Looked at a 32-20 yesterday with description as follows; ser.# 957XX, 6"bbl, condition 80-85%, believe grips are correct and are in very good condition.They do not have a medallion. Bore and chambers are bright & excellent. Hammer and trigger void of case color. Great deal of blue finish except on back of the grip,bottom of trigger guard and some muzzle wear. Balance of blue finish has many light "fly tracks ". Numbers on barrel,cylinder and frame all match. Did not remove grips so cannot say they are numbered and cannot know if rust exists or if it has been back to the factory.
Have not run into this model before and have no knowledge of value. Can buy for $450.00. Is price high,low or right on. Appreciate you input......Lou

The SN makes it from around 1920. Price is a little high. They are good shooters if mechanically OK. Ammo is available but it's not cheap and maybe that keeps the value on these down.
The .32-20 Hand Ejector Thread

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Mike, AmVets Member, Navy Vet

A 32-20 in that condition would not last 30 seconds for $450 at a gun show up here in the northeast. I know I would not walk by it..and I own 3 of them already. Finding a perfect bore is difficult enough. Finding one all original is even better.

32-20s are hard to find with even decent bores. That gun's selling point is the mirror bore.

Buy if you want it ,cause someone like me won't wait . I have one and absolutely love it .i am wanting a rifle to go with it .

^^^^^^.32-20 revolvers and rifles are just plain fun!

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Possum—The other white meat!

Probably not a really bad price. I recently bought a ca. 1926 .32-20 in top mechanical condition and with a perfect bore, except it had a very good non-factory re-blue, for $350 and did not feel it was a bad buy (the seller's initial price was $695, I managed to convince him that was totally unrealistic).

I really love the 32-20. Here are three that I own. The round butt with a 61/2” bbl. was shipped to New York in1905. The 5” square butt was shipped to Michigan in 1911. The 6” target was shipped to California in 1917. Bill

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Probably shipped in very early 1920s.
I show 96786 and 99052 both shipping in April, 1921. 90303 shipped in July, 1920. So that puts you in the ballpark. Of course, it should always be remembered that they did not ship in serial order, so this is only an indicator, not set in stone.

Sounds right. In the 1920s there was no medallion and the stock circle was convex.

I don't think $450 for a shooter grade gun in 80% to 85% is a terrific price. It just depends on how badly you would like to have the gun. The .32-20 HE is fun to own and shoot. But at that price you are buying a gun, not investing anything. You certainly won't flip that one for a profit.

Compared to the millions of .38 Military & Police revolvers, the .32-20 M&P is a scarce item (not rare or scarce in any absolute sense). Only 144,684 of them were made between 1899 and 1930.

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Jack
SWCA #2475, SWHF #318

I passed on a 1905-era ".32 Winchester" yesterday. The blue was now rough patina almost all over, except for the yoke, which was nickel. The hard rubber grips were worn but intact. The chambers were dirty, but without discernible pitting. The same could not be said for the barrel, which had more potholes than a Chicago side street. Brisk SA cocking locked up on all chambers with only a little side-play, slow SA cocking fell just short of lockup all the way around. A good cleaning and maybe a bolt spring would probably fix that...or not. I looked long and hard before deciding I didn't need another project, not even for $150 (plus $25 Crook County gun tax + $13.50 sales tax+ $5 NICS + plus gas to drive back in 3 days). It is probably a good $200 gun, but still...no.

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I need ammo, not a ride.

I picked this one up at a local Auction for $375 plus fees, around $420. I was happy paying that for this one.

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Get off my lawn!

I found a 32-20 packed in a box serial number 38056 can you tell me when made. Keeping since it belonged to my father

Probably a 1905 2nd change. Mine is sn 42448 and my notes say 1909 so that is probably close for yours too. For future posting ideas, usually better to start a new post than to add on to an old one. Welcome to the forum.

Jeff
SWCA #1457

38056 would probably have shipped in 1908. Amazing how the old threads arise from the dead.

Blame it on google when it comes to new members I can't count the times when doing a search on SWs this site will be in the list showing posts from a decade ago.

