Both exhibited genius. But based on who was more productive, ingenious, and innovative....who would get the nod as most sucessful?

giz

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I'd say Browning

I would have to say browning, his guns to this day in some cases are still concidered the top of the mountain by many, and his design itself is elegant as well as fully funtional and thought out on many different aspects

Hands down to Browning. Ruger made some good products, gave the public what they wanted, right quality, right price, but Browning had more innovative ideas.

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G.P. Charlie

In comparison to Browning, Ruger would place a distant third in a two man race

Never heard of a Browning recall.

But you should plan on it with any new Ruger product.

nuff said!

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C & L

another point, the 1911 was one of the only semi autos taurus couldn't mess up!!

Re read the question...

We are not talking about the genius of the design.

And to be fair, Bill Ruger was years dead before any of these recent recalls happened.

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Non gratum anus rodentum

I'd throw John Pedersen into the discussion. If you've not heard of him, be was Remington's answer to John Browning. He designed several guns for Remington, including the daddy of the conceal carry pistols, the 51 Remington. He also designed several obscure, yet innovative devices like the Pedersen device that changed the 1903 Springfield into a semi automatic. He wasn't as well know as the two men you mentioned, but, in my opinion, just as innovative.

And John Browning's been dead since the 1930's....

Ruger was a genius, and innovative, at least as far as taking advantage of the latest techniques. I am sure he helped advance investment casting as much as most invvolved in it. No doubt he is an icon in gun manufacturing. He was probably more personally successful in terms of financial gain.

Browning was a true inventor, going where few had been, and going there unguided by those who had. I don't thinki he became as personally wealthy as Ruger, but I bet his heirs did!
OK, reread the ques- Browning was far more productive, ingenious, and innovative.
Think of the term "Browning type" auto pistol. He picked up on gas operation watching the muzzle blast make grass wave. The recoil op A-5. The BAR, to give troops a 'portable' machine gun to take across no-man's-land. All the 'good' Winchester levers (and SS). The Superposed. On and on.........

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Regards,
Lee Jarrett

I did and it is fair to say that Bill Ruger had some very good design and manufacturing personnel that were never given their due credit.

My vote goes to John Mose.

His designs were produced by Winchester, FN and Remington plus the U.S. military contractors. Winchester is supposed to have bought Browning designs just to keep other manufacturers from making them.

I have several Ruger guns, and like them, but Browning was more successful.

GIz that's a tough question-the more I think about it the tougher it gets. For pure pull a new Idea out of the air-it's tough to beat Browning-case in point the first auto loading shotgun. For pure marketing savy and giving the publis new inocations regarding gunsmithing-Ruger hands down. But look at the product-Ruger took proven ideas tweaked them made them better and cheaper and made a fortune. Browning on the other hand invented stuff nobody had ever heard of. My vote goes to Browning-It's like comparing Babe Ruth and Michael Jordan

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Forum consigliere

Not even close.
John M. Browning!

"productive, ingenious, and innovative"
look at the number of guns he designed for productive.
look at the different types of gun he designed and helped produce.
look how long those guns have been on the market and used by the Military, Police and Citizens.

I don't see how it could be anything "close".

Rule 303

Evidently, you missed hearing about the salt-cured stocks. And some long guns bearing the Browning name just strike me as a little weird.

Of course, Browning himself was long dead before that stuff happened.

I met Bill Ruger and feel that he was a great industrial innovator and a shrewd businessman. He also knew how to promote his products.

But John Browning was probably a better all-round designer, for his day, especially. I think he was, overall, the greatest gun designer of all time. Too many today are just engineers who design guns.

T-Star

it seems like JMB was a pure genius - who never really was very good at marketing / making & selling what he invented. Granted, I've read more about Browning - guess I need to do a little reading up on Ruger.

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Don't need no stinkin' sigline

I think Browning was contracted to tweak the design of existing guns...like Winchester lever actions.

Those making the point that all Bill Ruger did was tweak existing designs really need to look at some of Brownings work. Surely they are not saying that he invented the lever-action...they were invented long before he came to Winchester.

Hiram Maxim was the inspiration for Browning's machine guns.

You can't have it both ways....saying Ruger was a gun tweaker ~ when Browning was contracted to do much the same thing.

I would give Ruger single credit for saving the Single Action. Colt had walked away from them. Bill improved the design and brought it back. The Ruger No.1 is another example of taking the Single Shot rifle and putting it into the hands of a average wage earner...nobody will argue that it is a elegant design. Elmer Keith and Skeeter championed the guns that Ruger developed for the magnum caliber handguns.

