Ruger Deerfield discontinued?

[azredhawk44]

Did ruger discontinue the Deerfield .44magnum carbine?

If so, I am now officially bummed out.... Anyone got the inside track on this? It's not on their website anymore.

[RedneckFur]

It wouldnt suprise me, just like they killed the 10/44 in the past

[Scorch]

Not enough 44 Mag fans buying 44 Mag rifles, it would appear.

[Kjay]

Lack of sales is undoubtedly true. But I've got to wonder how many Hawkeyes in .375 are going to be sold. I suppose they need the space in the production line to build something that they thing will sell. How about a Frontier in .223 that will take Mini14 mags?

[p99guy]

Ruger has come up with what, 2 nice semi auto .44 carbines over the years and has limited their utility to a small group of shooters because of the low ammo capacity. Had they made it take a magazine simular to a .44 Desert Eagle pistol, it would have appealed to the self defense crowd...would have made a passible patrol carbine or boat gun. But limiting it to 4 rounds and in the case of the first one, a tubular magazine like a shotgun rather than a magazine...killed its utility. The only thing of note about them in history, was that Penthouse publisher Larry Flint was allmost killed by one of the Ruger .44 carbines in a attempt on his life(it did leave him paralized)

Ruger could have made it a better seller if they had wanted to.

[jhgreasemonkey]

Its unfortunate that they dont make it anymore. You can still find them on gunbroker.com from time to time for a used one.

[mrawesome22]

They still make the 96/44 if your wanting a good 44Mag carbine.

[SamC]

The 77/44 in stainless/synthetic was a nice rifle too. It was also discontinued due to lack of sales. It was a great little brush carbine. I wish that I had mine back.

[azredhawk44]

I was seriously going to buy one this summer and work on a prototype magazine that took 12 rounds for it.... make an excellent companion to my 44 wheelguns, and same manual of arms as my M1A.

Why 12? Because it HAS to take more than 10 to keep old bill spinning in his grave, and 11 is a silly number.

I went to the gun store today to put $$ down on one, and found out that it was discontinued. Grrr. Argh.

[mrawesome22]

LOL! "Look Bill. One of YOUR rifles with a 12 round mag made by a "simple civilian". His face probably would have turned purple with rage.

And then whip out a 15 round P89D15. "Look Bill. A 15 round pistol made by your company with NO safety and the mag was made under your name!"

[SRG]

There's one for sale on Gunbroker.com right now.

[tulsamal]

I have one and use it for hunting deer.

I've heard the low magazine capacity argument before. I agree it would have made the gun "more versatile" but Ruger saw it as a hunting rifle. In that role, five rounds are WAY plenty. So far I've never even used shot number two. I do like the idea of having a fast backup shot though. After that, everybody is going to be gone. So, as a hunting rifle, just a one shot magazine would be enough!

And I really don't like hunting rifles where a mag sticks out of the bottom. Like that ugly pistol mag that sticks out of the bottom of the 40 cal carbine Ruger makes. Ugly and it gets in your way when you are carrying the rifle through the woods. The Deerfield has a smooth belly and can be carried with one hand wrapped around that area.

I get as annoyed as everybody else that Ruger wouldn't make and sell high capacity mags for the Minis. But he knew what he was doing with the Deerfield. I think the only reason they didn't sell more was they weren't exactly cheap!

Ruger also discontinued all .480 revolvers. And I didn't have one of those yet!

Gregg

[p99guy]

Bill Ruger , has had some truly american classic and timeless gun designs that were, and are a good value for the money and long wearing...but some of his personal pet peeves n' politics were toward the "odd duck" end of the scale..and very hard to fathom/confusing coming from a person in the arms industry.
While its a better world having ruger firearms in it...I cant say I miss ol'Bill
himself.

[CarbineCaleb]

What tuslamal said. It was called the Deerfield Carbine after all. If you can't take the deer with 4 (or even 5) shots, you probably shouldn't be shooting at him. It's designed to be a woodsy deer (or black bear, hog) gun, where shots will typically be 50-150 yards in the trees, and that's just what it is - light, sleek, compact, capable of a fast followup shot if needed and ballistically well suited to deer at those ranges.

It is true that high cap mags would have been a nice option for those envisioning Mad Max style applications. But, I don't know how easily that rotary magazine mechanism could be adapted - if it could have been done easily, then one of the aftermarket mag companies would have done it I suppose.

