Have come across two Pre-64 Winchester 94 carbines. Both are in mechanically sound condition but are aesthetically rough. Both have been used by the same hunter since they were new.

One is in 30 WCF (30-30) and the other is in 32 Winchester Special.

There's a ton of ammo for both -- all in 170 grain.

How many years will I have to hunt with both before figuring out which one is the better deer rifle ?


Would ask the original owner but he passed away before the rifles came to my attention.

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Don`t know how long it would take to decide, but I`m still shooting dads old 32 spcl I started with back in the mid `60s and have no 30-30 yet..........

If you are a cast bullet shooter you will like the slower twist of the 32 provided it has a good bore to start with. In theory you can get a tiny bit more oomph from the 32 but in practice it's a meaningless difference using jacketed bullets. With cast bullets you can drive similarly designed bullets of identical hardness 100-200 fps faster from the 32 and maintain good accuracy.

Yup. The original owner died without knowing, and so will you. Likewise any deer you hit with them.

Remember the old Winchester ads for those rifles? The 32 Special was touted as "For those who hunted both deer and bear"!

I have killed deer with both the 30-30 and 32 Win Spl and i can't tell a dime worth of difference between the killing power of the two . In my opinion they are essentially the same. The 30-30 would be much easier to find ammo for but if you load your own then either would be a good buy.

I have both and the only difference that I have found is that ammo for the .32 Special is cheaper. Even though I have dies and brass, I keep running across boxes of factory ammo in hardware stores and Mom and Pop groceries for $7-$8 a box. So I plink with factory stuff in the .32.

I"d love to have both of those. Not that I know, but looking at the rounds, should be no difference to speak of.

This question brings back old memeories. The very first "which is the better round argument" I ever got into was over these two rds. I was about 11 yrs. old.
The other guy owned a .32 Win Spl and pointed out the tiny muzzle energy difference as his proof....
The only thing I've found is that .30/30's shoot reasonably well even if their barrels are badly worn. .32 Win Spl barrels don't. If it were mine, I'd buy the .32 and turn it into a .25-35. Have a hankering for one. E

No longer than it takes for you to get in a debate with someone else on the relative merits. It tends to firm up a fella's opinion.

When I was a kid the .32 Special and the 303 Savage both had a rep for being more powerful than a 30-30.

The .32 Special had a reputation for wearing out the barrel faster too.

I wouldn't know. I was using a 32-20 and two different 25-35's.
I got a 300 Savage when I was twelve and that ended the need for other lever guns.

Hammer1-

When reloaded with black powder and cast bullets, the 32 Win Special is the better deer rifle. Winchester designed it that way, say JB & other writers.

--Bob

The 30-30 gets the nod for me just because it's easier to find ammo, and Buffalo bore has some new high energy loads. Both fine rounds IMO.

http://www.levergun.com/articles/special.htm

This is a fun article about the .32 Special that addresses the poor accuracy issue, plus more.

I have a '49 Marlin RC in .32 Special that I really like, but I also have a '50 336A with the 24" barrel in .30-30. I'm not selling either one.

Well with the .32 not commonly found anymore we don't have to worry too much about which of these two cartridges is better. We are freed up to agonize instead over such important things as the vast differences between the .270 and .30-06!

I vote .32 Special. What with bullets getting so scarce, it makes sense to go with cast bullets.

Naw, just joking. The .32 is a fine round but makes very little sense even with cast bullets these days. It made a lot more sense when you could buy black powder for MUCH less than smokeless, but that hasn't been the case for many years now.

I cut my young deer hunting teeth on a Winchester lever in 32. Pretty special gun to me. I thought I was John Wayne at age 10 packing that puppy for blacktail deer in the coast foothills of Northern CA. But then, at 11, I was packing a Model 70 in 30-06 like the big boys, and I was in hog heaven. Never did think that rifle had recoil..........

I have a really old one (1904). I killed an old doe with it on Dec 31 2003- wanted to sneak it in before the rifle turned 100.

