B & R Photography

The .204 Ruger has a need for speed. This cartridge came onto the scene in 2004 with a particular goal in mind and that was to create one heck of fast-moving varmint cartridge. I don’t personally own this one but it’s on my list. (I have brass and dies but no barrel yet.)  I would like to point out that the .220 swift is faster but you just don’t see to many of them outside of the Varminter magazine and Predator control forums these days. The .204 Ruger split the difference between other popular varmint cartridges like the .224 cartridges and .172 Cartridges. (Think .220 Swift, .22-250 Remington, .17 Remington and the .17 HMR.)

When it was introduced the .204 Ruger was the second fastest commercially available cartridge. I do want to point out that we are talking about factory ammunition here as the speeds than handloaders get out of wildcats or factory cartridges is a whole different ball game.

The .204 Ruger was designed built using the .222 Remington Magnum as a parent case. This gives the .204 Ruger a very good powder case capacity. Giving it about 5 precent more capacity than the .223 Remington.

Projectiles range in weight from 24 grains up to about 55 grains. Hornady also started to use a proprietary powder composition known as SMP746 which was specially formulated by Primex designed specifically to achieve higher velocities for the .204 Ruger. Examples are the 32gr load that has a velocity of 4,225 fps and the 24gr superformance load that has a velocity of 4,400 fps which is astonishing really.

Originally when the .204 Ruger was released it was available in the model77 MKII and a Ruger No. 1 as a single shot. The early reviews showed promise and the cartridge started to get picked up by other rifle makers.

When we get into the trajectory side of things. Using the factory data from Hornady and their calculator we see the 24gr superformance loading leaving the barrel at 4,400 fps have the following drop when zeroed at 100 yards:

As far as trajectory goes the

200 Yards: 1.1 inches of drop.

300 Yards: 6.0 inches of drop.

500 Yards: 35.8 inches of drop.

(Please note the above trajectory information was pulled from https://www.hornady.com/team-hornady/ballistic-calculators/#!/standard )

Short Notes.

Official Name: .204 Ruger    

Year Designed: 2004

Designed by: Ruger and Hornady.

Parent Case: .222 Remington Magnum

Rifling Twist Rate:

Maximum Point-Blank Range: 270 Yards.

I hope you enjoyed this brief overview of the .204 Ruger and will return next week for our Cartridge of the Week series.

Please remember to always practice safe muzzle control when dealing with firearms and happy shooting.

B