Lipsey's S&W 432 Ultimate Carry J Frame long term shooting evaluation.

[Dov]

The rear sight in the dovetail on my particular sample is TIGHT. Really it is a dang fine example of production done right. The problem for me is that I don't really have the proper tools to do fine adjustments, so I am doing it the old redneck way, with a brass punch and a BFH (big freaking hammer). Ok, so maybe the hammer is really not that big and it is a gunsmith's hammer but I started with a pretty small hammer and light taps initially and got nowhere, and moved progressively up, until I finally ended up moving the sight too far with one of the strikes.

The lesson was very definitely "use proper tools" which I do not posses, but oddly enough, just a month or so ago I had been offered a universal sight tool, and I declined as I didn't think I would need it as much as others might and did not want to be greedy. I felt some other person might put it to more use. Stupid me.

I also have a habit of loaning out tools and losing track of them over time. In fact there is a set of .45 caliber chamber reaming/uniforming tools floating around Pistol Forum land that I remembered the other day. It has been at least 5 years since I loaned those out, LOL.

The other thing is that I have 50+ year old eyes and ever since I had Lasik surgery done, front sights are fuzzy, so I am never going to do this gun the justice it deserves in terms of showing its true mechanical accuracy. I have proven that time and again shooting an RDO equipped gun next to an iron sighted one with the same load, such as with .45 Colts or .44 Specials. The group size difference is notable.

I may eventually put some Crimson Trace grips on this gun, but the thing is that I REALLY like the grips as issued. They are extremely well thought out and designed. There is no question that a lot of time and thought went into them. It is fortuitous for me as they are extremely close in size and shape to the grips I built up for my 442 J Frame that I have carried for so long. It makes me reluctant to want to swap them out at the moment, even though I do recognize that the CT grips have long been advantageous (for me) in some lighting conditions when it comes to shooting precisely.

Frankly though while I always think it is high priority to shoot precisely, with the little guns of this nature, precise shooting becomes even more important. It is one of the reasons I practiced so much with my old 442.

Here you can see how the grips are pretty similar.

I've wanted for some time for some good revolver grip company to offer addition of laser sight to wood/laminate grips. Inlet metal fixture if needed might not be as precise as factory designed for laser from ground up grip. But would allow for better hand fit with benefit of laser sight for pocket gun or other snubby.

[358156hp]

H&R Brand revolvers is what they are referring to the 432 is S&W brand.

As your probably aware much of Buffalo Bore is loaded hotter than typical mainstream factory ammo, so recoil with those loads in light gun might be more brisk.

I had one of the early H&R 32 magnum guns and the original Federal loads were almost too hot for it. I think it was simply a rechambered 32 S&W long model with no other modifications. S&W has made 32 H&Rs before, and I feel that BB would have taken them into consideration if they were lacking in strength. So I would have no concerns about using Buffalo Bore in the new 432 UCs either.

[Wood]

I had one of the early H&R 32 magnum guns and the original Federal loads were almost too hot for it. I think it was simply a rechambered 32 S&W long model with no other modifications. S&W has made 32 H&Rs before, and I feel that BB would have taken them into consideration if they were lacking in strength. So I would have no concerns about using Buffalo Bore in the new 432 UCs either.

(this post is mostly addressed to @JCS )I believe buffalo bore states on their website's .32 H&R pages that their .32 H&R loads are NOT safe to fire in Harrington and Richardson revolvers but ARE safe for any literally any other .32 H&R (or .327 obviously) chambered gun in good, safe-to-fire condition. Just to make it perfectly clear.

[Wood]

In confirming the language from BB regarding the +P H&R mag ammunition they've offered for a quite a while now, I discovered this new offering on their home page:

BUFFALO BORE NOW OFFERING A 100gr WADCUTTER *STANDARD PRESSURE .32 H&R MAGNUM ROUND

100 gr. Hard Cast @ (900 fps - 2" or 1050 fps - 6"/ME 222 ft-lbs)

Friends, this load is a collaboration of Jeff Hoover, Jason Cloessner at Lipsey’s, and myself, strictly as an anti-personnel load for their new “Ultimate Carry” six-shot J Frame chambered for 32 H&R.

The folks at Lipseys noticed that when firing our 32 S&W Long cartridge (Same cartridge as Colt 32 New Police) out of these 32 H&R Ultimate Carry revolvers, not only did that little 100 gr. HARD CAST wadcutter give great accuracy; it does what hard wad cutters do, and that is smash their way through flesh and bone, doing far more damage than round-nosed bullets. This forward smashing of living tissue also creates straight and, therefore, deep penetration. With the 32 S&W Long load featuring this bullet, they were getting about 830 fps from the two-inch revolvers.

