32-20...Why Not?

[TXGunNut]

I've been playing with the 32-20 for a little while now and recently bought an 1892 rifle just because it was so slick...and I own the dies and moulds to feed it. ;-) The revolvers are happy with 231 but the rifle isn't. Neither gun likes Rx7. My shooting partner laughs at me, he feeds his 100+ yr old 38-40 and 44-40 Winchesters with BP because that's what works best. He's even working on a BP 32 WS load. My SAA and clones in 45 Colt haven't seen a SP load in over a year; Colt never has, others may never again. So why do I keep trying SP in the 32 WCF? No idea, other than the only mould I have is a Lee TL314-90. Swede helped to remedy that recently when he did a short run of his 314008, should be in my PO box now. Sizing die will be here before the boolits are cured.
I have plenty of FFFg and SPG on hand, I think this will be fun. I can't recall seeing posts on BP in the 32-20 around here but you can rest assured I know the 500 meter rams are safe from my little peashooter. I'll be using RP and WW cases but haven't decided whether this round needs a wad. I'm thinking WW sp primers but I'm open to suggestions there, I think I can score CCI and Federal sp primers easily enough. Have a few sr primers as well. Powder shelf holds Swiss and KIK FFFg. I need to fabricate a powder compression tool but that shouldn't be too hard.

[Nobade]

I am finding BP works best in my two 32-20 rifles, a relined Cadet and a Marlin 1894. The 3118 is of course the standard, and if you use it with good lube and Swiss or Old Eynsford FFFg it will fire many shots before it fouls out. KIK works too, you just need to wipe it more often. Recently I have been playing with the Accurate Moulds 32 cal. BP bullet, it looks like a cross between a Biglube design and a normal 3118. I find as long as I use a very soft lube so it all slings off at the muzzle it is reasonably accurate and I can shoot 100 shots easy without foulout.

I don't use any wads or compression dies - just throw 20 grains of powder and smash it down with the boolit. It's not enough compression to distort the boolit or the case. Basically fill 'er up and put a boolit on top. And pistol primers work best, doesn't seem to matter what brand they all light the fire fine.

I actually can get higher velocity with BP loads than I can with smokeless plain base boolits without leading the bore. If I want to go faster I need to use gaschecks or paper patches with the smokeless. What's not to like?

-Nobade

[John Boy]

Remington #1 1/2 Rolling Block, 32-20 with black powder ... a fun shooting rifle. Having it relined now to shoot tighter groups at 100yds

[TXGunNut]

Thanks, Nobade. Sounds like my kind of loading; nothing fancy. I was pretty pleased when Al saw a couple of requests (one from me) on his suggestion thread and decided to run a few of his version of this old classic.
I guess we'll see, picked up the NOE mould tonight. I'm hope the revolvers will like whatever the rifle likes, they don't seem very picky.

[Nobade]

Shouldn't have any problem with revolvers. The rifle is the challenge, if it will run in that the revolvers shouldn't be any trouble at all. That's the thing with black powder and cartridges designed to use it. They just plain work!

-Nobade

[TXGunNut]

Agreed on all points, Nobade. Gave the new mould a good hot soapy scrub a little while ago and may cast a few before the day is over. Sizer and mould handles are still in my virtual shopping cart so it'll be awhile before I actually get to burn any Holy Black in these guns. Have some yardwork to do but breaking in a new mould is serious business. Too windy for yardwork anyway.

[TXGunNut]

Sizer came in yesterday, was a rough day so I got a little loading room therapy in last night. Thought the top groove (314008) was a crimping groove so lubed the bottom groove of 80 boolits before I loaded the first one and realized my mistake. Oops. 20 grs comes pretty close to filling the WW cases. New boolit sized to .313 chambers much better in my Navy Arms revolver.
Should be a fun weekend, weather permitting.

[Nobade]

Yep, it's like the 45 Colt - fill both grooves and crimp over the ogive to the right overall length so they will run through the rifle.

Have fun shooting!

