I just bought two Ruger Vaqueroes, one new and one slightly used. It is the used one that I have most problems with. I think that the previous owner has modified the loading gate in some way. After some work I solved the problem with making av little bend on the gate detent spring. Now the cylinder latch goes down into the frame when loading/unloading.
In Norway a new Ruger Vaquero costs about $1400 so I hoped that the gun would be super quality. I am a little bit surprised about what people in CAS say about the need to spend a lot of time and money to tune it up for CAS. And surprisingly the new Vaquero I bought had damaged threads in the base pin latch when I got it... Not good for an expensive gun like that..
But after fixing the gate detent spring, and putting some Wolf gunsprings into my guns, I am quite happy now.. They are good guns, and shoot very good groupings, see image added.
McCrower
Norway