I've read a lot of glowing comments about the XX/77 series elsewhere and have been baffled. While a compact, handy little rifle than handles very nicely and is very attractive, I found the 357/77 to be the single most miserable firearms I've ever purchased. Here, I thought I'd gotten a lemon. Aside from the OAL and nose-shape limitations (expected) imposed by the magazine and throat, it had other issues as well. Notably, the consistently poor grouping with cast in my specimen was not appeased by tuning a very poor trigger, shimming the bolt or attempting to relieve forearm pressure. I had to disassemble, clean and polish parts on two new magazines to get them to work, but after that, the even fed the NOE 360180 smoothly.
I won't go on and on because it annoys me just remembering that gun, but as I removed material from one side of the barrel channel, the fore end just kept crowding from that direction. Once it got to a point where it would be visibly ugly, I stopped and contacted Ruger and never got a peep back. Several months after having sold the gun, I got a call from Ruger CS out of the blue with an apology for the delay and was asked how they might help me with my bent synthetic stock. I advised that I had sold the rifle to a guy who was of the opinion that "two-inch groups at fifty yards was plenty good for hunting deer." I got another apology and the explanation that the previous CS rep left a number of long-unanswered CS e-mails which were being pursued, so good on Ruger.
Out of the box, the bolt was extremely stiff, in fact, the first time I slapped the bolt to extract the first spent case, I actually bruised my cheek and knocked my glasses askew. Felt like an idiot and nothing pushes my PO'd button like being struck in the face. I bought the shim kit and installed the thinnest one - no difference in groups but an even stiffer bolt. I cleaned the gun right out of the box and removed some burrs and shavings. After some use, I touched up some wear points, lubed everything properly and it was still slower to chamber the next round than a Handi-Rifle.
Not just to grouse about it - I see a lot of helpful and constructive input offered here and my intent is the same. My perspective is that if I can't get a 357 to shoot ANY cast load well, there's something wrong with the gun. I shot everything from 125 grain RFPs to 180 grain WFNs using numerous obvious and proven choices in powders for everything from "bunny loads" to deer loads. No luck. I will say that the gun was extremely consistent in grouping at about two inches (at fifty yards) regardless of what combination I loaded for a cartridge, which I found interesting.
Cute little sucker and I was sorely disappointed when it didn't work out. Maybe a wood stock would have been better, but I'd already paid more for that gun than I'd ever paid for any gun I've ever bought.