I use old worn out leather boots cut up. Don't know the thickness, but it's worked for me for a very long time.
-
Friends, our 2nd Amendment rights are always under attack and the NRA has been a constant for decades in helping fight that fight.
We have partnered with the NRA to offer you a discount on membership and Muzzleloading Forum gets a small percentage too of each membership, so you are supporting both the NRA and us.
Use this link to sign up please; https://membership.nra.org/recruiters/join/XR045103
Leather or lead for holding a flint
- Thread starter Artie Peltier
- Start date
Help Support Muzzleloading Forum:
- Joined
- May 6, 2014
- Messages
- 17,431
- Reaction score
- 16,433
I use leather in rifle and pistol locks.
Unlike Loyalist Dave, I only use leather in Military Musket Locks. I’ve tried lead, but it did not work as well in my two Pedersoli Brown Besses, a Charleville I once owned and from working other Pedersoli and Japanese Muskets for fellow reenactors. However, I do know a few people who had very good luck with leather for a flint pad in their military muskets for reenacting.
What I’ve always done when someone had a lock that was not sparking well and there was nothing wrong with the frizzen, was to try different sized flints in the lock with different thicknesses of leather. This included the flint being tried bevel side up and down. As a leather worker, I have lots of scraps of different thickness leather, so I could choose the best thickness of leather along with the best sized flint for each lock. So when I found the correct size flint and leather thickness for another’s lock, I informed the person and wrote that information down on a card and stapled a small piece of the leather to a card to refer back to it later. I also gave at least three or four leather wraps in the correct size to the person whose lock I worked on.
When I use different size flints with different thicknesses of leather, I am adjusting the distance from the flint to the frizzen. Only lately have I realized I never tried different thicknesses of lead for the flint wrap. Maybe that is why lead has never worked for me? Sounds like some experimentation is in order for my Brown Bess.
Gus
Unlike Loyalist Dave, I only use leather in Military Musket Locks. I’ve tried lead, but it did not work as well in my two Pedersoli Brown Besses, a Charleville I once owned and from working other Pedersoli and Japanese Muskets for fellow reenactors. However, I do know a few people who had very good luck with leather for a flint pad in their military muskets for reenacting.
What I’ve always done when someone had a lock that was not sparking well and there was nothing wrong with the frizzen, was to try different sized flints in the lock with different thicknesses of leather. This included the flint being tried bevel side up and down. As a leather worker, I have lots of scraps of different thickness leather, so I could choose the best thickness of leather along with the best sized flint for each lock. So when I found the correct size flint and leather thickness for another’s lock, I informed the person and wrote that information down on a card and stapled a small piece of the leather to a card to refer back to it later. I also gave at least three or four leather wraps in the correct size to the person whose lock I worked on.
When I use different size flints with different thicknesses of leather, I am adjusting the distance from the flint to the frizzen. Only lately have I realized I never tried different thicknesses of lead for the flint wrap. Maybe that is why lead has never worked for me? Sounds like some experimentation is in order for my Brown Bess.
Gus
I'll reply to your question like this:
No one will ever confuse me with a 'purist' but I do try to follow most of the very basic approaches used by the settlers in their hunting guns...using leather as a flint wrap is one of them.
Speaking only for myself, my leather flint wraps, mostly from Elk hide scraps I pick up, have worked perfectly for a good 15 years and about 15,000-16,000 shots...in multiple locks, multiple brands of locks, etc.
IMO, if someone finds that a lead flint wrap is required to improve the operation of a regular / typical sized lock on a civilian type of long gun, its compensating for some other problem...my approach would be to find / fix the root cause.
But others mileage may vary...
No one will ever confuse me with a 'purist' but I do try to follow most of the very basic approaches used by the settlers in their hunting guns...using leather as a flint wrap is one of them.
Speaking only for myself, my leather flint wraps, mostly from Elk hide scraps I pick up, have worked perfectly for a good 15 years and about 15,000-16,000 shots...in multiple locks, multiple brands of locks, etc.
IMO, if someone finds that a lead flint wrap is required to improve the operation of a regular / typical sized lock on a civilian type of long gun, its compensating for some other problem...my approach would be to find / fix the root cause.
But others mileage may vary...
Last edited by a moderator:
