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Lined shooting bags

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18 July 2016, 09:23 PM
walks with gun
Lined shooting bags
What would the advantages-disadvantages of a lined bag. I am debating adding a pillow ticking lining to my old deer hide bag, mostly just for something to do, the only possible advantages I can see is emergency patch material or a lining would probably keep the bag from stretching if one was in a extended rain or took a dunking crossing a river. Thoughts anyone.
19 July 2016, 05:55 AM
Loyalist Dave
I think the folks making the lined bags are doing so when deer, goat, or very thin cowhide are used, to prevent the outer leather from stretching too much.

LD


It's not what you know, it's what you can prove
19 July 2016, 11:51 AM
Hanshi
I have enough deer hide to make another bag plus some canvas that I've been thinking would make a good lining. I made a canvas bag a few year ago and reinforced it with deer hide on the bottom and on the flap (on the outside). It has worked great. I would prefer the canvas to ticking even though I also have a good leather bag lined with ticking.


*Young guys should hang out with old guys; old guys know stuff.*
19 July 2016, 06:35 PM
Notchy Bob
I don't think lined bags were common back in the Shining Times. I believe it was Clay Smith, who has handled a lot of old artifacts, who said he has never seen an original shooting bag with a cloth liner. I don't think the fabric or webbing straps with leather ends and brass rings were used much back then, either, but many bagmakers now incorporate all of these features. Just my observations, for what they are worth.

However, a cloth lining may have some advantages. Most of the softer leathers these days are tanned with chromium salts, which are highly corrosive. If you store your brass or steel tools in an unlined soft leather bag or pouch for any length of time, without taking the tools out and handling or using them, they will rust or corrode. Vegetable or bark tanned leathers, and I expect brain tanned hides, are somewhat less corrosive, although all leathers absorb atmospheric moisture and can therefore induce rust or corrosion with prolonged contact with metals.

Bark-tanned deer hide is not commercially available, to my knowledge, although a few independent craftspeople are surely producing it. You should find vegetable tanned pigskin or sheepskin if you look for it. Tandy Leather has milled vegetable tanned cowhide in 3-4 ounce weight on sale right now, at a very good price. This "milled" leather has been through a softening process that makes it much more supple than the vegetable tanned tooling or belt leathers. The lighter weight milled vegetable tanned cowhide is still heavier and somewhat stiffer than most buckskins, but it should make a good shooting pouch.

I believe a strong fabric liner may give a little corrosion protection to the metal tools stored within the pouch. I think the point made about keeping the leather from stretching is also valid.

Despite the statements made in my first paragraph, I have some chrome-tanned buckskin and moosehide that will be made into pouches as soon as I find the time, and I do intend to line them with osnaburg or ticking. Brain tan is out of my price range.

Good luck with your project!

Notchy Bob


"Should have kept the old ways just as much as I could, and the tradition that guarded us. Should have rode horses. Kept dogs."

from The Antelope Wife
20 July 2016, 08:44 AM
Rancocas
I think what Bob said makes sense.

I made my bag somewhere between 20 and 25 years ago from thin cowhide that I had bought from Tandy Leather. I don't know how the leather was tanned. I do not have a liner. The shoulder strap is attached directly to the bag - no metal rings. I do have a homemade iron buckle on the strap. That does rust if I don't wipe it down and grease it now and then.

It is a very plain bag, with no frills whatsoever. It is held closed with a button that I made from a piece of antler. At one time I had a sheath for a patch knife sewed on the strap, but I decided that I didn't like that and so I took it off. The tiny holes from the sewing are still plainly visible on the strap.

Inside the bag I have two small pouches that close with a drawstring. One holds all my ramrod accessories. The other is my ball bag. Loose in the bottom of the bag is a pair of combination pliers and screwdriver. All of these metal implements are well tarnished, but none have rusted. Also I have a little pocket sewed onto the inside back of the bag in which I carry a couple of spare flints.

At the beginning I treated my bag with boiled linseed oil, but I have not put anything on it now in over 20 years. I have carried my bag on some long hunts. It has weathered years of sun, rain and snow. The bag looks its age, but it is still strong and does its job.


Know what you believe in. Fight for your beliefs. Never compromise away your rights.
22 July 2016, 07:42 PM
walks with gun
I started thinking to myself, that fabric was probably a expensive, sometimes hard to lay hands on item in some if not many area's before and many years after the revolution, so lining a bag with it would have been a rarity.