So I purchased one of the new model Ruger Mark III 22/45 Lites.  I already have one Mark III and this will technically be my third because I had issues with the first one I purchased as well...Ruger replaced it with a Mark III Hunter(good gun by the way).

So I had the Mark III Lite for less than a month and sent it in for repairs.  The thing was a jam-o-matic.  Ruger replaces the barrel sleeve and basically says it's my fault because I was shooting lead ammo through the thing--I said WUT...

It had all manner of feeding issues, a few extraction issues, and also an extremely excessive amount of fail to eject issues...which is a major issue to clear that kind of jam in this gun...somewhat dangerous as well...

It failed with ALL ammo I used...even mini-mags...

Ruger says it's fixed and sends the gun back.  With the exception of the extraction issues the gun now works a lot better.  

Tonight I disassemble the gun for cleaning because it is really acting up again and this is the first thing I see when I get the upper off...I did clean it for the picture though...



Needless to say I am highly pissed off.  As you can see the anodized finish has been ground away and it looks like a someone beat on it with a hammer and punch.  This is un-fucking-acceptable in my opinion.

I guess I do have a question for the forum...  Do you guys think I am unreasonable?  I am going to call Ruger tomorrow and see if there is something that can be done about this.  I am so pissed right now...it's making my chest hurt

ETA: If you took a new car into the dealer for warranty work and they gave it back to you with scratches in the paint would you be happy with it?  This is the same kind of thing...

Looks like they installed a new ejector.

Those rivets are a bitch to drill out, so they probably had to mill the cap, then buck a new rivet. You know what that entails? A hammer and a punch-like item.

I wouldn't be so mad over it.

I'm an aircraft mechanic...I know exactly what it entails...I would have placed it on a milling table and bored into the head with a .050 end mill.  After that was done I would have moved up from there as required until the head came off.  And my process...the correct process would not have damaged the finish of the gun at all...

They reinstalled the same ejector, they replaced the barrel sleeve..or barrel liner...whatever you want to call it.

Did you try removing the loaded chamber indicator? Seems to be a common cause of MkIII malfunctions.

Yes, I had also installed a Tandem Kross mag safety removal kit as well.  I am sure if I spend enough money on aftermarket parts I could fix it myself...but why? especially now that the receiver tube has had the finish removed?  It's just going to have corrosion set in right where it was ground on...

I see your agony but really you need to take a deep breath. This is not the end of the world. The parts are not going to be destroyed because the finish and aesthetics aren't perfect. As long as it performs.

Send it back or take 4 seconds and apply some cold blue.  Bitching about it on ARFCOM doesn't solve the problem....

I really don't understand this thread or the potential issues with this Ruger semi auto .22 pistol.

The Ruger semi auto pistol is one of the most reliable and simplest ever made.  In the late 1950's, I spent $37.50 and bought a 6" Ruger Standard Model Auto.  Through the rest of the 50's, the 60's, and into the 70's, I burned more than a case each year of Remington .22LRHSRN through it and a semi auto rifle.  A case of Remington Golden Bullet 40RN was $25-29 in those days.  A CASE, not a BRICK.  Yeah, dream on if you can find any .22LR  today at any price.

The semi auto rifle had its guts replaced twice.  The Ruger pistol just purred along.  I used it less and less in the 80's to 2010's.  My guess is that it burned near 100,000 rounds, more early on than later.  The only thing that was wrong with it was that the ejector rivet was working loose to the extent that it flopped around if the bolt was out.  With the bolt in place, the bolt guided its location sufficient that if virturally never failed to function.  

The bluing was kinda gone in a lot of places and it had gotten dropped on concrete once landing on the frame tube behind the rear sight making a flat dent on the corner.  A few sets of magazines and one set of grips had come and gone, but the pistol always worked.  A grip screw stripped out in the frame and had to be fixed somewhere in the 70's.  My fault since I had not used any Locktite, if it existed that long ago.

