Mas89 said:

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Looks great- interested in what holsters will work best with the new gun.

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So far I've tried these: (top to bottom)



Veil Solutions Ghost

Galco Flex Tuk

Aholster pocket holster

Still not a huge fan of pocket holsters, but nice to have the option if I need it.

The Flex Tuk was my go to with my 642. Its still good with the 32s.

But The Veil Ghost is a really outstanding holster. I've taken a class with the guy who designed it and he's a great dude so its a double bonus getting to support him a bit.

Current J frame carry:

432 with 100gr buffalo bore hardcast in the Veil Ghost
Dauntless/Matt Helm Work Knife v4

I'm been intrigued about a j-frame to add to my EDC and have come across the 32 UC offerings. Sadly, I haven't found a range that has one for rent to try out. So it's just been YouTube

If I get one, is the titanium cylinder the way to go?

Yes on the titanium cylinder.
I have a 2000 J-Frame S&W Model 332 - .32 Magnum Airlite Ti Centennial with the titanium cylinder. Saves weight. Looks cool too!

I honestly dont notice a huge difference between my steel 632 and my titanium 432, either with how they carry or shoot.

You're welcome to try mine back to back if youre remotely close to Bell County.

Appreciate the feedback and generous offer!

Bender. Good day. Would like your opinion on this. My preferred carry is my S&W 332 Ti Airlite. I used to carry a Model 60 but wanted something lighter as I oftentimes put in 14 hour days working marine events. The wife carries a semi -auto but liked the 332. So I got her a 432 with a steel cylinder. She liked my 332 Ti better (she said the extra 1/4lb made a difference). So I gave her my 332 and I took the 432. It was a brand new revolver. The main thing I saw different from my 332 was trigger pull and action smoothness. The 332 was far superior than the 432. I have a cop buddy who has a 432 with a titanium cylinder and so we got together to shoot. His 432 with the titanium cylinder had a much lighter and smoother trigger pull than my 432. He said he never had it tuned or modified. So I took it back to the gun shop where I bought it and the sales guy there said it was due to the steel cylinder. He had another new 432 with a steel cylinder in stock and let me dry fire it. It felt just like my 432. He then brought out the same with a titanium cylinder and it felt much better in action smoothness and trigger pull.
I assumed it was just the machining of the individual revolvers. Smith and Wesson's QC has declined so much in the last decade I just chalked it up to that. Thoughts?

ETA. Forgot to add I sold the 432 shortly after.

Gunny456 said:

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He had another new 432 with a steel cylinder in stock and let me dry fire it. It felt just like my 432. He then brought out the same with a titanium cylinder and it felt much better in action smoothness and trigger pull.
I assumed it was just the machining of the individual revolvers. Smith and Wesson's QC has declined so much in the last decade I just chalked it up to that. Thoughts?

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I guess from a physics perspective, the force required to rotate the titanium cylinder is slightly less than what is required to rotate a heavier steel cylinder.

Even dry firing my 432ti and 632 back to back I can't tell much of a difference between them.

Both of my 32 guns need more trigger time to really smooth out, but that's to be expected with any new production revolver. They're not hand fitting them anymore. Its all mass machined stuff. Unless you get randomly lucky, they will all mostly be just "okay" until you smooth out and wear all the contact surfaces together with dryfire/shooting.

I would argue S&Ws quality has gone up significantly in the last decade over the previous two decades. My grandfather bought a 642 in the mid 2000s. The fixed sights were so badly regulated on that gun that it was hitting more than a foot off of POA regardless of the ammo used. That is inexcusably bad.

My experience with newer Smiths (post 2015 or so) have all been positive.

Also, as a tangential rant since I'm working off about 3 hours of sleep today: dry firing pistol triggers to feel for creep/smoothness/takeup/break/reset/whatever is goofy and I blame youtube reviewers and gun rag writers who needed to fill time and space for making people care about it like its a precision long range rig.

outside of bullseye shooting, pistol shooting for either self defense or competition is all about fast, accurate shots. If you're not a high level competition shooter, its not the stock Glock trigger or unsmoothed out S&W DA pull that's holding you back (unless you're shooting something real crazy like a Polish P-64 in DA for some reason).

Every modern handgun has a "good enough" trigger for the work you want to do with it, regardless of how many adjectives reviewers make up to describe its function.

I have everything from worked over really nice SAO custom trigger jobs to stock Glocks, and my current favorite competition gun is a MP5 clone (a gun notorious for its less than amazing trigger) with a completely stock trigger pack in it. Technique matters so much more than trigger that its almost absurd to worry about it.

Anyone tried the Ergo grip in their J frame?

Wife and daughter both have 642.
I carry a 342PD often....and on the boat.

BQ92 said:

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I'm been intrigued about a j-frame to add to my EDC and have come across the 32 UC offerings. Sadly, I haven't found a range that has one for rent to try out. So it's just been YouTube

If I get one, is the titanium cylinder the way to go?

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I would definitely get the steel cylinder. I know these aren't typically high volume shooters, but the long term durability concerns with the titanium cylinders are real.

You can't hone or ream the cylinder throats due to the protective coating so you just have to hope they are properly sized and consistent.

Certain brass bands (Starline) recommend against using their cases in titanium cylinders due to difficult extraction issues- at least in some chamberings.

Appreciate the reply. My wife's dad was an armorer and gun smith for the AMU and he also shot competitively so he raised his daughter with lot of shooting disciplines that I have been very thankful for for 50 Years of marriage.
He would never dry fire any weapon without snap caps. He was, however, a believer that a crisp, clean breaking trigger and a "smooth as butter" double or single action could make even poor shooters shoot better.
He spent thousands of hours honing and working on law enforcement officers and soldiers weapons to make their triggers and actions superb. I have a number of his Colts and Smiths from his collection today that he worked on that are unbelievably smooth.
I'm an old and have been collecting Colt & S&W wheel guns for a number of years....with a big jump start from the S&W collection my FIL willed to my wife many years ago. Personally I feel the best years for quality and fit and finish for S&W are revolvers built from the mid 1920's till the late 1970's. The smoothness of the actions and the hand fitting and finish of those years were stellar. The 1980's and 1990's were a rough time for S&W with all the ownership and management changes...and the quality of the revolvers suffered.
As you say, they build "good" guns now...but the quality of now is still not like the "golden years" of S&W imho. One has to just look at the collectors market to confirm that.
I guess messing with and shooting the old guns has spoiled me as to expectations of the new ones.

Again, thanks for the reply and discussion....good shooting.