Taming the BEAST
Ruger's Versatile Redhawk
A Whole Nother Ball Game...
When Ruger introduced its "Security Six" line of double-action revolvers in 1973, a lot of old S&W and Colt DA fans were what you might call reluctant to embrace them. It was anything but a traditional DA revolver. Luckily for me, I was young enough to be unfettered by tradition when I acquired my first one.
In those halcyon days there was a group of local pistoleros who met on Sunday afternoons for an informal bulls eye match. Camp Perry it wasn't, but there were several in our little group who had spent time on the firing lines there. These guys were equipped with the classic center-fire target guns of the day, and S&W Masterpieces and National Match Colts dominated the event. So when the goofy kid with the odd-looking Ruger placed high that day, people became interested in the gun. It lacked the fine trigger of the more expensive models, but the mechanical accuracy it possessed was impossible to ignore. I owned and carried a number of Security or Speed Sixes over the years, and they further reinforced my opinion that Bill Ruger knew how to build a stout, foolproof and very accurate double action revolver.
A .44 Ruger D/A at last...
When the .44 Magnum Redhawk was finally announced in '78, we knew we were getting a first-rate sixgun. The Redhawk debuted with some excellent features, like a crane lock and an easily replaceable front sight. While not as svelte as Smith & Wesson's big .44, the Redhawk was built like a tank. It also proved to be every bit as accurate as the Security Six had been.
So what did we gain over the Smith & Wesson offering? When Bill Ruger "overbuilt" the Redhawk, he provided us with a gun that is capable of handling an indefinite number of heavy .44 Magnum loads, and do it without "shooting loose". The Redhawk also has a significantly longer cylinder than most .44's, which allow advanced handloaders to seat the bullet further out- thereby increasing the available working space for the powder charge. We are talking loads beyond what the Model 29 will even chamber, much less handle without accelerated wear; some of these .44 loads approach the .454 Casull in raw power.
Just keep this in mind - YOU CAN WRECK ANY GUN if you push the limits too much. Get stupid with a Redhawk, and you will eventually destroy the gun and/or yourself on the process. You will just accomplish it a little more spectacularly than the fellow on the next range station. It is stupid to do so, and there is absolutely no reason or excuse for it. Buffalo Bore offers a "Redhawk only" .44 load that sends 340 grain bullets downrange at over 1400 fps. If you reload, stick to published loads. Hodgdon's Powder Company lists .44 Magnum loads that propel 325 grain bullets at around 1350 feet-per-second. If you need more power than these loads offer, there are pistol cartridges that will do it- and none of them are the .44 Magnum.
Besides, there is a lot more to the .44 Magnum than just full-power loads. If we are to enjoy the tremendous versatility inherent in these guns, we need to use them. More about that later...
The Cold, Objective eye...
Any look at the Redhawk should be an objective one, so let's just be honest about its faults. The blasted things are heavy, even in the shorter barrel lengths; poking them full of loads featuring a lot of powder and 300+ grain bullets don't make them any lighter, either. You'll need a good holster and sturdy belt to pack Big Red all day.
If the single-action triggers on the Security Sixes were less than perfect, the Redhawks were even worse. They are generally afflicted with significant over-travel after the break, and I'd be willing to wager that NO Ruger DA has ever left the factory with anything approaching a hair-trigger. No less an authority than Elmer Keith derided the Redhawk's SA trigger, when he first reviewed one for his column "Gun Notes" for the March, 1980 Guns & Ammo. Keith suggested that something needed to be done about the Redhawk's trigger, if we were ever going to realize its true accuracy potential. When Elmer talked, people listened- and it wasn't long before there were lighter replacement mainsprings offered for this gun. We later learned that the Redhawk's single-spring mechanism was not amenable to such treatment, and that misfires are almost sure to follow if you trifle with the factory spring weight. I leave the factory spring alone, having decided long ago that a half-pound more trigger pull beats the heck out of misfires.
That being said, I should add that there are some people who cannot be happy with a sensible pull weight. If you are one of them, leave the Redhawk alone. The author supplemented his patrolman's salary in the early 1980's by doing trigger-work on wide spectrum revolvers, for a friend who owned an Independence MO gun shop. The Redhawk taught me a lot about learning the idiosyncrasies of individual handguns. I would get the occasional customer who kept prodding me to get the DA pull down to six pounds, or the SA down to two - with no "push-off", or misfires. I would gladly knock $15 off their work and tell them to take the gun and go, and never bring me another one. I often wondered why they hadn't just hired someone to pull the trigger for them.
