Ruger red label inadvertant discharge

[EVIL]

Out hunting pheasant with my dad today and he had borrowed a RRL 12 ga from a friend. We had stopped, and with the weapon pointed in a safe direction he was showing me the barrel switch feature since I only own pumps and semi-autos, and was unfamiliar with the operation of this shotgun. He could not get the barrel lever to switch over with out the safety off. He disengaged the safety and flicked the barrel switch and the weapon surprisingly discharged w/o his finger any where near the trigger! It scared the **** out of us, I have never seen a ND before and I was looking right at his hand and I am 100% sure he was faithfully following rule#3...

do any of you shotgun gurus know why this would happen...?

I don't know enough about O/U internals to have a clue why this would happen?

We told his friend upon returning the gun (who was also baffled)...should he have it looked at by a gunsmith?

I have never seen a gun discharge with out pressing the trigger before....needless to say - I will never go near this particular firearm again. I thought RRLs were supposed to be one of the best made domestic shot guns?

Any thoughts? Thanks in advance!

 

[Sock Puppet]

I've never heard of this happening with an O/U, so I'm interested as well.

 

[Red Label]

I have a Red Label and the barrel selector/safety will not switch barrels if the button is in the fire position. That is the design. If this gun does switch in the fire position it needs to be sent back to Ruger. They have worked on my gun once and it pretty much came back rebuilt and adjusted like new. The only problem I had was with the ejectors. By the way they will most likely fix it for free. Don't use that gun again till its looked at.

By the way, I have had exactly one AD in my life and it was my fault. Always follow the rules of safety. I'm not saying what happened didn't, I'm only saying that as humans we make mistakes and if it was cold or gloves on the trigger could have been bumped. This just happens to be the first time I have heard of a RL going bang by itself.

 

[COK]

What was said above , it should not move as it did in the fire position.
I have had great service from Ruger when I have needed service on their products.

 

[Double Naught Spy]

I have never seen a ND before

While most get this wrong from the other way around, I think you did as well. Contrary to most such incidents, what happened sounds like an accidental discharge as there appeared to be no negligence involved (unless your friend knew the gun had this issue already and if so, then it would be negligent on his part to still be using it despite the mechanical problem).

Glad it was pointed in a safe direction.

 

[Mac11]

I just tried to get my Red Label to duplicate your problem and it will not. The barrel selector will not move unless the safety is on.

My gun has also been back to Ruger for a rebuild but it was because of a fall on the slippery wet basalt of the Snake River Canyon hunting chukkars. That ended breaking the forestock, damaging the buttstock and causing some barrel abrasions that required a repair and reblue. Their service was outstanding and the gun looks and functions as new.

 

[MaterDei]

Mechanical failure, it seems; hence the FOUR rules. You seem to be a very safety conscious individual, in this case it might have averted disaster. Hats off to you, sir.