Wool instead of wad?

[Stantheman86]

Do you just fold a bit up for over powder and over shot?

I just ball it up and it self compresses, the paper is pretty tough to withstand the scalding hot water and a heap of wet coffee so it holds up as a nice wad.

I've also used phone book pages, since the phone company leaves bundles of them laying around and no one uses them anymore , or just newspaper cut into 4"×4" squares. At night when I get home at 11pm, they don't care if I empty out the paper kiosk by the mailboxes since they take them out anyway. No shortage of newspaper.

 

[Redbearcat]

I’ve never used wool as a wad, just for scent while trapping. I’m an egg carton/tow kinda guy.

 

[Ranch 13]

You can purchase wads punched from wool felt , or you can get sheets of wool felt and punch your own.

 

[Pukka Bundook]

Ranch,
Yes, pure wool (dense) felt works very well, as good as anything, but wool cloth not much good.
Ivy leaves, tow from an old saddle, moss that hangs from trees, paper, cork, all make good wads for the birding pieces.
Bit of dry grass over the shot.

 

[Grenadier1758]

In Cleator's "Essay on Shooting", he disdains the use of loosely packed wool for use as a wad. He much prefers cork. In the earlier work on shooting flying, (and I can't remember the name), the virtues of a well felted wool in the form of a saddle blanket are extolled. There are more than a few members on this forum who have used wool felt hats as the source of wadding.

There's not much difference between a well lubricated ball of wool, a folded scrap of wool woven fabric, or a lubricated ball of a dog's undercoat. You don't want the charge to blow through the wad, so use a stuff lube such as 50% bee's wax and 50% olive oil. That should provive a dense wad that will contain the charge and provide good on target performance.

 

[sawyer04]

Read my earlier post with the link to Amazon.

Some comments on the raw wool for sale on Amazon said it had dung in it and smelled bad

Well, geesh, I can't believe they would sell such manure. Our wool came from farm sheep that were in open pastures and supplied ample bedding in their stalls. I am wondering if this wool of Amazon is from a factory confinement system. Wool does have an extinct odor, I agree. The tow from the cleaning and carding didn't seem to be bad, unless it got wet, and even then it was tolerable.
I have the wadding that is sold commercially for shotguns, but doesn't seem to fit like I would like for it too.
I have never thought about using wool clothing wadded down the barrel, would that flame easily?.
I like the wasp nest and his is the time of year to collect them. I have a five gallon bucket of them, Yep, they are empty.

 

[Pukka Bundook]

The wool with the dung sounds like someone was selling dags. (Wool cut from around the sheeps behind...............removed from the fleece.)

 

[Daryl Crawford]

Guess I have some experimenting to do. Running to Dixon's tomorrow to grab some stuff and I'll try out the loose wool (lubricated and rolled into a tight ball size of an acorn) packed over the powder, cork lubricated with Olive Oil, and a few others. Have to relook at the sky chief stuff to see what I need exactly for that.