The moral of that story is this- you cannot buy proficiency. All guns have assets and liabilities, and whatever you choose; you are going to have to master that particular gun. Learn to shoot it.
Your local competent gunsmith, however, can make significant improvements in the Redhawk's single-action trigger. I start by cleaning up the sear for minimum movement, with absolute certainty that it will not "push off" from full cock. Don't mess with the angle. This involves considerable assembly-disassembly to get it just right, and it is easy to go too far. Your gunsmith will earn his money on a Redhawk.
Over-travel stop- I use the locking-latch orifice, in the rear of the trigger-guard, as the starting point. I drilled through from the rear and tapped the hole for opposing set-screws; seems like I used 8-32's because drills and taps were handy. The finished product protrudes into the rear of the trigger-guard, limiting the trigger's rearward movement. Since the sear engagement was already sorted out, it was possible to set up my trigger for almost zero over-travel. Fine adjustments here also involved considerable assembly-disassembly of the trigger module. Loctite Red has held it solid through several hundred rounds of .44 loads that you'd only shoot in a Redhawk. Be advised that Ruger's carbon steel is much easier to drill/tap than their stainless steel- and I would not have attempted this work on a stainless gun.
The eventual result was a safe, reliable 3-3.5 pound trigger that is eminently more shootable than the factory offering- either offhand or from a rest. I just wish Mr. Keith were still with us and shooting today, because I would sure like for him to bust a few rounds with a tuned Redhawk. I think he'd notice the difference, and be pleased with the results.
It is worth mentioning that the example gun, which was made in '79, is still tight as a drum, with no end-shake, etc. In fact it is the tightest-fitted Ruger DA I have ever run across, and this may have something to do with the success of the trigger work. If the hammer pin and its corresponding hole in the hammer aren't a tight fit, you'll run yourself nuts trying to get a crisp trigger that won't push off.
I can find no fault here whatsoever with the factory double-action trigger of the Redhawk. They smooth considerably with use. The pull itself is light enough, and the cylinder locks "early" in the DA stroke, allowing the shooter a final opportunity to correct the sight alignment, prior to the shot. Dedicated PPC shooters used to spend big money getting their S&W's tuned to offer just this characteristic- and the Redhawk gives to you for free!
Some stainless Redhawks also showed an annoying propensity to lead-up badly, when fired with anything approaching warm lead-bullet loads. This was a particular aggravation for those of us who reload, which probably includes about everybody reading this. There are established methods for correcting this, that run the gamut from fire-lapping, to fiddling with specially-sized bullets. All of them are less fun than shooting, so many just use jacketed bullets instead. The blued Redhawks seem to have much smoother bores, probably because carbon steel is just easier to machine than stainless.
Oh yes - the grips. Luckily, there is a wide assortment of aftermarket grips available for the Redhawk. A lot of folks utterly despise the standard factory offering. I am probably the only black sheep who actually uses these with magnum loads, and gets along fine with them. I have a set of rubber "Butler Creek" which are OK for 300+@1325, if you are shooting single-action; Peggi sure likes them for anything approaching magnum loads. But they hinder my DA work with the gun, so they remain all but ignored. They remain for those occasions when "Little Red" takes "Big Red" out for a spin.
The final gremlin with Redhawks applies to post-86 Ruger DA's in general - insufficient firing-pin protrusion. It is not present in every Redhawk revolver, mind you, but it is a common enough problem that Hamilton Bowen installs a longer firing pin as part his superb custom conversions on these guns. Industry specifications for firing-pin protrusion in center-fire revolvers is .050-.055 inches, and I have checked a number of GP/SP series DA's that did not meet the minimum spec. The easiest fix is to test this yourself, prior to purchasing the gun, and to refuse any gun which fails said test. If the factory gets enough of them returned by dealers, they will fix the problem at Southport- where it originates in the first place.
Optimizing the Redhawk...
Once the issues with the trigger are sorted out, we can really begin to enjoy these superb revolvers. With a versatile cartridge like this to work with, it is only natural to experiment with handloading. There is a wide range of bullet weights available to us, but changing bullet weights requires re-zeroing the sights. If you're like me, you hate to mess with the sights once you get the spot-on for a particular load.
With the Redhawk, we don't have to! You simply center the rear blade, and crank the elevation all the way down. Bottom it out snugly, but don't strip it. You will probably never adjust it again.
The secret to optimizing the Redhawk lies in its replaceable front sight. If you intend to use diverse bullet weights, get several of the plain steel front sights, with the serrated ramp. When you are zeroing for a new load, you simply start with an appropriate front sight height, which will shoot a little low with the load you are using. I find that the Millett front sights work well for bullets up to 300 grains; still-taller front sights are available from Brownell's, for loads using even heavier bullets.
