Went to a gun show saturday and picked up a Ruger Blackhawk in 45 Colt with an extra cylinder in 45 ACP, blued finish, 4-5/8" barrel. I've been looking for one for a while at the right price, and was able to pick this one up for 450.00. Gun is absolutely mint. I shot it quite a bit on Sunday afternoon and the gun functioned flawlessly, after some sight adjustments I could put six shots in a 4-5 inch group at 25 yards using sand bags (don't know whether that's good or not). I'm one of those middle aged guy's that can see a knat on a camels *** at 1000 yards but can't see squat up close and have to use 1.5 power reading glasses, any tip from shooters on this problem? I can either see the target great and the sights fuzzy or vice versa but not both. The only other issue I had was, the casings were hard to eject on the 45 colt stuff, extraction was fine on the 45 ACP cylinder, it almost seemed as if the extractor rod needed to be another 1'4 inch longer, any one else encounter this problem? As usual, thanks for any advice.

I have had several Rugers with burrs in the chambers. Not a big deal to polish out if that is the issues. The ejector rods are not long enough to make the case completely clear the cylinder in .45 Colt - at least on my full sized guns.

What ammo are you shooting?

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MikeG

I have plenty of different 45 ACP stuff to try, I was shooting 180 grain LN, I just purchased a couple of boxes of 45 Colt in 250 grain LN to be able to shoot it some, but yesterday I ordered a set of dies and some brass, I've got primers and lots of H110 but haven't made any bullet selections, that was gonna be my next question, glad you asked.

Concentrate on the front sight. I wear bifocals so that's the lens that lines up the sights. The gun is capable of groups half that size. I hold my sbh barrel up and work the ejector ro d hard and fast. Hope you get things workin good!

I just got a ss bisley. What mikeg said about the ejector rod is true in the 2 I have also. I have not tried the acp cylinder yet though possibly today weather lets me. I think you will have fun reloading 45 colt it is a forgiving easy cartridge to load for you can shoot round balls to shot to 400gr bullets it is my favorite. Good luck and have fun

I have that version, too. I went through the process of measuring the cylinder throats and found them to be different sizes and all under 0.452. Also, I measured the barrel and found it to be 0.452. The Ruger is a fine firearm but needs a bit of rework, so I followed the suggestions on this site and reamed the cylinder throats to 0.452 and fire lapped the bore with the BTB's supplies. I'm still in the process of load and accuracy development, but my chronograph has 325 BTB's running hotter than Hodgdon's LiL-gun suggested loads, with a couple of gains less powder. Suggestion, measure the cylinder throats with a pin gauge, ream if necessary and fire lap. Since I have multiple .45 cal revolvers, I bought a reamer and pilots from Brownell's.

I know I love my Ruger Blackhawk. It'll do about 1.5" groups with my reloads. My heavy hunting loads are closer to 3". Heavies are 300 gr. XTP Magnum w/ a book minimum load of H110 and my target loads are a 200 gr. RNFP with 6 gr. of Unique. I have been loading some deer loads with 240 gr. Sierra Sportsmaster Bullets and 10 gr. Unique.

I have spent all morning reading up on fire-lapping, looks like I'm fixing to order some supplies and give her a whirl. Anybody got any recommendations on pin gauges suppliers?

My wife's gonna shoot me,................. I bought another Ruger Vaquero from a guy on another website doing an estate sale for his sister, this one is a pre-2000 model that has the 7 1/2 inch barrel. It does not have adjustable sights, but I would like to have them, it is not a flat top model, and has the V notch on top of the cylinder, any suggestions?

Read "Do It Yourself Sixgun Kit!" on this site. Good info.

Wish I could afford one of these! I think I'd opt for a longer barreled verstion but that's just me. Enjoy!

This will help you see your sights clearly,

Try a Merit Optical device. It's a small apature that suction cups to your glasses.

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Got a link for that? I've searched and don't see it?

I bought a NIB .45 RBH back in 1972 or 73and shortly afterwards sent it back to the factory for a fitted .45acp cylinder. The gun was target accurate with my load of 18grns 2400 and cast 250-260 grain bullets. Though I only fired a few "odds and ends" rounds through the acp cylinder, I was somewhat disappointed that the accuracy wasn't near what the Colt cylinder gave. This was a 4.5" barrel and the Colt load gave around 1060fps. In my identical 7.5 that same load gave 1260fps and stupendous accuracy. The long barrel BH shot 3" or 4" high. I never had a cylinder fitted for the 7.5" revolver.

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Young guys should hang out with old guys; old guys know stuff.

Merit Optical Attachment

Go to the BTB home page and look on the right hand side.

Thanks, ........... sometimes I'm an idiot.

Well I spent about 3 hours last night carefully honing the cylinders in one of my Blackhawks, tried it out this morning, WOW, what a difference. The "Do it Yourself Sixgun Kit" article was outstanding. My groups dropped from 4-5 to about 2 1/2 just by honing the cylinders. I'm waiting on my supplies to fire lap the barrel, and hopefully that will help it get down to the 1 1/2 group area. I'm gonna do a 357 Blackhawk that I've had for a while tonight. You guys are awesome, thanks for the tips and the help.

Welcome to growing older. The vision issues go along with it. I wear bi focals and you have to learn to deal with them. Seems like a lot of the time I find myself looking over the top the glasses, or just taking them off and wearing shooting / safety glasses. Doing either of those lets my sights be in focus. The target is a little fuzzy, but to me it's more important the sights are clear and lined up correctly.

I have one of the Ruger .45 Colt / .45 ACP revolvers commissioned by Lipsey's. It's a stainless flat top with a 4 5/8" tube. Mine is an excellent shooter. The more I shoot the .45 Colt the more I like it. There's just something comforting about those big ol' cartridges.

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Did you ever buy pin guages to measure the cylinder throats and if so, where and what was the cost?