StewartLeach
40 Cal.
- Joined
- May 12, 2008
- Messages
- 415
- Reaction score
- 1
A bit of expansion on Paul V's advice about washing patch material.
How you wash and dry patch material will affect the thickness of the resulting material. Washing in cold water and line drying- or the no heat setting on the dryer- will remove the sizing, but not change the thickness or density of the weave. If you wash twice in hotest water, and dry on the cotton or blue jeans setting you will remove sizing, and shrink the fabric, resulting in an increase in thickness and density (thread count per inch). You can use this to tune patch material to your rifle.
For example, I have a 40 caliber percussion rifle with a Green Mountain barrel. It shoots best with the seriously shrunk ticking and .395" Hornady balls. The beautiful little left hand 40 cal flinter has a Getz barrel with a much tighter bore. It is enough tighter I must shoot .390" balls cast from a Lee mold, and the ticking that is cold washed and line dried.
Kenneth Grahame had Ratty in Wind In The Willows say "There is nothing- absolutely nothing- half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats." Having grown up on New Hampshire's rivers and shores, I agree. But now I live in Colorado, where it only rains 12-14" per year, so I simply mess about with flints and caps and balls and patches and loud noises and clouds of smoke and bad smells. Life is good!
White fox, in the People's Republic of Boulder
How you wash and dry patch material will affect the thickness of the resulting material. Washing in cold water and line drying- or the no heat setting on the dryer- will remove the sizing, but not change the thickness or density of the weave. If you wash twice in hotest water, and dry on the cotton or blue jeans setting you will remove sizing, and shrink the fabric, resulting in an increase in thickness and density (thread count per inch). You can use this to tune patch material to your rifle.
For example, I have a 40 caliber percussion rifle with a Green Mountain barrel. It shoots best with the seriously shrunk ticking and .395" Hornady balls. The beautiful little left hand 40 cal flinter has a Getz barrel with a much tighter bore. It is enough tighter I must shoot .390" balls cast from a Lee mold, and the ticking that is cold washed and line dried.
Kenneth Grahame had Ratty in Wind In The Willows say "There is nothing- absolutely nothing- half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats." Having grown up on New Hampshire's rivers and shores, I agree. But now I live in Colorado, where it only rains 12-14" per year, so I simply mess about with flints and caps and balls and patches and loud noises and clouds of smoke and bad smells. Life is good!
White fox, in the People's Republic of Boulder