Anybody Still Like/Use the 32 Winchester Special?

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Coolhand_Luke

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I recently found a decent deal on an old 1947 made Marlin 36A in 32 Special. Not a collecters item by any means, looks like it made a trip to a smith and had the 24" barrel docked and was refinished in some kind of a matte finish looks like parkerizing maybe, something like Remington puts on its cheaper guns. Anyway, somebody who owned it previously was probably a pretty cagey old hunter and had it set up with an old steel Lyman 66 peep and a Marbles gold 'Sheard' bead. The sight set up is excellent, my favorite now of all my lever guns. It did have a loose buttstock but $10 worth of epoxy fixed that for now. I think the stock was loose for awhile since the inletting is fairly worn so I will probably have to do a full glass bed on the pistol grip as a permanent fix. I almost passed it up when I saw it was in 32 Special since I figured it was a dead and obsolete cartridge, impossible to even find any ammo for, but I'm glad I was wrong and grabbed it! Turns out Federal, Winchester and Remington all still load it, even Hornady has the new gummy tip round for the 32 Special. I was able to turn up quite a bit of ammo easily, locally, from okay not too bad to kind of stupid pricing ($32-44/box).

So far first impression is what a great old gun! It shoots the Rem 170 gr Core Lokts pretty well holding about 2.5" at a 100 yards, the Win PP's not so much about 4". I got some of the Hornady 165 great LeverEvo's to try as well but haven't had a chance yet.

Here is a pic of the old Marlin 36A

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And here is pic of both a 32 Special and 30-30 round Winchester 170 gr Power Points:

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It seems there must be a few 32 Special fans lurking about because there is still a good demand for ammo! So anybody here still use or like the 32 Special? :)
 
Completely obsolete and useless cartridge...

But having said that, my Grandpa bought a Model 94 SRC in .32WSpcl, way back, like 1920 or something... nobody in the family remembers the exact year.

The rifle is still all original.

He passed that rifle onto my dad, and the rifle was supposed to be given to my younger brother (Dad's wishes). But when my father passed away, my oldest brother swooped in and took all of Dad's guns. Kept them for himself.

So even though the .32Spcl is a useless and obsolete cartridge, that Model 94 SRC holds a special place in my memory, and I keep an eye out for one. Maybe someday I'll stumble onto one just like Grandpa's old SRC.
 
.325WSM said:
My go-to bush gun. Model '94. Lever evolutionammo makes it much flatter.
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I'm interested in trying that Hornady ammo. How have you found its performance on game? I noticed in pics the 32 special 165 gr bullet is flat based instead of boat tailed like 30-30 I wonder if it would hold together a bit better? I'm taking the old 32 hunting this weekend, gonna keep my Marlin 336 30-30 company as we go deer/bear hunting.
 
32 special supposedly shoot cast bullets well too, better then 30-30 can. I don't think it's "useless" everyone should know it will kill game within its range just as dead as any other cartridge. Shouldn't ever have to worry about ammo for a while if you reload. Can form 30-30 cases to 32 special as far as I know. Plus there's just a cool factor for shooting something a little different and slightly forgotten
 
I rekon if I didn't have a 375BB, I would consider the 32SPCL for sure, an at worst would have a 30-30!

its a wikid looking round an would be fine to fantastic for the smaller deer species in scrub

neat lookn gun, looks like some fun.. load er up mate

WL
 
I shot 20 or so deer with a Win 94 .32 Spl... on my first morning of deer hunting at 15 years of age, I shot five whitetail deer in five minutes with that rifle... deer haven't changed much in the intervening 37 years... so I imagine a .32 Spl would work great today also.
 
The problem with the .32 Winchester has nothing to do with it's bullet diameter, weight, or ballistics; the problem is the rifle barrel, or more specifically, with the rifling's rate of twist. Its not 1:10, or 1:12 but 1:16. Why does that matter? After all, the rotational velocity is sufficient to stabilize the bullet, otherwise the rifles would be hopelessly inaccurate. The problem is precession (yaw), which occurs twice during the bullet's flight, first upon entering the atmosphere from the muzzle, and again at impact with the target. The faster the rotational velocity, the more quickly precession is overcome. The .32's low linear velocity, combined with it's low rotational velocity, increases the likelihood of the bullet impacting at an angle other than tip on, and it's rotational insufficient to allow the bullet to recover quickly enough to perform optimally. The end result is reduced penetration, and minimized expansion, relative to what might be expected from a .30/30. If I was shooting a .32 Special, I'd be looking for the shortest bullet I could find, that was suitable for the task at hand.
 
So working on that theory (reduced rotational velocity) a 1-16 twist whelen would be equally as "challenged" in terms of penetration and expansion?
 
Where the 1-16 ran into problems was they envisioned a dual purpose gun able to shoot both BP and smokeless.Less BP fouling with the 1-16 twist .Shot out ones where usually re-bored to 38-55 Win............Harold
 
Twist rate aside... all I shot out of it were Win 170 grain silver tips... at 15, I knew little of twist rates and bullet "yaw"... all I knew was that I was supremely confident that when I held that rifle I could put the bullet where I wanted it to go. Many of the deer I took with that 94 were 150-200 yard unsupported offhand shots... I don't think that I would push it beyond that.
 
Had an uncle that was one of the first white settlers in the Peace River country AB ,that trapped and used nothing but a .32 special for everything.I remember as a boy him telling tales of his life in the woods.He only ever shot one grizzly ,one day baking bread ,he had a surprise visitor that died on the last shot with it's head between his feet damned near on the porch. He made it a point to avoid grizzlies after that......can't blame him.....Harold
 
Pretty cool! A buddy of mine just received a 94 in 32 special; inherited it from an Uncle in MB. This rifle is "well used", but still hoot to shoot. I wasn't familiar to the round, but a kin to a 30-30, I'm sure it still has it's place and following.
 
Where you fellas getting Hornady ammo, I looked local can't find any. Is there any sponsors on here that are selling it?
 
hoytcanon said:
Twist rate aside... all I shot out of it were Win 170 grain silver tips... at 15, I knew little of twist rates and bullet "yaw"... all I knew was that I was supremely confident that when I held that rifle I could put the bullet where I wanted it to go. Many of the deer I took with that 94 were 150-200 yard unsupported offhand shots... I don't think that I would push it beyond that.
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That's nice shooting with a semi or full buck-horn 94 carbine.
 
When I was in about grade five and going to a one room country school, every household virtually lived on wild game, shot year around. Us boys at school would spend hours talking about the various calibre rifles the families owned and how good the rifles were at getting game. One of the kids dads was an exceptionally good hunter who regularly got moose and almost always with one shot. His rifle was a Winchester 32 Special and we all agreed it was a far better calibre for moose than a 30-30!
 
For the past few years, that's been my whitetail rifle - a 1950's 94 carbine in .32 Winchester Special. I loaded up with factory ammo when Canada Tire was selling out their stock, plus I have a bunch of factory brass, plus 30-30 brass is simple to adapt. I love shooting the old rifle.

Of course, my opinion doesn't mean much, as I like shooting the oldies. :p For years I carried an ugly old 98 in 8mm, then rechambered it to 8mm-06. It has a $10 Fisher-Dietz fixed 4 power scope. I also smoked a few whitetail with a nice Churchill Gunmakers No. 1 MkIII* in .303 British.
 
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