The Buck Mark

I saw “Buck Mark” in the headline and had to read.

Sometime back I had one. It was a 7.25″ barrel, wood grips, ugly matte blued. Awful gun. Sometimes during firing, the action would send tiny slivers of aluminum flying at me. I never did figure out how or why. It was finicky, even by .22LR standards. And hard to clean since it can’t be field stripped, like the Ruger Mark 4’s. Also, as the magazine well wasn’t fully lined with aluminum and the inside bare wood of the grips was exposed, the manual warned about cleaning, and not getting any oil on the inside of the wood or it’d swell and make inserting magazines difficult. And of course was cleaning period was tough, since it can’t be field stripped. On the plus side, it did have a good trigger. And it fit my hand well. The controls were nicely positioned as well.

The one I had, had good adjustable sights, fiber optic, thick, good for regular target shooting and they’d have been good for hunting too, though I never hunted with it. They’d have been too thick for serious bullseye shooting. There was rail molded into the top of the aluminum frame, but I never tried mounting anything to it.

Why Browning hasn’t updated the Buck Mark, and do something similar to what Ruger did to their .22LR, the Mark 4 is mind boggling. The Mark 4 field strips like an AR15, and upper and a lower and BCG for lack of a better term. It couldn’t get easier.

I have a Mark 4 ‘Standard’ with a 6in barrel. It’s nothing special, but fits my hand well, and is reliable, to about 500-600 rounds before it begins jamming and needs to be put away till getting home and cleaned. If I could change something, I’d say the front sight blade should be fixed to the barrel, like a Colt SAA. The Mark 4 Standard has a screw and can be replaced. I don’t like that. The fit and finish could be a little better, there’s a fair bit of wear to the finish where the upper and lower attach and rub.

My Mark 4 does seem to group tighter with 40gr bullets. 36gr aren’t bad, but 40gr’s do tighten up a bit. CCI’s the best. The CCI Standard 40gr LRN in particular. I just glanced at CCI’s website and the Standard 40gr LRN is “unavailable”. Oh well.

I can shoot the Mark 4 better than any pistol I’ve ever shot. It’s a keeper.

Equip, train, pray and never disarm.