Ruger Charger question

I have a gemtech mist barrel, only about 10 inches of barrel, it cycles great even with weak remington subsonics, the original gun had a 18 inch barrel.

My 10/22 with 4.5" stainless barrel and 5" of K baffles in front cycles 100% reliably with CCI SV. Didn't with the full-length barrel and no modifications, tending to stovepipe now and then. I don't think barrel length had anything to do with it. More likely it was various changes made to the internals, especially rounding over the back bottom corner of the bolt and polishing that nicely to more easily push the hammer out of the way. Also smoothed the interior of the receiver which was a little rough from the factory. Other mods were mostly about trigger/sear function. Didn't change the spring at all, though I did polish the guide rod. Smoothly polished metals tend to slide more freely. I even polished the chamber a bit, as that tends to help ease extraction in just about anything.

As a_canadian notes, grinding a radius on the rear of the bolt will help. There is a lot of info out there about it if you do a search. One such result here, for example.

Excellent explanation given on that page GarretJ, thanks for finding it. I neglected to mention that it's very important not to carry the radius up into the cutout for the buffer pin. Shortening the bottom part of the bolt could be very bad indeed, as rupturing even a .22lr case can eject a lot of burning powder sideways from the action. Had that happen on a homemade .22lr bolt rifle when an improperly designed extractor blew out after 100 or so shots, leaving a small area of the brass unsupported. Very loud, when one isn't wearing hearing protection because the gun is normally very effectively suppressed.

Polishing the hammer face a bit can also help. I like to wipe a tin film of good low viscocity grease onto the hammer face each time I take the thing apart for cleaning just to ease the bolt sliding over it a little further. And of course my buffer pin is replaced with a 1/8" drill rod covered in 1/4" OD fuel line, which makes a very effective buffer indeed.

Is it good and clean? Run without the can on it? Have you fired it enough for it to have worn in a bit if needed? Tried other ammo and magazines?

They tend to run well so with a little work it should be fine.

I have an SBR one that I cut shorter than that, no spring or bolt modifications and it runs fine



What problem specifically, are you having and what ammunition are you using?

RGH25 said:

I am working on a Ruger 10-22 to support a supressor with the barrel cut to 10 inches it does not want to cycle reliable. Since the Charger uses the 10-22 receiver system and has a 10 inch barrel does anyone know if it uses the same springs. Ruger cannot/will not tell me. I know it uses the same bolt.

Click to expand...

Just out of curiosity, why didn't you just buy a Charger, and put the brace support on it? It already comes threaded....

When I can find a Charger, I plan on doing just that.......

If it’s dirty and the bolt isn’t fully closing the hammer will hit it instead of the firing pin.

In “failure to eject”, are you saying the case is extracted from the chamber but not kicked out?

You wouldn’t be the first to have a magazine problem but they wouldn’t cause the other two issues. A tight and/or dirty chamber could though.