Welcome to the forums from the Wiregrass, pcornell59! If you haven't heard yet, we crave pictures so we can covet other people's guns. You need to feed us or the forum gremlins will rust your 32-20.

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Guy
SWHF #474 SWCA LM#2629

I recently sold a 4" S&W 32-20 on this forum that was shipped from S&W in 1908 and it went for $400 with stocks numbered to the gun. It was in decent shape with a good bore. S/N was 753XX

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Tom Graham SWCA #2303

This is a great introduction to considering the extended part of our hobby: Reloading. Once you get the fever of 32-20 addiction it will push you ever so close to the quest for ammo. I have 3 S&W 32-20s, and 2 Winchester rifles in this caliber (an 1873 and a model 1892).They are truly fun to shoot and were very popular in the east in the 1920s-30s. Welcome aboard, its a great ride.

The 32-20 is a fairly good cartridge to learn handloading on... you have to take your time and line everything up right so you don’t damage the somewhat fragile brass. Getting good, consistent powder charges and just generally doing each step carefully will force the novice to become a good reloader. Then again, 32-20 factory ammo is expensive enough you need to reload so you can shoot it a lot!

Froggie

...32-20 was a legend in it's own time...

...the original...


...Eric Clapton...

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A Country Boy Can Survive

I passed on a couple of M&P .32-20s a few years ago. One was in ok shape, except for the bulged barrel.
The other had been nickeled (re-nickeled?) and had heavy polishing wear.
Roll marks were polished out at their ends, etc.
IIRC, it had a star stamped under the left stock.
The counter jockey said that that meant the refinish was done at the factory.
I countered with, "The star means it went back to the factory for something, not necessarily a refinish and sure as hell not THAT refinish job."
Counter jockey kept trying to BS me into believing it was a factory refinish and that the over polishing was just holster wear AFTER the refinish.
Guess he thought I didn't know that the nickel would have worn off BEFORE the steel.
Guess he thought I didn't recognize the signs of over buffing/polishing. Rounded corners that were originally sharp. Roll marks worn off at the ends/edges. Highly visible mating line at the side plate/frame.
Then, there's the nickeled hammer and trigger.
Said counter jockey is known locally to be full of bovine scat.
I already knew that because he's a friend of a friend. (Didn't stop him from trying to fiscally sodomize me on the price of that gun).

I've been trying to find either a good shooter grade .32-20 Colt or Smith for shooter grade prices, or a nice one for a non-astronomical price since the early 200s.

Still looking.
Thought about getting a Ruger Blackhawk in .30 carbine and getting a spare cylinder to have rechambered in .32 WCF and fitted to it.
Also considered trying to find a good barrel/cylinder/hammer in that caliber for my 1926 Colt Army Special .38 (Former Detroit PD gun that had its barrel chopped and hammer spur bobbed by a former owner.)

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What would Jim Cirillo do?

"Also considered trying to find a good barrel/cylinder/hammer in that caliber for my 1926 Colt Army Special .38 (Former Detroit PD gun that had its barrel chopped and hammer spur bobbed by a former owner.)"

Don't forget that the Official Police was also available in .32-20 and that OP parts will fit an Army Special frame.

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John 3:16
WAR EAGLE!

"I've been trying to find either a good shooter grade .32-20 Colt or Smith for shooter grade prices, or a nice one for a non-astronomical price since the early 200s. Still looking. Thought about getting a Ruger Blackhawk in .30 carbine and getting a spare cylinder to have rechambered in .32 WCF and fitted to it."

It's a whole lot cheaper to just load .30 Carbine brass down to .32-20 levels and using lead bullets. There's very little dimensional difference between the two cases. I have done that for over 20 years, starting when I used a .30 Carbine Blackhawk for CAS.

"Don't forget that the Official Police was also available in .32-20 and that OP parts will fit an Army Special frame."

I have a late 1930s Colt OP in .32-20 which is too nice to shoot. And the OP and the Army Special are essentially identical guns other than for their names. I also have an Army Special from 1912 in .32-20, but it's not quite as nice as the OP.