Opinions,Ruger Super GP 9mm vs S&W 929?

[mikeAZ]

Anyone shot both?..(Neither one seems to be available today)... So let's assume we do the internal polishing, replace the trigger/hammer springs and other tweeks... From what I read it seems you may end up with a better "game" trigger with the S&W?..If so,is it going to be a huge advantageS&W over Ruger?..Just curious.I've had a 929 with all the bells & whistles.

[triplesinglestack]

Apple and oranges maybe but I have the 929 and a 10mm Ruger.

The Ruger was much easier to get a good trigger.

Real interested in the 9mm Ruger Jason

 

 

[Fishbreath]

16 hours ago, mike NM said:

So let's assume we do the internal polishing, replace the trigger/hammer springs and other tweeks... From what I read it seems you may end up with a better "game" trigger with the S&W?

 

Ruger shooter here: you will probably end up with a heavier pull on the Ruger than the Smith once the gunsmiths have a look at both. (I haven't actually played with a fully-tuned Smith, but that's what people who have run both say.) The Ruger is notably better out of the box, in my opinion: I spent a few minutes dry firing a 929 next to a .357 Super GP at the local gun store when I was getting into revolver, and the Ruger was the clear winner in stock format. The Ruger design is simple to polish, and mine are both nicely slick, even if they're heavy by Smith standards. The yoke/crane on the Ruger is much stronger than the Smith design, and is retained by interlocking parts on the trigger and the crane, rather than a screw and pin, so you can beat on the cylinder quite a bit (by Smith standards) without breaking anything.

 

The S&W aftermarket is miles better. (In particular, @Toolguy's N-frame hammer seems like a huge win in ease of tuning.) Ruger's service department is great, but they're also fastidious about replacing any aftermarket or sufficiently-modified part. There are some QC things to watch out for: two of the three Super GPs I've seen in person have had the barrel shroud incorrectly clocked, so the front sight tilts; and they're very sensitive to any slight misalignment or misconfiguration of the ratchet and pawl, and to a lesser extent the other timing-relevant parts (cylinder latch and plunger, mostly).

 

The Ruger is the CZ of the revolver world, in that the chambers are short and tight.

[pskys2]

If you do a search of this forum there has been a lot of discussion on S&W actions, and quite a bit of comparisons.

 

I have several tuned S&W's and had a Ruger GP100 6 shot I tuned.  I liked them all.

 

Haven't ever run a Ruger long enough to determine the life span, have been running my 625 PC since 2006, and it's still cranking, my 627 PC since 2013 and it's my current Match Gun.  I tend to shoot an minimum of 10,000 rounds a year on my Match Gun.  I've had hammer or trigger studs break on just about all, had to re-time the 625 several times and multiple firing pins.  The 625 had a steady diet of major PF ammo, the 627's have been 95% minor PF.

The action on my 627's is under 5 lbs, the 625 a bit over 5 lbs.  All with good trigger return and reliable with Fed Primers.  I've done all of the actions myself.

 

The Ruger I had was nice, out of the box I really didn't see any advantage over the S&W's except the gun "felt" more robust.  But it was so tight it seized up on the 5th magnum shot, it didn't with my match loads and after a few thousand rounds it shot magnums ok too.  I put an action kit in it and could only get the action down to 6 1/2 lbs, but it did feel better than a 6 1/2 lb S&W action.  But not as good as a 5 1/2 lb action on my S&W's and definitely not as good as my current actions.   I just couldn't get it any lower without a lot more work than I put into the S&W's.

 

The final decision for me was the sights, I wanted a deeper notch and couldn't find any.  Add in the fact that I can swap out my S&W rear sight for an Optic Mount with just 1 screw removed and 3 added for the mount, combined with the ease of finding aftermarket parts, gadgets and tricks kind of settled my mind on the S&W.

 

Unless one is able to spend a "lot of time" with different platforms I'd suggest looking at what you are going to do with it, pick one brand and stick with it.

Either platform can win, neither are match ready out of the box.

Edited March 27, 2022 by pskys2

[mikeAZ]

Thanks for your opinions...Kind of a mute point since the Rugers aren't available at this time...

[GOF]

On 3/27/2022 at 11:21 AM, pskys2 said:

If you do a search of this forum there has been a lot of discussion on S&W actions, and quite a bit of comparisons.

 

I have several tuned S&W's and had a Ruger GP100 6 shot I tuned.  I liked them all.

 

Haven't ever run a Ruger long enough to determine the life span, have been running my 625 PC since 2006, and it's still cranking, my 627 PC since 2013 and it's my current Match Gun.  I tend to shoot an minimum of 10,000 rounds a year on my Match Gun.  I've had hammer or trigger studs break on just about all, had to re-time the 625 several times and multiple firing pins.  The 625 had a steady diet of major PF ammo, the 627's have been 95% minor PF.

The action on my 627's is under 5 lbs, the 625 a bit over 5 lbs.  All with good trigger return and reliable with Fed Primers.  I've done all of the actions myself.

 

The Ruger I had was nice, out of the box I really didn't see any advantage over the S&W's except the gun "felt" more robust.  But it was so tight it seized up on the 5th magnum shot, it didn't with my match loads and after a few thousand rounds it shot magnums ok too.  I put an action kit in it and could only get the action down to 6 1/2 lbs, but it did feel better than a 6 1/2 lb S&W action.  But not as good as a 5 1/2 lb action on my S&W's and definitely not as good as my current actions.   I just couldn't get it any lower without a lot more work than I put into the S&W's.