-Nobade

[TXGunNut]

I put a light crimp right on the front edge of the driving band, Navy Arms revolver has a tight chamber and will dictate the OAL and crimp. 1892 is not as picky, cycles and chambers most anything. I sized the boolits to .313 to accomodate the rifle's .312 bore and the revolver's tight chamber. Shooting buddy cancelled and I have yard work to do, will have to shoot them another day. :-(

[Wayne S]

Any idea on how fast the rifle loads are going ? Just for grins & kicks I thought I might try some BP in a 32-20 T/C Contender ??

[TXGunNut]

Haven't fired any yet, getting curious about that myself. I'm thinking 1300 or maybe 1400. I suspect Nobade has a better idea.

[Nobade]

About 1300 fps from a rifle, 1050 from a 10" Contender. 900 from a revolver.

-Nobade

[TXGunNut]

Slipped out to the range between storms, pretty much deserted for some reason. ;-)
I'm thinking 20 grs of KIK is a bit much, lots of unburned powder left in the bore. 50 yard group was pretty lousy as well. Bore is a little rough but I still think I can get her to shoot with the right load. To top it all off the magazine follower got in a bind and rounds refused to feed from the magazine. Disappointing day but at least I got out and gave it a try, will work better next time.
Gun's cleaned, magazine fixed, brass is soaking. Not a bad day, just not great.

[Nobade]

It's not unburned powder, it's fouling. Depending on bullet hardness, type of lube used, temperature, and relative humidity you have more or less fouling and having to deal with it to keep it under control. There will always be lots of fouling when shooting BP ammo, but whether it builds up and makes a hard mess near the muzzle or not depends on all these factors.

20gr. is the correct charge, hence the name 32-20. But if you want to clean it up and not have to deal with fouling control, you can put a grain or two of smokeless powder next to the primer and then a correspondingly less charge of black. Then you can shoot all day and not have to deal with it.

If the bore is rough, you may have a difficult time getting it to work all that great. And remember a rough bore holds lots of fouling, so use a nylon brush in addition to patches to clean it, so you get the fouling out of the pits. Keep the bore wet with Ballistol afterward for storage so you don't get rust problems. I have several rifles with pitted bores and am amazed at how much crud comes out after they look clean initially.

-Nobade

[w30wcf]

TxGunNut,
I don't own a .32-20 but a friend has a '73 Winchester with a 28" barrel (4" longer than standard). The barrel is a bit on the rough side. He wanted to see how it would shoot with b.p. so I loaded up 10 rounds for him.

I used the same bullet you are using, SPG lube and Swiss b.p. ignited by small pistol pimers. At 50 yards he said that all 10 rounds stayed in about a 2" group.

Based on my experience with KIK in other calibers using traditional 2 lube grooved bullets, fouling would be better controlled using Olde Enysford or Swiss. Lacking those 2 powders, as NoBade suggested, using a small amount of smokeless under the b.p. will help the fouling. I would suggest using 2 grs. of 2400, 4227 or similar burning rate powders under 16 grs or so of Kik.

w30wcf

[Dan Cash]

My shooting partner got a little 92 Win .25-20 relined to .32-20 and it really impressed me with its performance with smokeless. I had to have one too and found a nice 1894 Marlin about a year ago and fell in love. Have not gotten around to trying it with BP but that will happen soon; winter was really rough here and little shooting happened. If I can get 1400 with BP the gun will get a heavy diet of it. The caliber is a fantastic killer on porcupines and coyotes.

[TXGunNut]

My other BP guns don't foul this badly but they're all .45 bores. And yes, the nylon brush got a little action last night, Nobade. Was using SPG and ACWW and shooting between rain showers, wondering if a drier day would help. I still have some Swiss and I'm looking for an excuse to try OE. ;-) My .45's like the KIK just fine so it won't go to waste. I'm not afraid of a rough bore, I have a little old Colt Army Special 32-20 revolver with a bore that looks like the proverbial sewer pipe. Little junker shoots quite well in spite of it all.

