How hard do the sear surfaces on a Ruger M-77 need to be? When I checked it with a file it didn’t seem to be hardened. It had some tool marks on it so I removed them.
Ruger uses stainless steel for the sears on their M-77’s, I assume we are speaking of the current M-77 Mark II’s, so you will be able to cut them with a file. They are not as hard as could be with real steel. We polish out the machine marks as well, and you shouldn’t need to harden it. If it is butter soft you will need to harden it and I have seen some Ruger parts that should have been hard that were soft and some parts that should have been soft that were hard, so each Ruger will need to be checked.
Reply:
What about the earlier M-77 with the tang safety? Do they use stainless steel for the sears?
Answer:
I don’t remember. Check it out with some cold blue that will tell you. But the rules still apply positive, smooth, etc, etc. And they may be soft.
