10, I recommend cleaning patches be no larger than 1" square unless they are made from thin material. I cut my own from old Tee shirts and obviously the thicknesses can vary. Regardless, you will be doing yourself a favor by not going much larger than 1" square. Certainly 1.25" square maximum.
To expound on a few things already mentioned by others, your Crockett will most likely do very well with 20.0 grains of 3F. I do not recommend trying 2F. My personal favorite is Swiss as it has proven to foul less.
As others have tried, a .015 shooting patch lubed with TOTW Mink Oil will work and makes the loading process easier. I was having eye issues but to the best of my testing, .018" ticking proved to be a bit more accurate. When the patches are cut to the optimum size, I have found that when lubed with TOTW Mink Oil, that I can, and sometimes do, load as much as 4 times and was still not difficult to seat the ball with .018", although there is no doubt that overall, .015" is easier to load.
Personally, I purchase my ticking from October Country now. The last batch I ordered is very tight-weaved. I order it in the bulk and cut patches from that on a boring day.
I do use .310 swaged RB produced by Hornady.
In terms of hunting or test shooting, I much prefer to run a damp cleaning patch with Windex on it between shots, followed by one or two dry patches. This helps facilitate the reloading process as well as perhaps accuracy. However, I have found that one of the best attributes of doing so is the fact that my Crockett's are not very dirty at the end of the day. Very little crud comes out during the cleaning process. l'm fairly certain the Swiss powder helps with this. I have shot as many as 20 times one day while testing and by running moist cleaning patches down the bore after each shot, the ML was still not very dirty at the end of the day. In the woods while squirrel hunting (which is the real meat and taters) I will sometimes go as much as 3 shots without swabbing, depending on the situation at the time. If no more squirrels are seen, then the bore gets swabbed out. I have screwed myself several times by trying to swab the bore after I shot a squirrel, only to find one or two more that presented me with perfect, close shots, yet there I was with a half cleaned rifle.
One other thing is, I keep the jag on the end of the ramrod. Yes, it can be a bit of a pain but not nearly as much as having to fiddle around with trying to find the jag (or dropping it) while out in the woods. Due to the smaller diameter barrel, as well as the jag being in the way, I find it easier to remove the ramrod before I even begin to reload.
In addition, and you may already be aware of this, is a loading block really pays off big time during a squirrel hunt. Faster, easier, and less movement. Much easier to load up the block while at home sitting at a table than to try to fiddle with those small .310 RB out in the woods. This is painfully apparent with cold and/or numb fingers. I know carry 2 loaded up loading blocks on each hunt.
Coning the barrel will help tremendously with a Crockett.
Last but certainly not least, you will be well served by getting rid of the very poor excuse for a ramrod that comes with the Crockett rifles. Wooden blanks and fittings can be had from TOTW. I sanded mine down to where it is a little snug going down the barrel. A brass ramrod might prove to be better yet. I have one for each Crockett and they can really help with a load that is not playing nice.
Good luck and please let us know how it goes.
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I'm a bit north of you. I'm going to skip Saturday, I only hunt game lands, and they get kinda small when the lead starts flying. I'm going to greet the sun on Monday. Best of luck! Be safe.
fault it's gotten this bad, but by God was it fun getting there!
