The finish was smooth.
It takes a good minute of sitting wet after a full dip before it gets sticky, as to hold onto the bullet at all and to give sufficient drag on the patch board.
I'm thinking of trying this against that grain to see if it has more stretch but maybe a little more repeatable unlike the tracing paper.
If I wipe the water on and try to wrap right away it doesn't wrap tight and doesn't stick to the bullet at all. Weird
I think I'm going to order some 9# onion skin to try. I want something I can have a good source of and a known content to work with. I don't like the idea of not being able to get more of something once I run out.
When I wipe the tracing paper or soak the vellum and wait it gets to the point where it really sticks to the board and the drag while rolling does kind of what you're saying with the textures soft surface.
I'm going to show a picture of the different wraps after they have dried and let me know what you think about sufficient shrinking. I guess the 25% vellum doesn't shrink as much but it did handle the sizing without coming off. It's on there tight.
There was a lot of 100% rag vellum at the store but I figured it would be too thick, I guess I need to bring my mic with me next time.
The paper was very shiny after sizing. I'll try to show a pic of them all as wrapped and then sized to see what you think.
I guess the proof is in the pudding.