More Cadet Talk

[Hooker53]

Hello Bill. Thank you very much for coming on and posting your trim length. Man. For a few there I was wondering if I had something in my chamber. Ha. Well going from you trim length, I still have some room to work with. Yes. At my length, 1.244 if I try to eject my Boolit also stays in there. had a mess to cclean up in finding this out too. Lol. I sure am loving my Cadet. So far, I'v tried 4.0 and 4.2 grns of Unique. Not a lot of diff between the two. Thanks again Bill.

[calaloo]

I just recently borrowed my friends .310 Greener reamer to cut a chamber of a barrel I had to set back one thread. The rifle is not stocked yet but I did fire it after the chamber work. It chambered and fired the one round I tried but I didn't eject an unfired round to see if the bullet remained in the chamber. I'll try to remember to do that today after the gun show. First one I've been to in a long time. I excited! Hope I can find some Accurate 4100.

[Hooker53]

Bill. Soy ds like you have it going on. Post some photos and also how the chamber job went. Yea. I'd like to come into a used .310 Greener reamer myself. Hope you had some luck with the powder. We have a show coming up in Oct. powder and brass is what I'm going for. A man from Va. Beach had a bunch of 32-20 brass, Win stamp real cheap. I wish I had bought a bunch of it. Tried to get him to sell me some more and he would not even answer my emails. Ha. I shot my Cadet, my Rossi M92 .357 and my #4 Roller. It was my oldest girls birthday so we all kinda did a round robin. Had a ball. Ha. Later man.

Roy

[Hooker53]

Well after several rounds of test loads IV found out that I will be trimming another .020 off the OAL of the case that will be a total of .080 off of a stock 32-20 to fit my chamber. I think I could get by with just another .010 but gonna go .020 and get this standerardizing done. Also looks like my Cadet likes 4.3 grns of Unique but still testing on that.

[Ed in North Texas]

I finally have succeeded in getting this little rifle to the range. I followed Dromia's advice and ordered the heeled boolit mould from Tom @ Accurate moulds. .323 with a .308 heel is a perfect fit for my chamber and rifle. I found I needed to trim the .32-20 cases to the "book" length of 1.075 to get the heeled boolit loaded case to chamber completely. I took the Martini and a Marlin 336 in .35 Remington to the range yesterday for some load development. I was working up a load with 4227, taking 5 rounds each of 9, 9.5, 10, 10.5 and 11 grains. The boolit was lubed with LLA and corn starch baby powder to keep the boolits from getting sticky in the TX heat.

Being a (ahem) mature person with bi-focals and almost 70 year old eyes, I did have some problem with the open sights. And when I concentrated on the sights, I really couldn't see the aiming point of the sight-in target @ 50 yards. But I was pleasantly surprised to see the results and quit after the first 3 rounds of 9 grains. For now I'm happy with that load, and I don't know whether I'll even fool with 100 yards (I'd for sure have to use a regular bullseye at 100 just to see the aiming point). I'm a happy camper.

[Hooker53]

Great report Ed. My rounds will go in with a little more length left in but seems to like the work up. I have found that 4.5 to 4.8 of Unique is the ticket for my cadet. They are fun little rifles.

[challenger_i]

Gents:

I am working with a custom caster to work-up a 110-115 gr hollow-base round nose bullet to help cure the
accuracy issues when shooting 32-20 in the Cadet rifles that are so chambered. The intent is to have a .312"
bullet that fits the 32-20 case, yet will function properly in the .316"-.321" bores found in a substantial number
of Cadet rifles.

If enough interest is generated, I will publish my results in this forum.

Feel free to comment, here, and you may contact me by e-mail.

coltdriver1961@yahoo.com

By no means am I trying to make a profit in this endeavoure: just trying to pass on my findings, and, maybe, help out the Cadet shooters.

[Hooker53]

Challenger, do post your findings and keep us up to date. I for one would like to try first hand what you come up with. Thanks
Roy
Hooker53

[skeettx]

YES!! Please post your results
Mike

[challenger_i]

I'll do my best. At present, we are having issues getting a mold made. If that persists, I will have to tool-up, and make a swage set. At least, with a properly made swage, we can diddle with the weight more.

[challenger_i]

Ok, we may have a line on a couple mold makers, and are looking into getting a mold made.
My idea was for a hollow-base round-nose, with two grease grooves and a crimp groove, weighing
115gr.

I would like to hear any ideas ya'll may have, so we can incorporate them into the finished mold.

The floor is open, gents....

[calaloo]

Challenger:
The rim on a .32-20 is thicker than the 310 Greener. When the Cadet is chambered for the .32-20 round the rim cut is made deeper thereby allowing the .32-20 round to be chambered. The .32-20 bullet is too small for the Cadet bore. That is what makes it inaccurate. All you have to do is get a mould to make heeled bullets for the Cadet. RCBS makes one. When you fire a .32-20 round in the Cadet the brass fire forms to the cadet chamber. Usually dies are not needed to load the cartridge. Tumble lube with LLA and thumb seat the bullet in front of about 4.2 grains of unique. Don't make something hard out of something so easy.

[Bad Ass Wallace]

I've been working with Cadets and the 310 / 32-20 conversions for many years. An old time gunsmith who used to convert them told me that the conversion involved using a 310 reamer and cutting the chamber to the depth of the 32/20, then cutting the thicker rim to suit! When fireformed you have a case that is the length of 32/20 but the diameter of the 310 Cadet which was nominally designed to take a .316 boolit. Early barrels and early ammunition (1910-12) had bores of .316. Indeed we had a manufacturer in Australia for many years of jacketed boolits that were .316 x 120gn.