Somehow, Bill Ruger shoehorned himself into history. Colt is barely the company it once was, Winchester is gone, and Ruger's legacy is a viable company that is still pushing the envelope.

What we need are some more Brownings and Rugers to carry on the tradition....



giz

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Good one!

Ruger was better at marketing, he provided firearms for the common man, but Browning is THE MAN!

I beg to differ from that opinion.

Browning was a fair businessman, and figured out finally that he wasn't getting his fair shake from the boys at the big red "W," and finally went to find someone else to throw his designs to in Remington, and FN.

Quite a feat, considering that was before telephones, airplanes and T. Edison's inventions hit the scene.

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Lost it all in a boat accident

Wrong, Giz.
Read up on it. I'm not saying he invented the lever action- just the good ones. A 66/73/76 type and the guns with vertical locking bolts are quite different in design, and the verticals are JMB all alone. He did not tweak anything but his own designs.

After Winch found the SS, and hunted Browning down and bought the rights, JMB saw an ongoing opportunity. He kept designing guns, and taking them to Winchester. They bought the ones they wanted, and bought the ones they did not want to keep others from getting them!

He took Win the A-5, and they finally turned down a design, thinking the public had no interest. He had ridden a train to take it to them. He decided to take it to Rem. While he waited in the office to see the pres, Hartley (the pres) died of a heart attack!
He simply wired home he would be gone longer than he had forseen, and bought a steamer ticket to Europe to take it to FN, whom he had dealt with on pistols.
They made the A-5 for him, and Browning Arms was truly born with that gun.

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Regards,
Lee Jarrett

Lee,

You know me....it's the weekend. I just want to get folks thinkin' about all the things they think they know.

Who finalized the design for the Browning Hi-Power?


giz

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Good point re: Bill Ruger and the SAA.... The Blackhawk was the six-gun Uncle Elmer had been nattering Colt to build for 30-odd years; read Elmer Keith's work. Keith was one of the first to advocate coilsprings, adjustable sights and a frame-mounted firing pin. As nice as a hammer mounted pin looks, you will always have the risk of pierced primers more so than with a frame-mounted firing pin.

Thought:

How many .454 Casull Colt SAAs have you ever seen?

Don't know his name, but he was a staff engineer/designer at FN.

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Regards,
Lee Jarrett

Introduced in 1935...
by Dieudonné Saive at Fabrique Nationale (FN) of Herstal, Belgium

JM Browning died in 1926....


giz

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It's an apples to oranges comparison. One was a mechanical genius, the other copied others designs and made a reputation on selling an inferior product through sensationalised advertising. Of course that's just my opinion and others may not agree.

I'll go to my grave wondering which worthless *** of a room-mate stole my dad's Auto-5 from under my bed while at college. If I figure out who it was on the other side, I just wonder what the exchange will be?

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Don't need no stinkin' sigline

John M Browning was a Genious.
Ruger was an improver of allready built guns not an Inventor.

Ken

John Browning had to be the greatest individual firearms designer ever. He had an ability to innovate and design that I don't think anyone can be fairly compared to. He found new and better ways to make old ideas work and came up with more totally new ideas than anyone I can think of. His designs have lasted to this day and are copied all over the world. There have been a lot of talented minds in firearms design but most are noted for, at best, a few brilliant ideas. No one else covered as broad a field of design as he did. Lever actions, slide actions, recoil operation, gas operation, improving an existing design or coming up with something completely new, he was a genius.

What? You buy a new book on your way home or somethin'?

jmb no with out a ?

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WILL WORK FOR AMMO!

Pepsi vs. Coke Drew...

Sometimes we have to question what we all repeat...
You missed a great day at the club. Cush and I had a guest... George (SlashCat) showed up. He kicked butt with his 1911 Kimber. Really was on his game...

Weather was great and we had a good time. You and the boy's should try to make it up this Spring.


giz

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Keep reading.
Find the ..............help me out guys- going on memory..... the Mod 1922???

The P-35 would probably have been a BETTER pistol if JM had lived. He was going for striker fired, which made a much better dirt/mud sealed pistol, and does not have the disturbance of hammer fall.
He also was not apparently big on mag safeties, which I abhor. I'd rather have a single shot pistol (lacking a mag) than a very poorly shaped blackjack.

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Regards,
Lee Jarrett

Huh? ???????

