walnut wads

[Mike of the Mountain]

Originally Posted by Arthur Shaffer

Several years ago, I was at the local skeet club at the same time as one of our local personalities who was both offbeat and frugal. He was discussing at length his experimental loading with paper toweling as wadding. The members managed to ignor him until the second instance of starting a grass fire with the flaming cloud of confetti that accompanied each shot. At that time he was invited to leave by the club operator.

Art, we called that a "Prescribed Fire".

[OH Osthaus]

historically - hunters used all sorts of wadding/packing in muzzleloading fowlers - wasps nest was one I remember seeing -

not sure how much cushion nut shells would give to protect the shot during set back

[Stan Hillis]

Very interesting also to note that even though Jay sold his reloading business, he is still at work innovating. I sure wish he still was in the retail business with his low pressure, and short, loads. They were really good shells.

[Kevin McCormack]

Wondering if one could substitute "Quaker Oats" cereal for the surrogate wadding material? Would be great to see shells commercially available logoed with the smiling Quaker elder as on the cereal box with the big black hat and wafting neck bib.

[Mike of the Mountain]

Kevin, that would look like a ticker-tape parade after shooting “oat wads”!!

[Aaron Beck]

Gave this a try, just the thing to shoot down browntail caterpillar nests in the yard.

What i found was unexpected but in hindsight seems obvious. The walnut media took a rapid toll on the plastic cheddite hulls. one and done basically, most cases failed on the second loading such that I wouldnt attempt to reload them in the future. If you got creative with a wrap, perhaps this wouldnt be an issue. You might get two loads out of thicker hulls like rem or aa but i dont know. Otherwise they worked just fine.

[Mike of the Mountain]

Originally Posted by Aaron Beck

Gave this a try, just the thing to shoot down browntail caterpillar nests in the yard.

What i found was unexpected but in hindsight seems obvious. The walnut media took a rapid toll on the plastic cheddite hulls. one and done basically, most cases failed on the second loading such that I wouldnt attempt to reload them in the future. If you got creative with a wrap, perhaps this wouldnt be an issue. You might get two loads out of thicker hulls like rem or aa but i dont know. Otherwise they worked just fine.

I agree with you Aaron, a wrap would add longevity to the hull, but if the whole idea is to not use any plastic "wadding", that would defeat the purpose.

[Mike of the Mountain]

I have plenty of once fired Fiocchi hulls and a good amount of used tumbling media walnut shells so I'm also going to load a box or two. I will most likely add a card over the walnut shells too before I drop my shot. Maybe do one box like that and one box W/O the card.

[Aaron Beck]

mike. thats where i came out. unless the wrap was not plastic its only utility for home reloading is in the one size fits all wadding. If youre shooting plastic free into that california wma but shucking your hulls out of the boat, whats the point?
The bore was nice and clean when I was done.
let me know what you find yourself

[Aaron Beck]

maybe the used media is less abrasive