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Who can tell me what this is?


G-MAN

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Absolutely no clue

It's a Ruger XGI, which was a .308 version of the Mini-14. Everything about the Mini-14 was "upsized" for the larger round. The gun was set for introduction in 1985 and even appeared in Ruger's 1985 catalog.

In 2007, Ruger auctioned off one of the pre-production models (which is where those pictures above are from). Here was the text for that auction:

"Model: Ruger XGI Rifle

Serial Number: 800-01250

Caliber: .308 Win.

Rollmark Date: December 12, 1984

This is a very rare Ruger XGI rifle, serial number 800-01250, chambered in .308 Winchester. Less than 100 were fully assembled. It was rollmarked on December 12, 1984 and has a 5-round magazine. Announced in 1984, Ruger never commercially sold any XGI rifles. Bill Ruger put the project on hold indefinitely in 1985 when he decided not to expend additional engineering efforts to improve the rifle’s accuracy. This rifle will be shipped with a Ruger XGI instruction manual, scope rings, and in a white Ruger box of current manufacture.

The Ruger XGI was an autoloading centerfire rifle based on the design of the Ruger Mini-14 rifle, scaled up for larger cartridges. While the Mini-14 was chambered for the .223 Remington cartridge, the XGI was designed for both the .308 Winchester and .243 Winchester cartridges. The XGI was slightly longer and heavier than the Mini-14, but retained the essentials of both the Ruger Mini-14 and the proven M1 Garand/M-14 designs used by the military. Its red recoil pad was to be standard, and like the Mini-14 Ranch Rifles, it had Ruger scope bases machined integrally into the receiver, side ejection, a fold-down auxiliary adjustable aperture sight, and a blade front sight."

There are rumors floating around that Ruger still has thousands of XGI receivers in mothballs and plans to bring the gun to production utilizing the same changes they did to the Mini-14 a few years ago to take care of the accuracy issues that caused Bill Ruger to kill it.

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Originally Posted By: wwillson
G-MAN,

Isn't the Mini-30 already chambered in .308?

My bad - the Mini-30 is chambered in 7.62x39mm. .308 Winchester is 7.62x51mm..

Right. Chambering the Mini-14 for the 7.62x39 Russian was easy because the cartridges are roughly the same length and the 7.62x39 is a relative light load .30 cal. To go .308/7.62 NATO required a new gun. There's no way the Mini-14 could handle the pounding of full-house 7.62 NATO rounds even if the receiver opening was long enough to accept it. The gun would come all to pieces in a few hundred rounds.

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