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Dipped shells...


usapyro

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Just a random idea I came up with to make shells easier. You know how candles are dipped? Anyone do anything like this...

 

Take a shell, seal the edge and time fuse... Then dip it in a moderately thick 50:50 wheat paste/powdered sawdust paste, allow it to dry, then dip again. Of course, this only makes it easy if your dipping like 10 + shells, then allowing them to dry and dipping them again the next day, and the next.

 

Of course, there is always pasting machines, but those are expensive!

would like to see how that turned out

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Like Wiley mentioned earlier, I do paste around 4-500 shells per year, 3" up to 8". I have hand pasted all of them. It takes me about 10 minutes to paste a 3, 15 to paste a 4, 30 to paste a 5, and 45 to an hour to paste a 6. I don't mind it because the results of pasting are AWESOME. The Chinese blazed the trail for building ball shells, and they are always a couple steps ahead of us (and always will be) when it comes to shell building. So, until the Chinese start using something different, I certainly won't. I am however getting ready to build a shell paster, which will cut down on my pasting time drastically. But, I won't complain about having to paste shells. It is one of the most important parts of this craft and in my opinion well worth it. (I hate plastic hemis). Dipping shells, or some other methods that I have also thought of in the past, all lack in some way. With most of them, you will lose either symmetry, power, or structural strength. Also, depending on the material you use, there might be a large cleanup process that needs to take place. I love the fact that paper pasted shells leave no mess. Just another benefit. If I truly despised pasting that much, I would simply switch to cylinders.

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Funny thing is, I don't like pasting in "traditional" cylinders. On the larger shells, the paper must be applied in 2, 3, or more sessions with a thorough drying after each. Unless aluminum or thick-walled paper spolette tubes are used, some measure must be taken to keep moisture from migrating into the spolette's powder core. The shells look and feel fabulous when they're done, but I've found that rinfasciature gives me better breaks. It's also easy to use a few turns of pasted paper in lieu of the lightly spiked-on dry wrap described in fulcanelli for rin'ed shells. That gives more of the smooth, shiny look of a pasted shell, along with the durability and (potentially) nicer breaks of the rinfasciatured shell.
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Like Wiley mentioned earlier, I do paste around 4-500 shells per year, 3" up to 8". I have hand pasted all of them. It takes me about 10 minutes to paste a 3, 15 to paste a 4, 30 to paste a 5, and 45 to an hour to paste a 6. I don't mind it because the results of pasting are AWESOME. The Chinese blazed the trail for building ball shells, and they are always a couple steps ahead of us (and always will be) when it comes to shell building. So, until the Chinese start using something different, I certainly won't. I am however getting ready to build a shell paster, which will cut down on my pasting time drastically. But, I won't complain about having to paste shells. It is one of the most important parts of this craft and in my opinion well worth it. (I hate plastic hemis). Dipping shells, or some other methods that I have also thought of in the past, all lack in some way. With most of them, you will lose either symmetry, power, or structural strength. Also, depending on the material you use, there might be a large cleanup process that needs to take place. I love the fact that paper pasted shells leave no mess. Just another benefit. If I truly despised pasting that much, I would simply switch to cylinders.

any chance u could do a video of u pasting a 3 inch shell , it literally takes me an hour or more to do 1

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