Penetration was impressive, meat damage minimal, and the deer fell down and died. Pretty much like the one deer I killed with a 30-30! :-)

....As others have said, I too believe you'll find not a dimes worth of difference in killing power between these two cartridges, not a dime, in EITHER direction.. I do agree the 32 is perhaps the better gun for cast bullets, but the 30/30 is much the better for plentiful & easily found ammo.

....I personally would choose the 30/30 every time between these two, and go up to the 35 Remington if I sought a similar class cartridge with a shade more wallop up close at brush range.

My personal experience with both shooting 170 grain bullets is there is less difference than there is between a 270 and 280.

But, when I was in my early teens I well remember getting dressed down by older and wiser hunters for even thinking that the 32 special wasn't more powerful by a goodly amount. And when these 32 special owners started getting obnoxious "Ole Charlie" would remind them that if they wanted a real rifle they would get a 40-82. Of course he had one and I have pretty much wanted one ever since also.

I can remember back in the early 60's I worked all summer to buy my first deer rifle. I got a Winchester catalog from my uncle who had a gun shop in Monroe Oregon and I agonized over if I wanted a 30-30 or a 32 Special. I know I wanted a Winchester 94. I ended up buying a 30-30. It was a rifle, not a carbine and I later had Ward Koozer rebore it to 444 Marlin. Made a nice but hard kicking gun with the curved butt plate.
I few years back when my brother in law passed away he left me his '94 carbine in 32 special. It is a little rough on the outside but still shoots good.
I wonder if Winchester had brought out the 32 Special in 1895 instead of the 30 WCF (30-30) if we would have a 30-30 now.
Below is suppose to be from a 1903 Winchester catalog.

I wonder if I copied that ad and sent it in to Winchester if I could get a free copy of that 1903 catalog like the ad says?

There's probably no one at Winchester that knows what a 32 Special is. The ad says they can furnish rifles in this caliber.
Doc

I too have both & decided to use the .32 Sp. on a hunt in Florida in October. I grew up hunting with a .22 RF rifle & 12G. shotgun but shot my first "rifle" deer with a borrowed 94 in .32 Sp. This was about 1960 when the 30-30, .32 Sp. & .300 Savage were the calibers to argue about. I used mine to shoot 3 hogs with the biggest being better than 250lbs. The old .32 Sp. still works.

Get'm both.

The last 32 Specials that I have seen didnt stay around long,
one was a rough looking Marlin Model 36, the other was a pre-64
Model 94 that looked like it had just been taken out of the
box.

I have a minty M64 Deluxe that was such a good price when I got it I snapped it up too fast to even notice the caliber, a .32 Special.

I have 4 other 30-30's so it never gets used, a safe queen.

At least there is SOME difference there. Ain't enough distance between the .30-30 and the .32 Special to even stick a feeler gauge in there.

That's the best advice I can think of.

Exactly

All y'all saying there ain't no difference between the 30-30 and the 32 Special.

Don't go into car sales.

How you going to convince folks of the difference between a Chevy and a Ford ?

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They are balistic twins in every respect..The ammo for the 32 might be bit harder to come by and it has been said the 32 will shoot out a barrel quicker then the 30-30, but I don't see any reason for that to hold water...

I'd pick the 30-30 because its a more popular round, ammo is everywhere in the world, but if I ran across a good 32 Special then I would not hesitate to buy it..

It's pretty much a no issue IMO.

I can't believe that Hornaday is making a LEVERevolution load for the 32 Special. They must figure there are enough of them out there that they can make a buck.
Doc

The .32 spl is more rare than the .30-30 and that's why I'd buy it. .30-30's are ubiquitous and boringly regular. I find it more and more interesting to hunt with rare and uncommon cartridges. That's why my last build was a .257 Roberts, and my current one is a .260 AR variant. It's more fun hunting with something nobody else has. Performance wise, the slight edge goes to the .32, but basically inconsequential to whatever you shoot with it.

My .32 is a 1933 Model 64 carbine I bought from my FIL. I don't think I own a .30-30, but who knows what lurks in the back of the safe these days.

