“Pre-580” Ruger Mini-14

Seeing The Miss Better

Round two occurred after I had mounted a Tasco 4X scope on top of the rifle. Before wasting more ammo, I adjusted the scope for a perfect hundred-yard zero. I attempted to see where it was grouping on a paper target. Shot after shot sent more dirt clods skyward. I kept moving closer to the target until I finally hit it, then sent a few more shots at the same spot, expecting a lovely group. As I shot again and again, I realized why the A-Team never hurt anyone! The Mini-14 didn’t group and barely made a pattern. I couldn’t get two shots any closer than 5″ apart at 25 yards!

Session after session ended the same. While the Mini-14 was a hoot to shoot, the only way I could hit the broad side of a barn was to be standing inside it! Since my wife had worked hard to buy me the gun, I carefully tucked it into the back of the safe and only took it out when I had forgotten how inaccurate it was.

After about 20 years of frustration later, I decided to get to the bottom of the issue. By then, Al Gore’s Internet was loaded with shared gun knowledge. It didn’t take me long to discover I wasn’t the only person with a Mini-14 who couldn’t shoot a repeatable group. Fellow Mini-14 lovers estimated roughly 50% of the older Mini-14s to be stinkers regarding accuracy and I had drawn the short straw.

It became the gun I loved and hated. As a fan of the M1 Garand and the Springfield Armory M1A, I loved the lines of the Mini-14. I loved to work the action and watch the bolt rotate like its big brothers. I loved the cheap, readily available ammo with low recoil. I even thought about buying the folding stock I had seen so many times in the A-Team episodes! But I hated I could not reliably hit a target unless it was big and close.

These same things bothered the engineers at Ruger and caused them to redesign the Mini-14. The new model (post-580 serial number) fixed the inaccuracy issues. At the same time, it caused the value of the pre-580 version to plummet to heart-breaking levels.

So, what was I to do? It was a beautiful gift, but it grated my nerves every time I pulled it out of the gun safe. I finally asked my wife if she would mind if I sold it. She laughed it off as it was mine to do with what I wanted.