Thanks for the opinions dbowling & herman. I haven't confirmed them being discontinued by Ruger, yet. Their website shows serial numbers from 1997 through 2004. The last sequence they show is 730-16784 and mine starts with 730-17*** so it may have been one of the last ones made if the seller is correct about them being discontinued. But Ruger said they sometimes makes their serial numbers out of sequence so I'm getting them to give me the history of this gun. The one bad review I found by Randy Wakeman said he "wasn't sorry to see them go" but his article didn't have a date on it so I don't know when he wrote it.

The guy who had this rifle had two others but both were wood stocks / blue, one called an officers model (curved buttstock) and the other straight buttstock. They were cheaper than the one I bought but I was interested more in hunting durability than looks. That officers model looked like a mini-14 only with a fat barrel. I'm waiting for the show to come back in early March and if he has that officers model left, I may just have to take it home with me. I've found a couple of older websites and you are right, they did sell for a lot of money. I've also found a couple of other forums from the 1997 - 2001 era that addressed misfires. Some went to a musket nipple to solve that as they said no 209 conversion was available for the 77/50. However, we know that is not the case now cause I got one with my rifle. The instruction manual was printed in 1997 when the first model came out and one of the diagrams show a gap at the top so you can see the cap showing for safety purposes. However, on my model as well as yours, Herman, I guess that may be a change they made due to early complaints and testing. I guess if I go to that shotgun primer I'll find out about any blowback since I hear they are quite powerful. I only own sidelocks with #11 nipples so this is my first in-line as well as 209 primer. I really do appreciate your opinions