As it was, it was sleeker and more handsome than the Ruger police carbines, and I still see it as a viable home defense gun. At those ranges, you shouldn't be missing with a carbine, and it will hit hard too.

[JR47]

What the heck is a 10/44?

Rugers politics aside, after all, the man has been dead for how long? The 44 Deerslayer was designed after his death. The idea of a slim, trim, hunting rifle, chambered for a hard-hitting caliber like the .44 Mag is perfect for hunting in close cover. As was mentioned, sending 12 rounds downrange at the same animal might be considered reckless.

I'll mention this again, for all of the self-righteous, Remington has NEVER manufactured high capacity magazines for the 740. 7400, etc. series of carbines. The most you can get holds four rounds. Where's the indignation? They've been in production FAR longer than the .44 carbines of Ruger.

The first .44 Carbines were manufactured during a time when nobody wanted a "high-capacity" pistol-caliber self-defense carbine. Most people were quite confident that nasty situations could be handled by the hunting rifle, hunting shotgun, or .38 Speciual revolver. You know what? They were right.

Despite all of the should have, would have, postings. It's simple, the rifles didn't sell in large quantities, and were dropped.

Oh, and for the goobers talking about 15 round magazines, Ruger supplied them for a number of years before the ban, while he was alive. Evidently, he didn't seem overly concerned about them.

[RedneckFur]

The 10/44 came before the deerfield.... It looked basically the same, but had a tube magazine instead of that rotary junk. Higher capacity, too. My father had one, and its what i first hunted deer with. I think it was discontinued in the early 80's.

[Crosshair]

The magazine capacity is/was an issue for many people. I know it was for me. Working at the gun counter, people who looked at one WANTED the extra magazine capacity and a semi-auto. Many instead went for a lever gun for the larger magazine. Sure, have 4 round mags for hunting, but the average person wants the OPTION for something larger, the ability to upgrade the platform.

A semi-auto gun that has magazines that max out at 4 rounds is like putting a 500 hp engine in a car, but the only transmission available is a 3-speed automatic. It doesn't matter how good the engine/suspension/design is, You are not going to be selling many with only a 3 speed tranny in it.

This is yet another example of a company failing to listen to the market.

[p99guy]

WWZD= What would Zumbo do. Having a slim trim non evil black rifle in your patrol car that holds 12-15 rounds of .44 mag, is no more "MAD MAX than having a .30U.S. M1 Carbine...which I have carried many a shift.

[JR47]

I have a .44 Carbine, which is the nomenclature on the owners manual. They were also called Deerslayers in some models. I had just never heard it referred to as a 10/44.

The average person heading into a gunshop today isn't as much a hunter as a target shooter. The idea that self-defense requires weaponry with enough rounds to engage entire chapters of Hell's Angels is the result of too much non-combat experienced "what if" role-playing.

WWZD= What would Zumbo do. Having a slim trim non evil black rifle in your patrol car that holds 12-15 rounds of .44 mag, is no more "MAD MAX than having a .30U.S. M1 Carbine...which I have carried many a shift.

Now, how many police departments are going to allow carry of one of those "nasty magnums"? The rifle that you describe just has the wrong caliber. It's the Mini-14, with Ruger 20 round magazines. The .223 is regarded as more PC for the PD.

However, non-LEO participants are a little out there with the constant necessity of high-capacity everything. The rifle went to the box-magazine because the hunting rifles of today are moving into that system. The four rounds fit into a non-protruding magazine, keeping the weapons trim, with as little to catch brush, or be damaged if dropped.

Self-defense scenarios that need more than five rounds of .44 Magnum, at carbine velocities at self-defense distances, point out the need for a spare magazine, and more training.

A semi-auto hunting rifle is just that, a hunting rifle. A 7400 Carbine in .30-06 is also a hunting rifle, not much larger than the .44 Carbine, and it has also a max of four rounds, with no high cap magazines. Has anyone refused to buy one, "because of the OPTION of high-cap mags not being available"?

Hunting rifles of all types have been used as self-defense items for centuries. They were most often different than the existing military rifles. Only recently have we found the need to have the "option" of turning them into wannabe battle rifles.

