Ruger hawkeye mkii opinions

WhelanLad

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I'm chasing your honest opinion on the Hawkeye mkII from Ruger..


I have one.. I have my opinion, but I want to hear yours..


PS- is there any way to lighten such beast?

WL
 
I really like the Ruger 77 MK II design. I have owned several.

My experience has been that as time goes on, Ruger does less and less to smooth out the sharp edges left from any machining.
Some of the examples I have owned or handled in the past few years have had some seriously sharp edges.
 
The MKII is not a Hawkeye and the Hawkeye is not a MKII... they are guns of different eras with different design subtlties. The LC-6 trigger was introduce with the Hawkeye model, but I personally prefer the MKII "lawyerized" trigger after I have worked on it... for the most part, I dislike the Hawkeye matte finishes in both stainless and blued... but the "satin" blued finish is nice... I prefer the MKII "bright" stainless and deep blue finishes... I also believe fit and finish is better (in general) on the MKII guns.

What do you mean by "lighten the beast" are you referring to the trigger pull or the physical weight? Trigger jobs are simply done... as for the physical weight, M77's are robust builds (I like that), so weight reduction will primarily come from the stock, barrel contour and barrel length... if weight is an issue start with the Ultralight (RL) model as the 20" pencil barrel and smaller contoured stock save about 20 ounces out of the box over the Standard model (R).

I own M77's in many calibers and most versions, including the Stadard (R), Ultralight (RL), Iron sighted (RS), International (RSI), Express RS, Safari Magnum (RSM) all of my rifles are MKII's with the exception of an M77 RS 20" Carbine .358 Win which was never made in the MKII series... if it had been, I would jump on it.
 
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The MKII is not a Hawkeye and the Hawkeye is not a MKII... they are guns of different eras with differnt design subtlties. The LC-6 trigger was introduce with the Hawkeye model, but I personally prefer the MKII "lawyerized" trigger after I have worked on it... for the most part, I dislike the Hawkeye matte finishes in both stainless and blued... but the "satin" blued finish is nice... I prefer the MKII "bright" stainless and deep blue finishes... I also believe fit and finish is better (in general) on the MKII guns.

What do you mean by "lighten the beast" are you referring to the trigger pull or the physical weight? Trigger jobs are simply done... as for the physical weight, M77's are robust builds (I like that), so weight reduction will primarily come from the stock, barrel contour and barrel length... if weight is an issue start with the Ultralight (RL) model as the 20" pencil barrel and smaller comtoured stock save about 20 ounces out of the box over the Standard model (R).

I own M77's in many calibers and most versions, including the Stadard (R), Ultralight (RL), Iron sighted (RS), International (RSI), Express RS, Safari Magnum (RSM) all of my rifles are MKII's with the exception of an M77 RS 20" Carbine .358 Win which was never made in the MKII series... if it had been, I would jump on it.

Yes sir! I,too,have an RSI,an Ultralight RL and Hawkeye all weather SS. Unbelievable tack drivers,the best I've ever owned.
 
The MKII is not a Hawkeye and the Hawkeye is not a MKII... they are guns of different eras with different design subtlties. The LC-6 trigger was introduce with the Hawkeye model, but I personally prefer the MKII "lawyerized" trigger after I have worked on it... for the most part, I dislike the Hawkeye matte finishes in both stainless and blued... but the "satin" blued finish is nice... I prefer the MKII "bright" stainless and deep blue finishes... I also believe fit and finish is better (in general) on the MKII guns.

What do you mean by "lighten the beast" are you referring to the trigger pull or the physical weight? Trigger jobs are simply done... as for the physical weight, M77's are robust builds (I like that), so weight reduction will primarily come from the stock, barrel contour and barrel length... if weight is an issue start with the Ultralight (RL) model as the 20" pencil barrel and smaller contoured stock save about 20 ounces out of the box over the Standard model (R).

I own M77's in many calibers and most versions, including the Stadard (R), Ultralight (RL), Iron sighted (RS), International (RSI), Express RS, Safari Magnum (RSM) all of my rifles are MKII's with the exception of an M77 RS 20" Carbine .358 Win which was never made in the MKII series... if it had been, I would jump on it.

Pretty good summary..... The M77 action is a beefy one, so pretty hard to make a truly light rifle out of it.......

I am pretty sure the MKII frontier was made in .358...... Either that or I spent a lot of time searching for a unicorn..... Lol
 
I don't have any of the MKII's but have half a dozen Hawkeye's. One of the best rifles in it's price range in my opinion. Love all of mine and have no intention of parting with any of them.
 
Pretty good summary..... The M77 action is a beefy one, so pretty hard to make a truly light rifle out of it.......

I am pretty sure the MKII frontier was made in .358...... Either that or I spent a lot of time searching for a unicorn..... Lol

You are right, it was made in 358... I remember because while I was trying to decide between that and 338 federal, they stopped making both!
 
The MKII is not a Hawkeye and the Hawkeye is not a MKII... they are guns of different eras with different design subtlties. The LC-6 trigger was introduce with the Hawkeye model, but I personally prefer the MKII "lawyerized" trigger after I have worked on it...

I've owned a M77-MarkII that had the LC-6 trigger from factory. It was a stainless compact in 223.
 
Had a Hawkeye in .257 Roberts. Good, solid, accurate rifles. The action feels like a bank vault locking up. Solid as ten rocks.
I found the trigger okay at best; I had planned to swap it out but then sold the rifle in a fit of madness.
 
I am pretty sure the MKII frontier was made in .358...... Either that or I spent a lot of time searching for a unicorn..... Lol

I have owned two Frontier's in .358, one stainless and one blued... but the Frontier rifles do not use a light contour barrel... they are short at 16.5" but are actually quite beefy.
 
I've owned a M77-MarkII that had the LC-6 trigger from factory. It was a stainless compact in 223.

In the changeover period many MKII's had LC-6 triggers factory installed and also many of the Lipsey's special runs are denoted "MKII" and have the LC-6 triggers also... but that was not the norm for the 15 years of full production MKII's.
 
PS- is there any way to lighten such beast?

WL

You're just getting spoiled by that Kimber. Take the Ruger up a few hills before your muscles atrophy.

I've had a couple of tang safety Rugers, but only one MKII... generally unimpressed. Big gaps in the inletting (rain gutters), and the action was so rough I never did manage to polish it enough to stop it from binding. I would start to think I was making progress, then compared it to one of my Mausers. I finally gave up and let it be someone else's problem.
 
Here is my 12 year old son's tang safety 77. It was bought used and it had been lightened by having a Winchester fwt contour barrel installed and a Brown Precision stock.

 
I've had a couple of tang safety Rugers, but only one MKII... generally unimpressed. Big gaps in the inletting (rain gutters), and the action was so rough I never did manage to polish it enough to stop it from binding.

I have had more than a 100 M77's and that has never been my experience.
 
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