[John Farrell, Charter Member #33]

Paul - I am doing 16 gauge paper hulls. I determined that the interior of the 16 gauge is roughly 5/8". I finally found an appropriate 5/8" woman's electric curling iron from Wal-mart's online catalog and ordered one. About $10 shipped to the local store. The curling iron is a tubular unit with a concave finger that is operated with a thumb lever. I use common candle wax or paraffin that melt at 140 - 145 F.

Preheat the curling iron. Put the hull over the 5/8" heater and release the thumb opener for the metal finger. The exterior metal finger holds the hull against the heated iron. Hold the end of the candle or piece of paraffin wax against the heated iron and let the wax flow to the hull. It will flow along the heater part and the outer finger and coat both inside and outside the hull as you roll the hull around the heated curling iron. A pretty simple task.

Being a scrounger of many years, I found a plastic thingy with 27 tubes that would accept the 16 gauge hulls. I drop the hulls into the tubes, put a small metal tray over them, invert the tray and put the thingy with the hulls in the oven that was preheated to 170 F.

The wax will melt at 140 F. Leaving the hulls in the oven for 20 minutes, base down, distributes the wax down the hull. Remove them to the kitchen table to cool and you are done. Any excess wax on the outside of the hull will scrape off if you run the hull through a full length resizer. You want to make sure the hulls will chamber after you reload them, so try them in your gun after they cool so you won't be screwing around later. If you find there is too much wax after the oven treatment, just wipe the exterior off with a paper towel when they are still warm.

Send me a pm with your e mail address and I can send you a photo of the plastic thingy that I use to hold the hulls while in the oven. I think a plastic shell box for 12 gauge would also work for the oven warming since the plastic won't deteriorate at 140 F for the short time it is in the oven. JF