A batch of replacement barrels came into the country which were oversized running .319-.321 and in 1930 the Colonial Arms Co. in South Australia came up with the idea of a heeled boolit to get these replacements to shoot with some sort of accuracy. This does not mean to say that all Cadets require a heeled boolit.

I have 11 original rifles and 10 used a conventional plain base non-heeled boolit which is cast and sized to .317". Only one (a Greener) has a bore of .321"

My main concern with the idea of a .312" hollow based expanding boolit is that you have to overwork the brass to even get it to hold a projectile after the case has been fireformed in the converted rifle!

>310 Cadet and 32/20 cases compared


​L to R Loaded 310 Cadet, 32/20 fireformed and reloaded, 32/20 ready for fireforming

[challenger_i]

My 32-20 cases come out of my Martini looking like they came out of a Winchester 92, or a Colt revolver, i.e: still a bottle-necked cartridge. I am certain there is a LOT of variation in the chambers of these rifles.
My idea was to have a 32-20 round that would shoot well in most Cadets rechambered to 32-20, and still be usable with a Colt, or Smith, revolver (some of us are still two-gun shooters...).

We have a mold maker cutting the mold. The projectile will be a round-nose, weighing about 115 gr.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

I've been working with Cadets and the 310 / 32-20 conversions for many years. An old time gunsmith who used to convert them told me that the conversion involved using a 310 reamer and cutting the chamber to the depth of the 32/20, then cutting the thicker rim to suit! When fireformed you have a case that is the length of 32/20 but the diameter of the 310 Cadet which was nominally designed to take a .316 boolit. Early barrels and early ammunition (1910-12) had bores of .316. Indeed we had a manufacturer in Australia for many years of jacketed boolits that were .316 x 120gn.

A batch of replacement barrels came into the country which were oversized running .319-.321 and in 1930 the Colonial Arms Co. in South Australia came up with the idea of a heeled boolit to get these replacements to shoot with some sort of accuracy. This does not mean to say that all Cadets require a heeled boolit.

I have 11 original rifles and 10 used a conventional plain base non-heeled boolit which is cast and sized to .317". Only one (a Greener) has a bore of .321"

My main concern with the idea of a .312" hollow based expanding boolit is that you have to overwork the brass to even get it to hold a projectile after the case has been fireformed in the converted rifle!

Would you be the Wallace that I, also a Wallace, used to correspond with in the days of the old Shootertalk website? Your user name isn't conclusive evidence.

I'm sure you are right about what the Cadet will accept in the way of bullets, but Greener illustrates a sectioned cartridge in "The Gun and its Development" which undoubtedly has a heel bullet. The latest that could be was his Ninth Edition of 1912, the one which is usually reprinted, but the picture could have been considerably earlier. That is a date by which Greener, in his usual manner, was heavily promoting his target and sporting .310 Martinis for individual purchasers, with no mention of BSA, or of Francotte, who invented the thing.

The Cadet, with its normal load, should be pretty good at expanding a soft bullet to groove diameter, or swaging one down without dangerous pressures... maybe. With a jacketed bullet, accuracy would surely suffer. The only version of that I knew about was the batch produced in case the Cadet had been required for emergency use, defending Australia against the Empire of Japan. I would always feel happier with a groove-diameter bullet, and if it requires a heel, that means a heel.

The real key to this problem is the chamber neck diameter, and whether it will allow a bullet of larger diameter than the conventional heel. (I am a long way from the only Cadet I own, and don't remember any measurements except the inside of Bertram cases, which was about .307. I was looking into the .300/.310 cartridge, which I know only by name.) I think this rifle needs the use of a chamber cast or pin gauges to determine this, since it may not expand the neck before gas gets around the outside of it.

The .32-20 conversion was done by many people, and it is far from impossible that some of them may have an enlarged shoulder to accommodate a larger than .312 bullet (which in my opinion means it should be called a something-else-20.) I agree that I would much prefer not to work the brass that much on sizing and expansion. Enlarging the die neck, with a bush at the rear of the die to keep a reamer concentric, could avoid that. A 21/64in. engineer's reamer might suit, and if high speed steel wouldn't cut hardened die steel, I think carbide, available on eBay, surely would.

There are other ways of solving the rim thickness problem with .32-20 cases. If the primes will go in further than flush, lathe turning the head forward a few thousandths might do, and would probably remove the headstamp, stopping the case from looking at you accusingly, saying "I'm a western-hemisphere .32-20." A simple fake chamber in a steel block would let you do it accurately with a file. Alternatively you could make a fake chamber with the correct rim recess depth, and squash the rim thinner in a vice.

[Hooker53]

B in S. just plain good Info. Gonna read it several times and let it sink in. Thanks for posting.

Roy
Hooker53

[Ballistics in Scotland]

Was it BSA? The OP said "Birmingham Arms", and it used to be quite common practice for the Belgians, even those who made quite presentable guns, to find a Greenar, Greenor, Purdie or Purdy on skid row, and do a deal for the use of his name.

You need a chamber cast, to see what diameter of bullet the .32-20 case will accommodate without being a wedge fit in the chamber. It might let you use a bullet very close to the groove diameter. You only need the neck diameter, and car body repaid filler will do, if you oil the chamber.

[Ed in North Texas]

Birmingham Small Arms = BSA

Great Post.

[Hooker53]

Now that's a new one. Gonna have to try that one. Has anyone tried that to chamber cast that can report as to shrinkage or other properties?

[Ballistics in Scotland]

It has, for me, come out accurate enough for the purposes envisaged here, but I suppose there is no guarantee of all brands behaving the same. You have to make sure the chamber is oiled or greased, and that might be a source of some error in itself.