In 2013, I sent it to Ruger who rebuilt the guts to new and reblued it for something like $120, three times the original cost of the pistol.  It still works perfectly after its return.

I read this thread and see hints like (1) removing the loaded chamber indicator and (2) installing a magazine safety removal kit.  I could only guess about other things done to it.  The result being that it did not eject or some such other complaint.  The work necessary to remove the rivet and replace the ejector, on a gunsmithing level, I have no knowledge of or about.  It does seem odd, although I understand the one fellows explanation.

What I do know is this.  

This thread reads like the Glock threads that go, "My lousy Glock will not work no matter how many after market parts I have tried to install or modifications I have made to factory parts or how much Bubba charged me to work on it."

Getting a Ruger to not work takes end user help.  

Getting it back with claims of not working after warranty service stretches my BS meter to about 10 feet.

Removing the LCI and mag disconnect safety won't alter the function in a negative way. It essentially restores the pistol to MK II specs. OP needs a VQ estractor and to go shoot the thing. Not sure why they would remove the ejector to replace the barrel...but who knows what Ruger did to it...

I wouldn't waste my energy being mad over it but I would take the issue up with Ruger over it.

I could do that job in my shop without marring it in anyway even if I had to make the rivet, ejector and the tools so I think that it is not too much to expect that the manufacturer could as well.

You have no idea what you are talking about.  As for your BS meter...you are wrong again.  This is my second Ruger mark that has been sent to Ruger.  They kept the first one for almost 6 months before they decided that they could not fix the gun.  They replaced it and I was happy enough...except for the time I lost...

You obviously didn't read my post.  Ruger did fix some of the issues.  The reason the gun had problems to start with and the reason Ruger replaced the barrel is because the feed ramp was improperly machined and was not aligned with the chamber.  The failure to eject is the last issue and it was an issue that Ruger did not fix.  My problem is this...they failed to fix the ejection issues and when the gun was returned to me it was hacked up...It was not hacked up when I sent it in it shouldn't have been that way when I got it back.

As for you not understanding the issues of this gun having problems I would agree with you that you indeed do not understand and you obviously don't have a clue as to anything you are talking about.  And no I did not bubba the gun.  The only reason I removed the 2 parts that I did was to increase reliability...in many cases those 2 very parts cause more issues than good.  I reinstalled the parts prior to sending the thing back to Ruger.  You see you have no idea what you are talking about...

As far as your bullshit meter goes...the 10 feet of bullshit that you described is what came out of your own mouth.

As for the other guy who said put cold blue on the gun...well I LOL in your face...the receiver of this gun is made from Aluminum...it is not 'blued'...

Somehow I bet if you took your car into the dealer and they took a grinder to the front fender you would not be OK with it...I am certainly not OK with it as they did it to my gun...nor would I be with anyone elses work if it was destructive...

I called Ruger again today and emailed pictures to a manager...this will be handled...

I hope Ruger's customer service is better than their warranty work...because their quality has gone way down hill...I said it...and the sad part is that I am a Ruger fan with quite a bit of their products in my safe.

This post was not designed to get help fixing the gun...I was doing two things...a little bit of venting and sharing the failure of the Ruger quality control system so future owners might know what they are getting into.

Then use Alumablack. I was referencing off of my MKIII...but heck if you're going to act like an ass...best of luck with your issues and goodnight. Judging by your vocabulary ("LOL in your face" ...what are you like 13)  and attitude this is you daddy's gun anyways.

Ok, sure seemed like to me you said 'just put some cold blue on it and shoot it'...but no,,,I'm not going to put Alumablack on a Cobalt anodized finish either...thanks for your insights though...

And this is why the quality of gun makers is going downhill...because people don't hold them to the quality that the gun maker claims to have...basically the younger generation folks just accept whatever someone gives them...I guess it's just part of being entitled.  I work at a real job earning real money and it pisses me off when I buy a turd...

