Worst Patching Material Used

[musketman]

Once I experimented with different patching materials, trying to find an suitable alternative to pillow ticking.

What was the worst patching material you ever used for round balls?
All patching tried was lubed with wonder lube and shot out of a smoothbore.

1. Silk (burned through)
2. T-shirts
3. Terry Cloth
4. Polyesters (they melt)
5. Wool (smelled like burnt sheep)

6. Flannel (worked OK)

I would rather use my uncle's toupee than a plastic sabot...

What else have you tried?

 

[Stumpkiller]

Learned a lesson about making paper cartridges ahead of time and letting them sit. I dipped the ball end in melted Crisco & Beeswax for a lubricant, and it leeched up and into the powder over time so I had semi-ignitable powder. Oops.

Osnaburg (thick fiber cotton, almost canvas) worked pretty well but was a little thick.

The wierdest I tried was a paper wasp nest. I read that this was used at need in the good old days. By gum, it works and doesn't burn! Kind of brittle so you have to spit lube or smear it carefully. Works very well as shotgun wadding. Much better in smoothbores than rifles.

 

A long time ago, when I fisrt started muzzleloading, I tried a T-shirt....only once!

I used to use wasp nests in my ML shotgun, it worked pretty good. Never tried it in a rifle.

Vic

 

[musketman]

quote:Originally posted by Stumpkiller:
The wierdest I tried was a paper wasp nest. quote:Originally posted by sharps4590:
I used to use wasp nests in my ML shotgun, it worked pretty good.Didn't you guys get stung?

 

[Haggis]

I guess I'm not paying attention to the right stuff? I've used my old T-shirts for about thrity years, and prefer this patch to everything I've tried; and I've tried about everything.

We had an old man up the road from our place who would collected old muzzleloaders and he rebuilt some of them. I bet he had a couple of hundred stacked in corners around his barn and shop back in the early '60's. The most common patch that I saw him pull, or else he'd pull the brech plug and push the load out, was newspaper. People would load those old guns and leave them for 50 or a 100 years and he'd get them still loaded from back in the day; and it was newspaper.

I guess it makes a little sense; some beeswax and tallow soaked into the paper to make it pliable, you can keep adding layers for patch thickness till you get what you want. A copy of the Sunday New York Times would last a while.

 

[musketman]

quote:Originally posted by Haggis:
The most common patch that I saw him pull, or else he'd pull the brech plug and push the load out, was newspaper.Was the news paper of yesteryear like that of today's paper?

I thought it was heavier, almost parchment like in weight and strength.

The heavier paper would make a more durable patch.

 

[Haggis]

Back in those days I was a bald faced boy and wouldn't have thought to look for a difference, I don't remember the thickness of the paper only that it was in layers.

 

[Stumpkiller]

quote:
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Originally posted by Stumpkiller:
The wierdest I tried was a paper wasp nest.
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quote:
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Originally posted by sharps4590:
I used to use wasp nests in my ML shotgun, it worked pretty good.
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Didn't you guys get stung?


Heck no. Gather the nests in the winter. Just don't stockpile them in your cellar unless you split them and remove the comb and any dormant wasps first. Bzzzzzzzzzz.

 

what stumpkiller said....

Vic

 

[Rocky Johnson]

Musketman - On the patchig meterial? How did you happen to know what burnt sheep smell like, or don't we want to go there? Rocky

 

[musketman]

quote:Originally posted by Rocky Johnson:
Musketman - How did you happen to know what burnt sheep smell like.Well, My ex-wife was a wonderful cook...

I know someone who once got his wool blanket too close to the fire, and since it's made of spun sheep, I just deduced that it would smell like that...

Not that setting sheep on fire should be done to varify this speculation...

 

Originally posted by musketman:
"and since it's made of spun sheep,"

How does one go about spinnin' sheep? Don't they get dizzy and fall over?

 

[Zonie]

quote:by tuffy: "...Don't they get dizzy and fall over?" They SHEAR do!!!

I'd try using a 'zonie paper wasp nest but ah'm a feared as dry as it is har it wood be like addin' another 20 grains ta the powder charge an she'd hit 3 inches high at 50 yards.

 

[musketman]

quote:Originally posted by tuffy:
How does one go about spinnin' sheep? Don't they get dizzy and fall over?That's why I put them in the washer on the spin cycle...
I can clean and spin them all at once, they don't fall down if you pack them tight enough...

"Packin sheep", that sounds almost illegal...