Waxed Canvas Plash Palatka

I cant remember where I first learned about the Plash Palatka (Russian for raincoat tent), I think I came across it when I was searching for cheap surplus poncho tents at some point in the past. I ordered one off of ebay cheap and then promptly let it sit for about a year before I finally got around to doing anything with it.

I’ve been wanting to try my hands at waxing canvas myself and I thought the Plash Palatka would be a good first item to try since its so flat and basic. I looked around for recipes for waxed canvas and found a ton. It was actually a fun rabbit hole to go down, as there are a ton of historical methods for doing this. Info here and here.

I ended up using the method outlined by NightHawkenLight here - youtu.be/HedRbIsM7…

His method is a blend of paraffin wax and mineral oil. He uses a ratio of 500ml of mineral oil per kilogram of wax.

I mixed the wax in oil together in an old cast iron dutch oven and then waited for it to cool. This was an interesting process as it made a really weird sound, which I think was air escaping out of the wax and bubbling up or something. It took a long time to cool, and I ultimately had to let it sit overnight until it cooled down and solidified.

Once it cooled and solidified I took an old Iron and got to work. At first I would cut off a soap sized piece of wax and hold it to the iron letting the wax drip down, but that method seemed unnecessarily messy and was hard to get consistent coverage. So the next thing I tried was just rubbing wax into the canvas then going over it with the iron. That method took a bit longer but seemed to work better.

Overall I’m fairly happy with the results. There are definitely some spots that got to much wax and it looks a little greasy but I picked up some good tips on that from someone manning a Tipi at the Lester River Rendezvous. He told me to hang it out to flap in the wind and sun to loosen it up some then go over it with a board to scrape off or buff off with a towel. I did that and it seemed to work well.

Now all I have to do is wait for some rain to test it out!