mean time, I have looked at a couple of Italian 20 guage SXS shotguns, but they are plus $3,000.00. I would like to run into a BSS or SKB with a strait grip.

Having said all of that, The Gold Label was a cool shotgun.. to bad it didn't work out for Ruger.

 

[gunzo]

There were 4 SKB 280's in 20 ga. on Gunbroker when I started typing this. They are the straight gripped models. Older fixed choke guns but are IC & IC, great for quail & such. They were well made, dependable guns.

 

[Mike Armstrong]

I got a pistol-gripped GL from my brother for a retirement gift in 2005. He got the straight-gripped one because of its cool look, but knew I didn't like them. He isn't much of a hunter and not much of a scattergunner either, so he gave it to his best friend, who is both.

I only use mine for hunting in areas where the ground is flattish and the shots likely to be open, like Kansas and the CA Coachella Valley and similar terrain. I'm not a target shooter.

The nice thing about the GL is that it's a 12 that you can carry all day. It DOES kick--I tried mine for two rounds of trap without the slip-on pad that I normally use (the factory LOP is a little short for my ape-hanger arms). At the end of the day, I thought "RUGER" must have been permanently stamped on my right shoulder.....

But with most bird hunting you don't shoot that much and it's nice to be able to walk for six hours and still be able to mount the gun while the birds are still in reasonable range. Always a compromise with shotguns.

Mine has probably shot a thousand rounds of field ammo since I got it and killed a lot of birds, pheasant, quail, partidges of both kinds, grouse ruffed and blue. I love it BUT (Mike's big butt):

It is too light for 3" magnums. I don't know why Ruger put 3" chambers on such a light gun, but unless your central nervous system is stronger than mine. magnums will induce a flinch.

The barrels are too thin for hunting in rocky terrain like our CA Coast Range canyons. If you whack those barrels on a boulder, you will at least need a real pro to remove the dent. If you whack the choke tube area, you may need a real genius to remove the tube and repair the area. The gun would be a perfect chukar killer except that making the barrels durable enough for rocky terrain would make it too heavy to chase those little bastards up and down the ridges. Compromise.

Mine has been absolutely mechanically reliable so far. I don't torture-test it with trap marathons and I keep it clean and remove and grease the tubes frequently. It all works like a charm.

Would I pay $3000 plus for one? I couldn't afford them when they were less than half that new. As much as I love mine as a gift, I'd say they were a great experiment like the Hawkeye handgun. While I'm glad Ruger made the effort, I think it was a noble failure.

I don't buy guns as "investments". My heirs can figure that dull stuff out--I shoot em all.

The real SHOOTING investment in Ruger shotguns is an RL 28. Not as pretty as a GL but a vicious little killer. They shoulda made it in stainless and called it "The Ermine."

 

[WAYNO]

My answer is from a different angle.

I owned a Gold Label, and two Red Labels. They were safe queens that only saw the light of day at display shows.

For a $1500 side-by-side, I thought it was exquisite. And maybe too exquisite for me to carry in the field, so I never did. It would have been a wonderful gun to carry, if I owned a plantation in the South, or a corn field in North Dakota. Not so much for sliding down canyon slides in Oregon, chasing Chukar birds.

Now, these Gold Labels are upwards of 3-Grand. Are they worth it? Yep they are, since that is what folks are willing to pay.

Back to my original thought, the Gold Label being exquisite. Yes it was, for a $1500 gun. If I compared it to a high dollar double, it would not compare. That's why my qualification, "for a $1500 gun". The original concept, a nice double at a working mans price was huge. And apparently unrealistic, even for Ruger's mass production.

 

[Jeremy Pearce]

So many critical responses, and yet only a minority of posters seem to be owners of Gold Labels or shooters, as opposed to collectors.

I am an owner of a Gold Label who has put 12,000-plus rounds through my gun. To my eye, it's a well-designed shotgun with few peers in the price range.

Has it been flawless? No. Some trigger problems and doubling. Sent the gun back to Ruger for a fix, but that's not possible any more. Parts are hard, if not impossible, to find. Broke an ejector, which was repaired with some effort by a good gunsmith.

Choke tubes "flying out" of barrels may be a fallacy raised by those who have failed to tighten them regularly. Barrel regulation in my gun is excellent...contrary to some reports about wacky regulation.

Should you buy one for $3K vs an Italian or Spanish gun?

Hard question to answer. I like mine, and intend to keep it for a long time.

 

[wwb]

..........
I am an owner of a Gold Label who has put 12,000-plus rounds through my gun. To my eye, it's a well-designed shotgun with few peers in the price range.

Has it been flawless? No. Some trigger problems and doubling. Sent the gun back to Ruger for a fix, but that's not possible any more. Parts are hard, if not impossible, to find. Broke an ejector, which was repaired with some effort by a good gunsmith............

Not sure if your gun is an aberration or not, but if that history is typical for a Gold Label, it's a pretty sorry shotgun for that kind of price.

12,000 rounds is more than I have heard of anyone else putting through a GL.... there are a few hunters with nowhere near that round count, but the guns are mostly collectors items. That said, I sent my SKB 85TSS in for a tune-up a couple years ago (new firing pins, firing pin springs, hammer springs, and trunnions) after about 500,000 rounds. It was still working fine, but with summer approaching, I didn't want to chance having something fail and be without the gun for a couple weeks. At the time it was purchased (early 90s) it's price was comparable to what the GL would later be priced at. That's 500,000 rounds with zero problems - and that is typical for a mid-priced shotgun (except some recent Browning Cynergy shotguns have had problems - 3 at my club alone - but Browning fixed them and they've been fine since).

 

[ceadermtnboy]

My take so far. Owners tend to like them. Non owners have strong opinions against the GL. The truth lies somewhere in the middle (my guess). Even though I put limited rounds through the first one I owned. I feel like it was a nice gun compared to my old Remington SXS and my 1908 LC smith. Again the SST and strait stock helps me a lot! 3K is a lotta mulah so gotta make sure the pride of ownership (cool factor) and future value is worth it. Thanks for all the posts!