With greatest respect Charger... you're totally off on this.
First, Bill Ruger Jr. was a friend for almost 20 years before he passed 18 months or so ago. He was a true gentleman, philanthropist and supporter of more good causes than you can imagine. When 2008 took the guts out of the construction industry in USA... Bill personally restored a mill in New Hampshire to keep hundreds of construction trades employed in Newport... until the market bounced back. His factories not only included Ruger assembly, but Pine Tree Castings... which is a highly-innovative facility that serves a worldwide market with state of the art casting techniques. And dozens of feeder and support shops. He employed thousands IN New Hampshire... not overseas. Where he refused to outsource even when lots of others were doing it. I only met his dad a couple of times and he was wheelchair-bound and not doing well in the early 2000's... so I can't comment on Sr. But if he raised the kind of a son that Bill Jr. was, he had to be a good man as well.
Second, Ruger has done an amazing job of putting affordable, highest-quality firearms in people's hands through innovative design and advanced manufacturing and engineering processes that have rippled through the whole of the gun industry in postitive ways. Ruger has led the way in so many areas, I won't even begin to list. But if you go back to my (Scout) review of the RPR rifle a few years ago, I did a pretty exhaustive description of how they 'did what they did' with the RPR and what things they pioneered leading to their ability to deliver that price/performance package. Are their guns London Best Holland & Holland or Boss? No. Not intended to be. But if you could not afford a Citori or a Superposed or another high-quality O/U back in the '80s... there was the Red Label. Beautiful and built like a tank. Wanted 'any' Dropping block back then? The Ruger No. 1 (and No. 3) are still the basis for more customs than one can count. How many shooters have taken up target shooting with a dead-nuts accurate and reliable Mk II Bull Barrel? Is the Blackhawk junk? I don't think so... it out-performs the SAA in every category... and was 1/4 the price of an SAA. Ruger found an important niche in firearms. And filled it brilliantly. With affordable highest-quality guns that they probably could have charged more for. But chose the volume route instead... long before people were making things out of plastic, they found ways to do metal... affordably.
Last, The Mini 14 was certainly not the epitome of the gunmakers art. But it was a hell of a lot better than that Bushmaster thingie... which is only making thousands of dollars on the collectors market... because it's rare. Which is why I was happy to get a Mini 14 for it. Which, while totally reliable, would shoot minute of softball, rattle like a pissed off snake and had a stock that looked like it was made out of a fencepost. But it was a better .223 Semi than the Gwinn... and later it helped me trade up to the gun I really wanted (and still have) a Colt CAR-15. Which, in all honesty, is made 'cheaper' than the Mini-14. Has even less fit and 'finish.' But it does say Colt and, hey, it was an AR in 1990. Noone else had one then. So I was cool.
Ruger is a fine company. Bill Ruger was an amazing gentleman... collected guns, the finest cars, live artillery (a whole floor of cool stuff at his mill building) and paintings/art, watches, sculpture. He hunted all over the world and helped create an amazing hunting club in NH. Knew wine, food, bourbon and cigars like nobody's business. Yeah, if I wanted to ever grow up, I'd want to grow up to be Bill Ruger. Who never really grew up. His toys just got better. Another admirable trait! That sort of sounds familiar.
So while you are entitled to your opinion... I am happy to vehemently disagree with it.
Sirhr
and they shot a lot