Next, you pick a specific range to zero your chosen load, and then file off the top of the front sight (if necessary) to correct the elevation. Small windage adjustments may be accomplished by filing lightly on the side of the front sight, in the direction you want to move the point of impact, as viewed from the shooter's perspective. Go slowly, because it generally takes very little material removed from either side of the front sight, to correct the windage. When you are finished, mark the sight in a manner that you will be able to look at it and determine which load it is corrected for. If you are using a steel blade (as opposed to Delrin) a little cold blue cleans up the work. Repeat the process until you have a sight for each load you intend to use.
I used this process to zero this 5.5" .44 Redhawk for six different loads, using bullets weighing from 190 to 300 grains. On the light side of the spectrum, we have a Midway 190 grain SWC loaded over a .22 LR case full of W-231; in effect, this is a ".44 CB cap." While not "silent", it is vastly quieter that any .38 wadcutter load and it will just bury the nose of the bullet in a soft pine board. This load will shoot through 10-15 pound varmints just the same, and it knocks squirrels out of the tree like a lug nut from a slingshot. It is accurate to 15-20 paces, which is where it will be employed. This front sight is cut from a white Delrin aftermarket sight, and it is easy to see at night- when this class of varmint becomes a nuisance.
My standard defense load for the .44 Magnum is the WW 210 Silvertip, supplemented by CCI blazer .44 Specials using the 200 grain Gold Dot JHP. I cut a blue steel front sight for these loads, zeroed for 50 yards with the Silvertips. It also works well at 25 yards, with my practice/qualification load of 8 grains of Universal Clays, and a 200 grain RNFP lead "cowboy" bullet.
Next up we have a "Keith load", but using a little slower powder than Elmer's beloved 2400. I use 22 grains of W296, and an authentic 250 grain Keith SWC bullet. This load generates in the neighborhood of 1250 fps, and will handle about any heavy-handgun chore you can imagine. I was amazed to find that the 200 grain front sight planted this load about two inches above point of aim at 50 yards. One-pound coffee cans cannot hide from it at 100 yards, either. Windage was right on, and no correction was necessary. Talk about luck...
Finally there the 300 grain loads, of which I have two. NEITHER OF THEM IS RECOMMENDED FOR USE IN ANY REVOLVER EXCEPT THIS REDHAWK. The first load uses a 300 grain Hornady XTP seated in the bottom crimping groove, over enough W296 to give it 1310 fps from the short barrel. A Millett orange ramp plants this load on the button at 100 yards, with iron-sight groups right around 4-5 inches at that distance.
Finally, there is my ".444 Lite" load, using a Hunter's Supply 300 grain WFN over 22.5 grains of W296. The load is as accurate as the XTP load above, and at 1330 fps the big hard-cast bullet penetrates like gangbusters. It also shoots close enough to the Millet sight at 25 yards to call it "good."
Like most things worth doing, there was considerable work in this project. Several days were spent at the range, fine-tuning individual front sights to a particular load. In my opinion, it was worth the effort. All the front sights fit easily in a small pill bottle, which goes wherever the Redhawk goes. Adapting the gun to vastly different loads now only requires snapping-in the appropriate front sight, and reloading the cylinder.
"From Mice to Moose in 60 seconds", if you will...
Final Conclusions...
The Redhawk is a fine double-action revolver, in the tradition of big thumpers like the Colt New Service; but it possesses however a versatility far beyond that of its early predecessors. It begs for a little TLC, and responds very well to such treatment. I seem to have found an outstanding specimen, easily capable of 4 MOA w/irons, on days when I can still shoot. It kills anything I turn it on- at least so far.
I suppose if for some reason you couldn't be happy with the .44 Redhawk, the .45 Colt version would serve your needs. Just be advised that US gun manufacturers, and Ruger in particular, seem to have an uncanny ability to screw up chamber-throat dimensions with the .45 Colt. For what it's worth, I have owned and fired a pile of Ruger .44 magnums over the years, and not one has exhibited any accuracy problems. It only took me two Ruger .45 Colts (Blackhawk's) to find one that wouldn't shoot for sour apples and the problem was easily traced to bad cylinder boring. Even for me, the math isn't hard on this one.
I have heard that Ruger was discontinuing the .45 Colt chambering of this gun, and perusal of their web page on this 28th day of January in 2006 would seem to confirm that. If you want a .45 Colt Redhawk, you can probably still find them on the used market. In my opinion a better option would be to just have a blue .44 converted, by someone who knows what they are doing.
You will be getting one hell of a fine revolver, either way.
