A Browning/Ruger Shootout Member John Calkin
The contestants, the Browning Buck Mark on the left and the Ruger Mark III Target on the right. Both wear Weaver 2.5-8x scopes.
seemed like semiuseless shooting accessories. Still, they have an allure. When I moved from the restrictive state of New Jersey
I
to the free state of Virginia, the allure grew stronger. One of the more useful pistols for knocking around the countryside is a .22 semiautomatic. The rimfi re round is cheap to shoot and powerful enough for various varmints at short range. And it has to be a semiauto because .22 revolvers are a pain to load with the tiny ammunition. The fi rst handgun I ever bought (more than four decades ago) was a Ruger Single-Six Convertible Long Rifl e/.22 Rimfi re Magnum. It was a better pistol than I deserved, I guess, but I grew tired of the slow process of stuffi ng the little cartridges into the chambers, especially in cold weather. So my fi rst purchase in Virginia was a Browning Buck
Mark, the least expensive version offered at the gun show I attended. The fi rst time I took it out was to an abandoned clay pit. My wife, who had never shot a handgun before, spent the fi rst magazine rolling a soda can from 10 yards out to about 25. I was pretty impressed. My fi rst 10 shots rolled the battered can out to about 40 yards, where it dropped into a ditch out of sight. I was very impressed. How accurate was this thing, anyhow? I ordered a B-Square mount for Weaver-style rings (the
only one I’m aware of made for the Buck Mark), as well as a Weaver 2.5-8x handgun scope. Benchrest groups at 50 yards ran around three inches, and I was all too aware that I was the weak link in the system. It proved very easy to pull the crosshairs to the left side during squeeze-off if concentration wasn’t absolute. The package was compact enough that I never considered removing the scope for fi eld use. I couldn’t
’ve always been a rifl eman, and never thought much about becoming a profi cient pistolero. Handguns
The Ruger Mark III Target came out the winner, but not by very much.
fi nd a holster to house the scoped handgun, but once I got my concealed carry permit it was a simple matter to drop the rig into the pocket of a belly pack. The pistol comfort- ably accompanied me on woods rambles for birding and wildfl owering, and uneducated nonshooters saw no nasty ol’ handgun to upset them. When the Ruger Mark III came out I couldn’t resist the
Target model with the 5.5" bull barrel. In retrospect, I should have chosen the Hunter model with the 6.88" long barrel, but the stainless steel and reddish cocobolo grips were just too ugly for me. Any other grip material probably would have been fi ne, but never mind. The Target model also comes with a tapered 6.88" barrel, but the store didn’t have one on hand and I hadn’t read the catalog. The bull barrel version felt good in my hands, especially after I fashioned a set of mahogany handles to replace the stock plastic grips. The Mark III came with a scope base, so I purchased a BSA red dot sight from Wal-Mart. For $30 it wasn’t much of a risk, and I wanted to try out something new. I was quite surprised when the rig turned in 50-yard groups of 2 inches. It was a huge help that the red dot was nearly an exact overlay on the target bull at that distance. It wasn’t lost on me that centerfi re handguns that turned
in 2" machine rest groups at 25 yards were considered pretty fi ne shooters. Perhaps rimfi re pistols routinely did better. I don’t know, as they aren’t as frequently reviewed. At any rate, I couldn’t help wondering what the Ruger would do with a more powerful optic. I ordered another Weaver 2.5-8x scope. A word about the scope is probably in order. The optics
are very good. At 8x the exit pupil is small enough that acquir- ing the target is slow, even off the bench, and any unsteadi- ness will make the target fl icker in and out of sight. This is much less of a problem at lower magnifi cations. Under fi eld
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