However, if that's what the people want, then they'll have to buy something else. I'm pretty sure that Ruger understood what they were doing, and chose to market the weapons as hunting arms first. After all, look at the fuss about the Mini-14. It, too, was initially built as a hunting rifle. The public has tried to make it intop a military rifle, and have complained about accuracy during long strings of fire, that the sights weren't robust enough for combat, and on and on. Think maybe the company had had enough??

[Noonan]

I think an SKS paratrooper is superior to the Deerfield for close-range hunting, and costs about 1/2 as much.

[support_six]

JR47 said, "After all, look at the fuss about the Mini-14. It, too, was initially built as a hunting rifle."


Oh yeah, well, what about the A Team? What were they huntin'?



I recently saw one of the used Ruger .44 Carbines at a Cabella's in Boise. I would have bought it for the $400 they wanted except the stock was quite dented.

I think the value of a removable magazine, even one that only holds 4-5 rounds, is ease of loading. It's much quicker to load a single magazine than to feed individual rounds into an internal magazine like the .44 Carbine or a Winchester 94.

[tulsamal]

I think an SKS paratrooper is superior to the Deerfield for close-range hunting, and costs about 1/2 as much.

I can't agree with that. The SKS is bigger and heavier. The Deerfield side profile is exactly the same as a 10/22. If I put the two Rugers side by side, the barrel diameter and the plastic handguard thing is about the only way to tell them apart.

I've never found the SKS to be a "natural pointer." My Yugo and I have never gotten along. When I try to use the sights, I get frustrated that my sight line is only a tiny bit higher than the top of the receiver. The Deerfield shoulders just like my 10/22 that has thousands of hours in my hands. It has a fold up peep sight that is actually quite good. And then it is easy to mount a scope if you want to do so. And that scope can be mounted easily and solidly and low on the receiver.

I assume you said "close range" because you know the Ruger will clean up against the SKS if we fire them at 100-150 meters on paper? Especially if we use the crappy iron sights on the SKS and the peep on the Ruger!

But even at close range, would most people consider the 7.62x39 round to be "the same" as a .44 Magnum out of a rifle length barrel? I've never personally shot a deer with the Soviet cartridge but I've been impressed with what a .44 Magnum can do at close range. And that includes the black powder season deer I've taken when using that sort of bullet in a sabot.

An SKS is a useful rifle and everybody should have one. But the Ruger Deerfield is a much more refined and modern rifle. You couldn't give me three SKS's for my Deerfield!

Gregg

[tulsamal]

I think the value of a removable magazine, even one that only holds 4-5 rounds, is ease of loading. It's much quicker to load a single magazine than to feed individual rounds into an internal magazine like the .44 Carbine or a Winchester 94.

The big advantage of the newer Ruger over the old one is that the removable magazine holds the cartridges side by side instead of point to primer. The old guns couldn't be loaded with some types of pointed bullets. The new one is fine with that.

I've thought about getting a spare magazine and carrying it with a different kind of ammo in my pocket but they are $25 or so and I'm cheap!

I was in love the first time I took mine apart. It is sort of like a Garand/M-14 but it has elements of the M1 Carbine as well. Very cool design.

Gregg

[Gewehr98]

Like there's a metric buttload of pointed-bullet .44 Magnum loads out there on the gunstore ammo shelves for the Deerfield carbines.

[tulsamal]

Like there's a metric buttload of pointed-bullet .44 Magnum loads out there on the gunstore ammo shelves for the Deerfield carbines.

I wouldn't know about that. None of my .44 Magnum rifles or revolvers have every fired a single round of ammo "from a gunstore shelf."

I would have never mastered the magnum revolvers if I had to shoot factory ammo! Who could afford it? I get tempted to shoot cheap factory ammo in autos because I get tired of looking for the brass in high grass. But revolvers are perfect for reloaders. The only factory ammo that gets shot through any of my revolvers is the rimfires!

I seem to remember it wasn't just "pointed" .44 Magnum bullets that were a problem with the original carbine. Really soft hollowpoints got banged up from recoil. And a bullet where the jacket went all the way over the tip could possible hit the primer of the round in front of it. (I'm thinking something like an XTP bullet.)

I haven't shot anything through my Deerfield that I would classify as truly pointed. But if I had a tubular mag I would stop and think about my choices on occasion. Just something to wonder about. With the Deerfield mag, I never consider anything except OAL.

Gregg