 

The final decision for me was the sights, I wanted a deeper notch and couldn't find any.  Add in the fact that I can swap out my S&W rear sight for an Optic Mount with just 1 screw removed and 3 added for the mount, combined with the ease of finding aftermarket parts, gadgets and tricks kind of settled my mind on the S&W.

 

Unless one is able to spend a "lot of time" with different platforms I'd suggest looking at what you are going to do with it, pick one brand and stick with it.

Either platform can win, neither are match ready out of the box.

RE Ruger lifespan. I ran a 4.2-inch six shot GP-100 for about 30,000 rds of 125 PF loads (old IDPA requirement) before it needed a tune up. As for better sights, I have the Bowen Rough Country and am very happy.

[Luv2rideWV]

Not trying to drift the discussion, but does anyone have an opinion of the regular Redhawk in the eight-shot .357? The 4.2” gun is like 50 ounces. I was kind of interested in that. Could you get a good trigger on that?

[Fishbreath]

I haven't run one myself, but the regular Redhawk has different lockwork than the SP101/GP100/Super Redhawk, with one spring powering the hammer and returning the trigger rather than separate hammer and return springs.

 

I've heard that they're harder to tune than the dual-spring Rugers (less room to reduce the spring), but not from competition people.

[IHAVEGAS]

Had a 9mm SGP and and still have a 929. 

The 929 has a very smooth 5.5 pound trigger (thank you BOSSHOSS), best I got to with the Ruger was a not very smooth 7.5 pound trigger. Personal opinion is that the ruger trigger design works well for 6 shot guns but is pushed to its limit with the minimal cylinder rotation of their 8 shot 9. Timing was off on my ruger after a few shots and it would hang on a couple chambers and scarred the cylinder stop grooves - ruger replaced the pawl to address the timing but didn't test the gun with moon clips & the pawl would then hang up on the brass/star/clip area (fixed with some filing of the pawl tip). 

I thought the tight chambers of the ruger had to be a bad idea for reloads on the clock but never got fancy on timing reloads between the two or tracking oopsie rate. 

For my needs (steel challenge & USPSA) I can shoot the S&W just flat out faster with better accuracy, a better shooter might be better able to deal with the ruger trigger. 

 

I wish the smith was as robust as the ruger and had the same excellent warranty support. 

[Fishbreath]

13 minutes ago, IHAVEGAS said:

a not very smooth 7.5 pound trigger

 

I have my Rugers pretty slick now—there's a lot to polish beyond just the trigger/hammer interfaces, though, including things like the mainspring strut and the hammer pin. When I find a second 9mm Super GP, I'll write it all down as I do it, and share it somewhere.

 

I still haven't so much as dry-fired a nicely tuned Smith for comparison, though. Hoping I get to rectify that this weekend. If not then, I'll certainly bug someone about it at nationals.

[pskys2]

2 hours ago, Fishbreath said:

 

I have my Rugers pretty slick now—there's a lot to polish beyond just the trigger/hammer interfaces, though, including things like the mainspring strut and the hammer pin. When I find a second 9mm Super GP, I'll write it all down as I do it, and share it somewhere.

 

I still haven't so much as dry-fired a nicely tuned Smith for comparison, though. Hoping I get to rectify that this weekend. If not then, I'll certainly bug someone about it at nationals.

We're squadded together, 206, if my knee doesn't get worse (twisted it at an RO Seminar this weekend of all things!) you can play with mine.

[testosterone]

On 3/27/2022 at 10:32 AM, Fishbreath said:

 

Ruger shooter here: you will probably end up with a heavier pull on the Ruger than the Smith once the gunsmiths have a look at both. (I haven't actually played with a fully-tuned Smith, but that's what people who have run both say.)

You really really owe it to yourself to have olhasso tune those guns for you, seriously.   

 

I would call Daves gp100 like 95% of his s&w triggers which are as good as you could ever hope one to be, near enough that you really wouldn't care or notice the difference after you spent time with the gun anyways.  Its not even necassarily that the smith trigger is "better" its just a  totally different design that has a different feel, the flat vs coil spring, the geometry, etc...

 

Enough of the enlightened think super light is probably not all its cracked up to be anyways, a perfect balanced 5 or 6 lbs trigger is no surely worse than a 4/sub4 lbs trigger, the key being more the balance and not stacking/hitches...

 

 

 

Edited April 4, 2022 by testosterone

[IHAVEGAS]

6 minutes ago, testosterone said:

I would call Daves gp100 like 95% of his s&w triggers which are as good as you could ever hope one to be,

 

Interesting, when I was discussing my SGP with Dave (had him bob the hammer to match his) he was still trying to figure things out.

 

Do you know what measured pull weights he is achieving? 

[testosterone]

2 minutes ago, IHAVEGAS said:

Do you know what measured pull weights he is achieving? 

no idea, his gun is pretty damn light though...and yeah i think he will continue to evolve what he does with those guns for a long time to come.  

[Fishbreath]

42 minutes ago, testosterone said:

You really really owe it to yourself to have olhasso tune those guns for you, seriously.   

 

Maybe the second 9mm will go straight to him, then, when I find it!

 

I think we're both shooting revolver at MD State, albeit not on the same squad—maybe I'll see if he'll let me try the trigger a few times at the safe table.

[IHAVEGAS]

5 hours ago, Fishbreath said:

 

Maybe the second 9mm will go straight to him, then, when I find it!

 

I think we're both shooting revolver at MD State, albeit not on the same squad—maybe I'll see if he'll let me try the trigger a few times at the safe table.

I'm skeptical that he has found a magic trick for the same Ruger action that has been around for several years and tinkered with by many revolver smiths,  but sometimes discoveries happen.  Will be interesting to hear about it if you get to check out his gun. 

 

 

[mikeAZ]

watching, watching...mike