If I misunderstood your post my apolgies

Let me get this straight... you think that the "new generation" just accepts what is given to them, don't care about quality, and that is because they are "entitled"?

Damn, that's the craziest thing I've read on arfcom in weeks... I think it's just the opposite... You are the entitled whiny .... we'll save that for another day. How can you possibly connect the dots that "just accepting something" = "entitled"? Those 2 things are so far from each other on the spectrum that the are OPPOSITES. You clearly don't understand what "entitled" is. It's being demonstrated VERY CLEARLY in this thread.

On to your issue, sure you have a right to be mad, and call Ruger and complain until they completely replace your firearm. You're entitled to perfection afterall. You paid for it with your hard-earned money, you deserve the golden standard firearm produced by them this year.

But anybody with a shred of common sense left would be fairly happy with a repair that fixed the issues. The small cosmetic "damage" you're referencing is on a hidden part of the gun, doesn't affect the function, and doesn't matter to 90% of people, even people of an older generation. The fact that you're complaining about it says a LOT about you, and the manner in which you're doing the complaining is VERY telling.

Btw, how old are you? By your attitude expressed here it's clear that you are very young, very immature, or just a whiny ENTITLED ass-hole. Maybe if you approached these issues with a bit less attitude people would take you more seriously on your concerns. Until then, you just look like a whiner and nobody wants to coddle a whiner and tell them how right they are with their whining...

The other item I would note about this story and why it flags my attention is that the pistol was disassembled for cleaning so soon after receipt, i.e., the receiver/barrel assembly was removed from the grip frame.  

The Ruger Standard Auto of which I mentioned above did not get disassembled more than once or twice for cleaning in 50 years or a fortune in ammo.  It ran just fine taking the bolt out, the hammer spring system out, and cleaning what is accessable that way.

Mine was fitted so tight that it only came apart if you soft hammered the barrel/receiver tube off the frame handle.  Not to be done needlessly and sure not with an aluminum frame one.  The Ruger stainless steel Competition model I purchased in later years has never been disassembled in that manner and runs fine with standard cleaning.

Lotsa Lookie Lou snooping and pooping and such also puzzles me.  (I being of the old school of if it ain't broke, don't fix it.)

My BS "meter" is now stretched to twelve feet.  There gotta be more to this story.

SIGOwner is spot on.

No more to the story...I am just anal about cleaning my guns.  If you have issues cleaning the Ruger marks then you are doing it wrong.  The only guns I own that I am not anal about cleaning are my Glocks, but I pull them down every 500 rds whether they need it or not.  If you cleaned yours more often you would find the process become more intuitive the more often you do it.  I also think modern rimfire ammo is more unreliable and dirty than it has ever been before.  With exception of premium ammo of course.  I took it down for cleaning after approximately 200 rounds when it was failing to eject and stovepiping every 3-4 rounds... believe what you wish I don't care.  I sent the thing in after having it three weeks.  The gun wasn't hacked up at all.  I received the gun from Ruger about 10 days later.  It was still not fixed and is now hacked up.  They should have not sent it back to me in worse shape than I sent it in...I am over being mad now.  I have accepted the fact I got screwed out of 430 bucks.  It wont happen again.  I am sure you guys are all rich...I'm not.  I punch a clock.  I hate getting ripped off.  Now not only do I have a gun that doesn't run properly it looks like someone took a grinder to it.  I am glad all your stuff is working good for you and I hope you never get hosed.  Best wishes.  I have more important things to worry about now. Not guns or money :(

Later

Can't speak for anything but Mk1's and earlier.  I hardly shot anything but lead in mine.  Same for my brother.  We found Thunderbolts (cheapest Remington ammo back in those days) gave us great groups so that's what we shot and hunted with (a thunderbolt to the head kills squirrels and groundhogs as well as anything).

Never any issues with lead bullets in those Mk1s.