Enter Buffalo Bore; I was asked to use the very same 100 gr. hard cast bullet, but load it into 32 H&R brass with a two-inch muzzle velocity of 900 fps.

It's worthwhile to click through on that link; if you've not been to the BB website before, he likes to editorialize on his individual product pages and this one in particular's an all-timer. In exulting the UC revolver he also takes the earliest possible opportunity to rail against the Hilary Hole.

38.32usd for a 20 round box as of the time of posting which uhhhhhh

Still, one of the early examples of a big name in the business bringing a new .32 cartridge to market as a direct result of the UC

[Paul Blackburn]

In confirming the language from BB regarding the +P H&R mag ammunition they've offered for a quite a while now, I discovered this new offering on their home page:

BUFFALO BORE NOW OFFERING A 100gr WADCUTTER *STANDARD PRESSURE .32 H&R MAGNUM ROUND







It's worthwhile to click through on that link; if you've not been to the BB website before, he likes to editorialize on his individual product pages and this one in particular's an all-timer. In exulting the UC revolver he also takes the earliest possible opportunity to rail against the Hilary Hole.

38.32usd for a 20 round box as of the time of posting which uhhhhhh

Still, one of the early examples of a big name in the business bringing a new .32 cartridge to market as a direct result of the UC

Are the BB offerings coated?

[Wood]

Are the BB offerings coated?

Not the full coat, like Underwood or LR wadcutters. From their .32 S&W Long WC's page, which has the very same bullet:

We alloy and lube these bullets properly so they will NOT substantially lead foul any normal barrel.

[jh9]

Attachment 118967

FWIW American Rifleman got 1,148fps out of a 432 with that load. Contrast the .327 magnum 100gr gold dot out of an LCR at 1,276fps. I think the 100gr gold dot was supposed to be toned down a bit from the 115? Not entirely sure, and I think they're both discontinued anyway. But that's ~120fps difference. So you're probably giving up a lot of the benefit of a .32 there. I would expect the recoil out of an aluminum gun to be somewhat unpleasant.

[jh9]

if you've not been to the BB website before, he likes to editorialize on his individual product pages and this one in particular's an all-

Yeah, the .380 standard pressure JHP product listing recommends a JHP in the chamber and ball in the magazine. At least he didn't suggest alternating / candy caning.

The first and last time I bought BB ammo was some .357s that had images with speer gold dots (bonded) but shipped with some cup-and-core generic bullet. I think later on they added some "bullet may vary" verbiage to the website. Substituting the bullet seems to be an odd thing to do when you're selling ammunition. If you bought a case of HST from sgammo and they shipped you some HiShoks you'd probably call them up and ask what's going on.

The solid copper Barnes and cast bullets are probably safe, but their regular JHP can be a crapshoot. And since the major difference between the 85gr JHPs used by Black Hills and Federal is one of them actually expands through heavy clothing and one of them doesn't I would rather know which one I'm getting.

[Jamie]

Are the BB offerings coated?

I don't have any of the .32 H&R mag loads being talked about, but I do have some 100 gr .32 Long WC from Buffalo Bore.

I chronoed them out of my 327 LCR about 6 months ago. They are not coated as mentioned. Very slight leading was noted...very minimal (but I am switching to all coated bullets as I replaced my reloading stock FWIW).
The 100 gr .32 S&W long BB ran 797 Avg FPS out of my LCR .327. They list 900 FPS on the box, but I don't recall what gun they used.

In the tradition of relevant thread drift for P-F my shooting buddy (an avid collector with much deeper pockets than I) brought out a recently acquired 4 inch 631 J frame in .32 H&R mag along with a box of (probably) 20 year old Georgia Arms .32 H&R mag semi-jacketed hollowpoints that list 1100 fps on the label.
The 631 looked brand new. Minimal turn lines and very tight overall. NICE!
Awesome little gun, good trigger and sights. Those Georgia Arms rounds were a bit "spicy", akin to a P+ 130 gr .38 spl imho. But very subjective I agree.

For the time being I'll stick with Lost River's .32 H&R mag for carry and my handloads that mimic them for practice.

[JCS]

H&R Brand revolvers is what they are referring to the 432 is S&W brand.

As your probably aware much of Buffalo Bore is loaded hotter than typical mainstream factory ammo, so recoil with those loads in light gun might be more brisk.

I can confirm it’s pretty spicy. Not painful but also not fun to shoot.

But it did group sub 4” at 15 yards when I did my part.