Black powder wads material?

[Gaucho Gringo]

Hi

A company in Portland, OR - a futon maker - is giving away cotton sheets that they use to make futons. It must be pretty heavy duty because 6-8 sheets about the size of a full size bedsheet weighs 55lbs. They are giving them away in full 55lb bales only. Would this make good wads? They say the reason they are giving it away is it has a funny smell.

 

[Eric F]

hey the price is right I say go for it if nothing else you could make patches out of them.

 

[Seafarer12]

Heck yea take it, you can figure out something to do with it.

 

[Macmac]

Yeah I bet... The funny smell is probably mildew and mold. be carefull.

patches should be cotton, wads should be wool, these are not one in the same.

And incase I am wrong and the smell is more chemical it might be formaldrahyde, in which case be even more carefull...

 

[conrad carter]

use lubricated Ox-Yoke Wonder Wads.
no sense being penny wise and pound foolish.

 

[Mike 56]

If you want to homemade wads these guys sell wool felt just give them a call they sell to blackpowder guys all the time. http://durofelt.com/products.html Harborfright had punch sets for 2.50 last week. Tip cut the felt into strips and lube the felt first before punching the wads.

Mike

 

[JCT]

I use felt from Durofelt too, they list the specific product that BP wads are to be made from ( thick, stiff felt ).
It's probably easiest to lube them after punching them. I heat a pot of lube and dip a strainer full of wads into the lube until they're saturated. Then seperate them on wax paper to cool.

 

[whistler]

it might just work. you will not know till you try it.I tried using the white foam that comes with a package meat it was not bad but not the best.

 

[JCT]

I'd stay away from foam, plastic and so called "felt" from craft stores, which is really just rayon. These all melt and foul up bad. They won't do much good. The stiff thick felt holds plenty of lube/wax and also clears out some fouling.

 

[Steve499]

I've used foam wads from meat trays for years. I got started doing it when I was loading .38 wadcutters with very light loads of bullseye. The foam wad pushed down onto the powder with a pencil eraser kept the powder from all laying along the bottom of the length of the case when the loaded round was horizontal, a circumstance which makes detonation, rather than progressive burn possible. Anyway, after firing a few hundred rounds of those, I noticed little foam discs all over the ground. they were intact with one side sort of stippled, but definitely not melted.

I have also put them into 45/70 cases loaded with black powder to protect the base of the bullet. They also survive the discharge. The side presented to the burning powder shows the same stippling as the .38 wads did but what comes out is bore size, so there can't be much, if any, material deposited inside the barrel.

I've heard that the foam wads shouldn't be used because of the residue they leave in your barrel. That sounds like good sense but hasn't proved to be factual in my experience. Perhaps there are foam formulae which do melt at the stresses and temperature times encountered during the barrel dwell of a discharge but if so, I've not had any of it in the wads I've used.

I don't use foam wads these days for anything other than the very light .38 special loads. I believe, though, that the stories about them melting and gunking things up are just passed along from person to person without anyone ever actually trying them out. It just sounds like it makes so much sense, you know? I tried them before I heard you shouldn't and they worked fine for what I wanted them for.

So, I don't know how valuable they would be in a cap and ball revolver situation but by all means, if you think they are what you want, try them out. They won't hurt a thing.