New Project! .32 Rimfire!

[P.K.]

Recently went avisitin' some of the better 1/2's extended family and one had a .32 RF Belgian Flobert. He called it a "Belgian" and I'd confessed I'd never heard of one. Now after a little "Yahoo-fu" It's one of them. Is there anyway to get ammo for this huny? Saw an article on reloading for it(suspect and would rather have factory) but would like to find some for him to have to go with it when he passes it on to his grand kids.

Any input appreciated,

Thanks.

[I'll Make Mine]

Factory .32 RF hasn't been made since about WWII.

Dixie Gun Works offers conversion cases -- load 'em with a boolit or sized buckshot pellet and insert a .22 power load (the kind used in concrete nailers -- they come in various power levels). Load the resulting round oriented so the power load rim is under the firing pin, and BANG! They're five bucks or so each, so you could reasonably get several (which would make it easier to fire a string, since they take a couple minutes to unload and reload).

If that's too much trouble, the .32 Long Rimfire is dimensionally the same as .32 Long Colt (and likewise for the short rounds), giving the option of a centerfire conversion, though you'd have to load the Colt with a heeled bullet to get good accuracy in the chamber and barrel made for rimfire ammunition. Depending on the age of your rifle, modern .32 Colt ammunition may or may not be safe to fire, which would be a consideration if you were to convert, especially considering the in-laws preference for factory ammunition (it'd probably also shoot poorly with modern .32 Colt rounds, because Colt converted the round to inside lubed, i.e. undersize bullets, decades ago).

[Bent Ramrod]

Old Western Scrounger used to have current manufacture .32 RF shorts and longs, made in Brazil. The prices are somewhat heart-stopping, but a few shots should satisfy your curiosity. Have a gunsmith check your gun out before you fire the thing.

If your Flobert is the original design, with the hammer being the breech, it would not be safe to convert to centerfire. If it is the so-called "Remington System" or the "Warnant System" it would still be marginal.

I have a .38 RF Remington #2 RB that I tried those Dixie cases in. They might be OK for a revolver, which is held out well in front of the shooter's face, but in a rifle, where I was snuggled up close to the breech, they would leak a little around the priming and would pepper my face with hot particles now and then. The service life of the shells was not great either; the rim area around the .22RF shell seat began to tear out after 5 or 6 shots or so.

[Mk42gunner]

I tried some of the recent manufacture Navy Arms .32 Long in my No.2 Remington.

Results were discouraging to say the least. Case splitting, horrendous leading and very poor accuracy. It did go bang, but that was about it. Mine is now converted to centerfire and I use .32 Short or Long Colt ammo.

If your Flobert is safe to shoot; I would pony up for some of the CIL ammo at collectors prices, if I really wanted to hear it go bang.

Robert

[texassako]

If you do try to reload, this method is better than the Dixie cases IMHO: http://32rimfire.blogspot.com/ . I used it in a #2 RB and had no gas leakage. A lot cheaper as well.

Is the flobert rifled? Some of them were not and were just shotshell garden guns or for indoor gallery shooting.

[Spector]

Did the Floberts us the ''bulleted breach caps''? They were built foe very low powered loads, I believe mainly for parlor shooting matches. I think there was a chapter devoted to them in Grant's ''Boys Single Shot Rifles''. I sold the copy I bought back in ''68'' or I'd look it up. I recall many were Belgium made......Mike

[BCRider]

The other option, if it's not worth a lot of money as a collectable, would be to have the barrel bored out and sleeved to take some form of regular .22. I don't know what sort of pressure .32RF produced but likely standard velocity .22LR would be fine.

[P.K.]

Thank you all for the time to reply. Again, I know next to nothing about this rifle and need to do a little research on it but you all have given me more options than I had.

I'll Make Mine and Mk42, that is added to the list to go over.

BR, yup, I did a little looking for4 ammo too, upwards of 3-4 bucks a round for display stuff. :roll: I found your mention and oh my!

TX Saco, On the list. I will have to talk it over with the owner before I do anything.

Spector, I'm sure there were some that were as you mentioned but this was similar to a rolling block and chambered for a cartridge, no caps.

BCR, another point added to the mix and I may push for this because unless I miss my guess none of the kids/grandkids have any intrest in shooting/reloading. I was thinking 22LR or 22WMR. But we'll se what the owner want's to do.

Again, thanks for all the input!