These aren't 20 calibers but I thought I'd share anyway...

[Jim White]

About 5-6 years ago I picked up these two little carbines. They were made by Winchester in the early 80's and are known as the Wrangler [32 WIN SPL] top eject and Wrangler II [38-55] side eject. Now, there has been a lot of Model 94's with the Wrangler name but this one is unique that it has scrolling on the receiver as does the Wrangler II. They came in factory boxes and paperwork but, the Lord willing and the creek not rising I intend to change that.

Anyway, the 32 Special is pretty much a 30-30 shooting a .321 bullet with the most common being 170 JFP. Im loaded some up using W748 and a WLR primer in Winchester virgin brass.

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The 38-55 on the other hand is a puzzle within itself. Not to get too long winded but this cartridge has been produced through the years with a variety of different bore sizes from .375 to .381" and to add, the brass is produced in various lengths and right now it's difficult to find any 38-55 brass anywhere. Fortunately when I bought this I also picked up a bag of brass. There is a local bullet maker here that provided me some samples of 245 gr hard cast flat nose pills. I hope in the next few weeks as the weather warms and the range stays open for longer hours I'm going to give these a shot. I'd like to some jacketed bullets but the best I can find so far is .377 by Berger. I won't bother with .375 bullets because I just figure they won't be that accurate. For this round, I'm trying Reloader 7 with virgin Starline brass @ 2.125" with felt lines above the powder.

Hopefully...everything will work out!

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[MTPaul]

Jim,

They are both classy looking rifles and, in my book, you can't go wrong with the styling of these rifles...timeless...and a throwback to the famous rifle that won the west. Hopefully the weather will warm up soon in WA and allow you to put them through their paces on the range.

[Jim White]

MT Paul...I plan on doing that next week, rain or shine. I am a little curious of the potential recoil of the 38-55 because the round looks like it could be a "thumper". As I'm getting older and have been shooting small calibers lately I may have to get reaccustomed to shooting some of the larger calibers. I'll post here how it turned out.

[Rick in Oregon]

Very nice there, Jim! What 'gunny guy' doesn't have a few lever rifles?

Big fun wheather jump shooting jackwabbits in the sagebrush or just roaming about in the woods. Mine are in 22LR, 22WMR and 44Mag:



And for some fun in the rat patch, my Winchester 9422 Mag with a Lyman tang peep sight is good for rats out to about 125 yards with my aging eyes:



Once you return to the field with that 38-55, be sure to let us know how it all worked out. There's just 'something' about a nice lever rifle.

[jsh]

The 38-55 is a 99% chance it slugs at .375. I run .377 cast bullets in my 375WW with good results, loaded at 38-55 pressures or up to full tilt 375’s.

There were a few modern 38-55’s with .380 bores as I recall, but I don’t think Winchester was one of them.
The recoil is more of a push than a snappy or jarring type. It is a good cartridge but looked over by many that go to the boutique type stuff.

The Lyman cast bullet manual should have plenty of data I would think along with R7, 4198,unique,4227 maybe and 2400. I can dig though my library if ya need data.


As far as jacketed and having played with both of these. I would not waste time or money on jacketed, both are excellent CB shooters. Do NOT get hung up on “hard” when it comes to cast. A hard cast will actually skid before it grabs the rifling, where as a softer alloy will grab right off.
Size is king, period end of story. Then you can argue lube and alloy.

[Jim White]

jsh...my 38-55 barrel slugged at .380 inches so I'm not going to consider any jacket bullets at this time unless I can find some that are closer than .377". If you have suggestions for load data then please send it along. I have RL-7 and H4198 on hand of those you mentioned.

WRT to the term hard-cast, is their a hardness STD? Just curious because my experience with cast bullets is exclusively with with 185 and 230gr 45 ACP loads and 38 SPL w 148gr HBWC with 2.7 gr of Bullseye [a very accurate load]. I hear not only the term hard-cast but also whether or not to look for rounds with gas checks.

One thing I hope to avoid is to have so much velocity to cause leading inside the barrel. For my current load 26.0 RL-7 w/245gr LFP, I do use small felt pads to help with the void between the powder and the bullet base. I use 2.125" brass which is difficult to find currently.

Thanks for the info.

[Rick in Oregon]

One thing I hope to avoid is to have so much velocity to cause leading inside the barrel.

As a lifetime shooter of my own cast bullets, I'd highly recommend the use of the Lewis Lead Remover for scrubbing a barrel having been shot with cast bullets. Works as advertised, and in use, you can plainly see the lead being removed from the barrel.

I primarily shoot the Lyman #2 alloy, and it has been proven over the years as the perfect combination of hardness vs mallability (for me) in order to properly engage the rifling of the barrel. Works in my Marlin 1894 .44Mag, Win M92 .44M, also my Smith handguns so chambered.

Also, all the deer and hogs shot with this combination have resulted in complete penetration and one-shot kills in the field.
JMO

[Jim White]

Appreciate the info Rick, I'm already looking for some and since I have a birthday discount at Midway USA pending that will be where I look first...hopefully they'll have it but if not I'm sure Brownell's or Sinclair will.

I've tried scrubbing lead out with bronze brushes and its a chore. Heck, it was almost as if I was scrubbing solder [ha'...maybe I was ] I've used Lead-Away cloth and while good for a lot of things it didn't work for me in that venue. I never encountered a problem with 148gr HBWC in my 38/357 loads with 2.7 grains of Bullseye presumably it being such a light load. For my 1911's HARD-BALL guns, I ended up firing a couple of magazines of 230 gr FMJ with 8 to 9 grains of Blue Dot down and that took it right out. My 45 WAD-CUTTER 1911's never really had that issue because the loads were lighter. For the most part, the lead was in the throat area and never was so bad to cause significant accuracy issues.

As a long time lead bullet user, what is your thought on hard-cast vs a softer compound with a gas check? It's not my intent to turn this in to a highpower magnum load and jsh's comment about hard cast not engaging the rifling initially kinda' got me to thinking about that since my barrel is only 16". I need to buy bullets anyway so I just as well get what I need all at once and be done with it.

Thanks again for the tip