Ore to Axe

I came across this movie the other day produced by Ken Koons entitled Ore to Axe. I rented it at Amazon, but was so impressed with it I’m buying a copy. 

The film goes through the process of making an axe literally from the ground up.  It details collecting and preparing the iron ore, to making the necessary amount of charcoal. From there, a smelter is constructed and the ore is turned into iron. The smiths then take the bloom and forge it into an axe. Along the way they transform part of the bloom into steel for the axes cutting edge.

The movie is not a detailed step by step process, but it's well done and extremely interesting. I highly recommend it.  

Post Drill

Finished restoring an old rusty crud covered Champion #90 post drill for my forge shed. The drill was a mess and the whole thing was seized up. The guy I got it from told me it had been lying in his grandfather’s barn ever since he could remember so that’s at least 30 years. I believe the drill would have been made in the early 1900’s.  

 I tore the whole thing apart and scraped what dried crud I could and then used an angle grinder with a metal brush to clean up the rest. After a paint job and some lubrication, the drill works surprisingly well. These old post drills have some wobble in them but for what I’m using it for it won’t be a problem.  I also installed an adjustable chuck as I can’t find any bits made for post drills.  

Operation is simple, just put in your bit adjust the top wheel by turning it until the drill is in contact with the work and start turning.This type has a knurled knob up by the top wheel that lets you adjust the advance 1 or 2 clicks every revelotion of the handle. When the hole is drilled you flip up the feed paw and unscrew the top wheel to remove the drill bit from the work.

I also took a picture of my anvil and vice bench. Before the shed, I had been doing my blacksmithing outside. That’s hard to do in Nebraska because there is almost always a strong wind around 30mph. I will take more pictures of my forge shed once I get everything done. I can’t wait! 

Field Stripped Brace

I've had a few questions on how I made my brace pictured in an earlier post so I decided to provide some better pictures.

The one I made is a copy of an original that I believe dates to the early nineteenth century. The body of my brace is made out of yellow birch as well as the pad. I copied the pad from the original with its tapering octagon. In the future I think I will use hickory for the pads. The head of the brace is made out of hard maple because that was the only wood I had large enough to get the diameter I wanted. The head is held on by a friction fit wooden pin. I wouldn't make the pin permanent its nice being able to take it apart.

I love the brace and it works great. Make one there not that hard. The only hard part is finding bits. I recommend using only small bits like spoon or spur bits. You get too big and the torque will break the wood. Don't use auger bits save them for metal braces. 

Unknown Plane

Had this plane for awhile and never been able to figure out what type of plane it is, I've never seen one like it. Any help identifying it would be greatly appreciated. By the way It's not marked as to the maker or previous owner.

It has what I believe is its original butcher blade. At one time it had an adjustable fence on the bottom like it does on the side but someone has placed a permanent fence on it and filled the holes with putty. It has a nicker blade so I'm guessing it's some kind of strangely made panel raising plane. Don't know why it's made in a trapezoid shape and cant understand why someone went through all the time of making the throat opening raised like they did. Seems it would have been easier to leave it one solid block.

 

Small Containers for Fast Fun

Sometimes when I get board I go out in the garage and work on projects that yield fast results. Some of the common items I make are small containers. Now days it seems silly to make such things because you can buy them cheaply or repurpose them out of trash. A few hundred years ago this wasn’t the case. If you needed something for storage on the frontier you probably made it yourself.

Here is some items I made in the past using what a settler would have available which include; earth, wood, and animal parts. No fancy tools were used in the construction and you don’t need to attend an $800 dollar class (not that there’s anything wrong with that if that’s what you’re into).

1.      Top large bowl made out of mesquite hollowed out by a combination of burning, and chisels.

2.      Small elm bowl.

3.      Salt container made from horn and wood.

4.      Two candle boxes. Candles made out of tallow were stored in protective boxes because they tasted good to pests like mice.

5.      The two stone bowls are carved out of soapstone.

6.      Two containers hollowed out of limbs. Larger one is wild plum that I used an auger bit on. The other is sumac branch which has a center consisting of spongy pith that is easily dug out.

7.      The last is my favorite container which is made out of Birch Bark. I love Birch trees.

  

Plow Plane

I made this plow plane a few years ago it’s proven to be a very useful tool. Besides using it for cutting groves like in a door panels it can be used in conjunction with hollow and rounds for making moldings. Check out the Blog “Musings from Big Pink” located on my blog links. The site has wonderful tutorials on the subject. 

The plane itself is made of yellow birch. I wanted to keep the character of an eighteenth century plane so I used rivets instead of screws to attach the skate to the plane body. I also made rivets for the arm of the fence. The rivets work real well. I have an eighteenth century plow plane that was made using rivets and after all these years they still hold the skate tight to the body.

I recommend making one! I feel this plane was easier than some of the molding planes I’ve made. Obviously buy a set of blades before you start then build the plane around the blades. I also suggest using wooden screws for the adjustment on the fence. I bought my threading kit from Woodcraft and have gotten a lot of use out of it on other projects. The alternative for holding the fence is using wedges but I find them a bit harder to adjust.    

Dominy Inspired Workbench

    I took advantage of the unusual weather we’ve been having in Nebraska (it got above 70 degrees on Thursday) to do some repairs and modification to my Dominy inspired workbench. You could say the bench is somewhat green because I salvaged much of the oak out of a trash pile behind a tractor supply business. The top started out 6 inches thick but due to continuing warping has been planed down to about 5 inches. What I like most about this bench is its weight as it doesn’t move around at all when I’m working on it.

    The vise has been a bit of a problem because as the top warped the holes the vice screws go in have started to bind. I fixed that problem this week by taking a long in cannel gouge and enlarged the diameter of the hole. Now it works fine at least till summer comes. It gets extremely hot and humid in the northeast part of Nebraska where I live and it plays hell on wooden tools. The vice does not have garters I don’t need them and this allows me to clamp odd shaped stock. The length of the vice is also nice because I can clamp long boards and plane them without any support.

    A few other features are the new chisel rack in the back. The bench is narrow and this does not leave space for tools I didn’t want a tool well but after dropping a few chisel on the cement decided the rack was the best alternative. I really like it! I also have an adjustable bench hook. You will note in the photo that it has a recess in the top so it can be retracted out of the way. This is important to protect your hands and stock. Also I forged a couple crude bench hooks. I really like them and don’t know what I would do without them now that I have gotten so use to them. The bottom shelf is where I store my planes when not in use.

The last few photos are of my pug security system she also doubles as a bench dog. The house buried in the snow is a picture from two years ago at this time. Winds in Nebraska are strong especially in the winter. We also don’t have many trees around here so that makes it worse.