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Regards,
Lee Jarrett

Ruger didnt do much in the way of advancement.
Yes, he sold alot of guns but he didnt really design them.
Browning did design guns. his vision allowed him to see a firearm in a few chunks of 4140 bar stock that no one had ever seen before.
Ruger could not do this.
as innovators go Ruger played it safe, he seems to have stayed away from innovation, which is fine. Charles Garrand, Pederson, Mauser, Samuel Colt, and our beloved Horace and Dan did all that for him

john mosses browning no question, no i aint been drinking!

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WILL WORK FOR AMMO!

JMB hands down.
i think its on the order of about 130 guns he designed/patented ?

and he covered all bases. handguns ? 1911 and hi-power how many millions in service ?

machine guns ? 1919, BAR, ma deuce ?

lever guns ? all the nice winchesters? how many tens of millions made in various models ?

shotguns ? lever shotguns still being used by CAS guys, Auto 5 in production for 90 years, he pioneered the over under shotgun in the superposed. pump shotguns ? win 1897

semi auto sporting ? model 8 rems ?

single shot rifles ?

please. and how many calibers did he develop for his guns ?

I'm stooo-pid.

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Regards,
Lee Jarrett

You know me Bro.... I only drink Branch Water or maybe Birch Beer.

I could use a break.... Between "Green Methods", "LEED", and "Woman / Minority Owned" the Construction Business for the Gov. is really kicking my ***.....

Think I need to shoot somethin'....

Drew

Is Giz reading more, or making a beer run?

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Regards,
Lee Jarrett

Both where geniuses. John Browning as a designer and Bill Ruger and his company as a marketer. Ruger knows how to make a product that looks great and is a quality product for the price point.

Troy

Bill who.....? lol Both were great men. My personal taste is definitely geared towards Browning. The book pictured is a great read on "The" man himself...JMB. Really some great information in it from his childhood through his adult years as a father, inventor, and businessman. JMO..........

Attached Images

IMG_1506.jpg (100.9 KB, 29 views)

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Go big or stay home

IMO, no one compares to Browning, certainly not Bill Ruger.

John Browning enough said!

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SC Army National Guard

What you say is true.

My point was to be fair to Ruger, he didn't have as many designs, nor did he have as many innovations, but he was able to start his own empire.

Browning didn't do that.

Browning designed firearms for others to manufacture.

So, I was just trying to say a nice thing about Ruger.

Browning is the man, no two ways about it.

At the risk of being redundant ...

Not even close, John Moses Browning...

This may not address the original point of the thread, and for that I'll apologize, but IMO I wouldn't nominate Bill Ruger for best anything. Whatever positive innovations he may have introduced, or effect he may have had on the shooting sports, I believe he more than made up for by his anti-gun sentiments and political maneuverings.

From what I've read, Bill Ruger was the driving force behind the 10 round limit on magazines, and was pushing for passage of the entire AWB. Of course, the Mini-14 was conveniently excluded from the AWB. Have you ever priced factory 30 round mags for the Mini-14? They're rare as hen's teeth, and uber expensive...because Bill didn't believe that civilians had any business owning such high capacity magazines. He's the single most anti-gun CEO of a gun manufacturing company, of which I'm aware. I realize many will say that this was part of his marketing plan, but I don't consider that advocating the trampling of citizen's rights is a viable marketing tool, or can be anything but harmful to the industry in the long run. I was actually quite surprised that no one had mentioned this yet.

So...I vote for JMB!

Tim

Wait a minute here boys- hold the phones!!!

I hate people that have a "world view" and think that Americans only think about themselves, but I do think we are in some sense on this discussion.

M.K. and Stoner have been mentioned, but what about Mauser? Didn't his company make some royalties off of each rifle and pistol made from his designs? At least, for a while... After all, how many nations were armed with Mauser rifles and pistols made either directly or licensed?

The only other fellers that come close might be the Nagant brothers or the Beretta family- and don't forget Gaston and Luger.

I'd say Sam C. made a few dollars too.

I'd be interested to see which individuals in the firearms business profited the most personally, if adjusted for inflation. Likely, there'd be some huge surprises!
It'd likely make a great subject for a history dissertation.

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Lost it all in a boat accident

JMB. And, most importantly, he was a very astute businessman. Also, he only had a third grade education. (Couldn't spell ammunition. And Col. Colt had more spellings of revolver than the Justice League has secret identities.)
About the only business opportunity he missed was not realizing that, in designing the Auto-Five, he had also invented the shock absorber. Missing out on that patent cost his family plenty.
Also, during WWI, he waived all royalties for the duration and after. Collected not one thin dime from the Great War.
His family did the same in WWII.