Fast Ed

Here it is 2009 and we're still discussing (on the internet, no less) the old .30-30 vs. .32 Special question. For sure, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

The only correct conclusion is to buy both and see firsthand...

+5 on the buy both plan...(grin!)
Virgil B.

I bought a .32 Special last summer. I'd just gotten rid of my last 30-30 because I couldn't hit anything with it. I meant to get another 30-30 because I like having one around. I got the gun home and discovered it was a .32! I like it though and have no plans to get rid of it. I'm still looking for a 30-30.

There's an article on the 32 Special in Rifle Shooter March/April 2008 issue, by Terry Wieland. Said there's been a startling amount of renewed interest in the caliber ever since LeverEvolution ammo came about, lots of demand at Hornady for it. Apparently sales for .35 Remington ammo wildly exceeded their expectations. So Hornady also is adding the 32 to the line.

Bit of history: First produced in 1902. Lots of theories as to why, but no paperwork survives, no real answers.

Continued by Win. until 1973. Also offered in Marlin 1893s and 336s until mid '60s.

Says if only 20% of Winchester's production of 3.5 million of the '94 went to the 32, that's still a lot of 32 Specials out there...not to mention Marlins.

Author ran 5 rounds of LeverEvolution 32 Special 165 gr through his 26" barreled 1894, averaged 2,374 fps. With iron sights, groups tightened from previous average of 2.5" to under 2".

Whichever you decide on, you're going to have some decent ammo to use in it. LeverEvolution made a serious hunting rifle outta my Marlin 30.30, I can't imagine using anything else in it.

I think this ad was posted here before:

ZI'm assuming you are speaking in terms of increased velocity/flatter trajectory. Have you actually chronographed this ammo out of your Marlin? Have you shot any side-by-side comparisons of this ammo vs. what you had been using, out at the distances at which you now feel your rifle is effective at?
I've got to say, I'm a little skeptical of how much more effective this will make the typical 18 or 20 inch barrelled, lever-action .30-30 or .32 Special carbine.

By the way, I've always considered a .30-30 to be a serious hunting rifle.

The 30-30 is for deer and the 32 Spl.is for bear, so you need them both.

My Marlin 30.30 336 sports a 20" barrel. Most ballistic tables are based upon 24" barrels or thereabouts. All things being equal and regardless of ammo selected, performance will be affected according to barrel length.

I don't own a chronograph, don't hand load.

However, looking at a ballistics table for popular ammo in Peteren's 2007 Annual...

At 200 yds the 160 gr. Hornady LE is rated at 1304 ft. lbs. and 1916 fps.

Next closest is the Winchester 150 gr. SP at 1017 ft. lbs. and 1747 fps.

Average for 150 to 170 gr bullets from the chart would be about 950 ft. lbs. and 1600 fps.

It stands to reason that, all other things being equal, a spitzer boattail will outperform a blunt nose, flat based bullet pretty much every time...physics wise.

My own experience at the range is, sighted in 3" high at 100 yds, I'm dead on at 200 yds.

Prior I'd being using Federal 170s. With a Leupold 6x, I was happy with 1.5" to 2" groups at 100. I never tried them at 200 yds because I had no intention of taking a 200 yd shot at anything with a 30.30 at the time.

With the LE, I've tightened the groups to between 1" and 1.5", and I've shot a couple of 2" 3 shot groups at 200 yds.

Whatever capabilities the 30.30 used to have, they're definitely considerably greater now.

IMHO, my rifle comfortably went from being a 150 yd gun to a 250 yd shooter that still packs over 1000 ft. lbs. of whack.

My son-in-law bought a Marlin lever in 308 Marlin Express. If one is into lever guns, there's a genuine all around combination that covers a lot of the bases out to an honest 300 yds, and then some.

I agree. Back in the '60's and '70's I had 3 long guns, a 12 gauge Rem 870, .22 Rem pump and a Marlin 336 / Sears .30-30.