[srk]

HI
If your open to smokeless, I have an 1885 low wall in .32-20 and have tried
a few different powders thru it.
The best performer at 100 yds was 8.8 grs of Imr 4227
Just my two cents.
Best of luck!

[TXGunNut]

Actually this little rifle doesn't seem to like smokeless powder at all, bore is pretty badly pitted. Against Nobade's advice I reduced the powder charge to 18grs KIK FFFg, when I cleaned it after 10 rounds I was pushing fouling sludge out with the moosemilk-soaked patches, took over a dozen patches plus a good scrubbing with a nylon brush to clear that clog.
Accuracy was decent...for the first few rounds.
Seriously considering a liner.
I'll try some Swiss just for academics but not feeling terribly optimistic.

[srk]

Hi
I had a 1892 in .25-20, bore was in rough shape.
I ended up using Speer Flat points 85gr.
I know its jacketed, but it made up for the poor rifling.
Maybe try black powder with the jacketed bullets???
I kept the distance around 75yds, they performed pretty good.
Again my two cents, just trying to help.
Sean

[TXGunNut]

Thanks, Sean. I suspect it'll probably shoot j-words ok if given the opportunity. No offense but I think I'd rather sell it than shoot j-words, not being snobbish just realistic. I bought this ol' girl because she has a slick action and she's too rough-looking to be a collector piece. I figured she's good for one thing, plinking away w/ CB's and BP. All she needs is a new bore...or a new owner.

[griffiga]

My experience is that black powder and jacketed bullet don't mix too well. I have never been able to get good groupings with any black powder cartridge gun. I have a nice little 92 carbine with the short mag that loves green dot shotgun powder with 100 grain laser cast bullets. Can't remember the exact load I use right of the top of my head, but the lyman reloading manual has some good information and seems like that's were I got the info. I also have a Uberti 7 1/2 inch bbl SAA that likes the same loading. In fact, at my family reunion, we regularly hold a pistol shooting competition and the last two years I have beaten the glocks, Sigs and Rugers much to the disliking of my brother in laws!

[TXGunNut]

Welcome to the affliction, griffiga! I have a 5 1/2" Navy Arms SAA to keep me busy loading 32-20's until I decide what to do with this rifle. It does OK with smokless but BP will be a lot more fun, that's what all my other SAA's shoot anyway.
If you really want to have some fun with the BIL's load up some BP for the next reunion. It's a real crowd-pleaser and it won't let you down in the accuracy department, at least my 45's don't.

[griffiga]

Thanks for the welcome TXgunNut, I have quite regularly beaten them with black powder. Probably the most sounding defeat came at the hands of my Pedersoli LePage pistol. I was exploding soda cans out of the trees quite regularly at 50 yards with the thing and they were lucky to even hit the tree! - They had no idea how accurate it could be in fact one brother in law has got me on the lookout for him one. Another one bought him a Navy Arms Rolling block .45-70 that he really loves - slowly but surely I'm converting them and they are finding they can reload them quite cheap compared to buying .9mm/.40's/.45's. In fact, next year I've proposed a black powder shooting match and they all agreed. I have loaded my .32/20 with Pyrodex before with pretty good results, although I'm not a big fan of the man made stuff in my muzzleloaders (probably mostly because I shoot flintlock), I do like it in cartridges as it seems to be a bit easier to clean up. By the way, a very good receipt for cleaning those cases is a 50/50 mixture of water and distilled vinegar. Punch the primers out and soak them no longer than 10 minutes or the mixture starts to "etch" the cases. I set the timer for about 8 just to make sure. Rinse with water and set on a towel upside down to dry. I polish the outside afterward with some fine steel wool and wipe them down with a paper towel - does a pretty good job.

[TXGunNut]

I use a multi-step method for BP cases these days. Soak & shake in hot, soapy water. Scub the innards and rinse. Drop in ultrasonic cleaner for an hour or so. Rinse again and let dry. If I want shiny cases next stop is the vibratory cleaner. I spend more time on the cases than I do on the guns!