  We have measured the critical velocity v_c at which 3He-A in a rotating
cylinder becomes unstable against the formation of quantized vortex lines with
continuous (singularity-free) core structure. We find that v_c is distributed
between a maximum and minimum limit, which we ascribe to a dependence on the
texture of the orbital angular momentum l(r) in the cylinder. Slow cool down
through T_c in rotation yields l(r) textures for which the measured v_c's are
in good agreement with the calculated instability of the expected l texture.
