I finished the oak cabinet in the office. Now I have to load it onto a trailer by myself.

It looks ready to go to me Alex. I really like the finish I think a wet wood look is more appealing than the mirror polish look in many situations. It's as beautiful as all your work, thanks for bringing us into your shop.

Ah, your helper must be away! I was having trouble imagining you loading the trailer by yourself being a problem. More work rather than a problem. I get THAT!

Frosty The Lucky.

 

 

4 hours ago, Frosty said:

It looks ready to go to me Alex. I really like the finish I think a wet wood look is more appealing than the mirror polish look in many situations. It's as beautiful as all your work, thanks for bringing us into your shop.

Ah, your helper must be away! I was having trouble imagining you loading the trailer by yourself being a problem. More work rather than a problem. I get THAT!

Frosty The Lucky.

 

Hey Jer ! Thanks! My assistant is gone for a couple of weeks. I'll have to handle this on my own.

 

Paving of any type has gotten insanely expensive - I was looking at what it would take to pave my chicken enclosure because it turns to muck and soup in the winter. I think it was going to be about three hundred for the cheapest - just to make a two-inch slab. I might end up going with some of the heavy rubber floor mats from the home dumpot. I hate being broken for the next few weeks; those candle holders are making me want to forge and the weather is perfect for it but just standing up and walking gets brutal after awhile.

I got into making kimchi maybe 10 or 12 years ago - it's surprisingly close to sauerkraut and doesn't have any chile powder in it (although mine usually does). Some is surprisingly sweet, especially the cucumber and daikon radish stuff. I got into fermentation for...not food reasons and then went sideways after reading The Art of Fermentation by Sandor Katz. Kombucha, natural pickling, and vinegar helps my stomach too, but I don't like kombucha much, although I'm really regretting letting my mother (of-vinegar) die. I used it for both.

Soju is actually distilled - sake is brewed, although soju is cut back and sweetened. You want a brewed rice wine try dongdongju or makgeoli and brace for the hangover. I miss the big plates of yakimandu (fried dumplings) dipped in soy, vinegar, sugar, and kochukaru (red pepper powder). What I don't miss is the smell of my Korean teachers at DLI having scarfed down a quart of kimchi for breakfast mixed with half-a-pack of coffin nails because you had to go down five flights of stairs and outside to smoke, then leaning on my desk since I was in the corner.

Fabricated myself flatter from 1 " by " mild steel welded leaf Spring to it 

Yeah, Washington has always been over regulated and tax heavy and it's only gotten worse. I'm originally from the PAC NW and have family from the Canadian Okanogan as far south as San Francisco and East to Idaho. I don't think I had relation in the Lewis and Clarke expedition but they started showing up not long afterwards.

Last time I was there except to change planes at Sea Tac the Folks were living on the shelf above the Columbia River on the east side. The view was spectacular but you almost needed a permit to mow your lawn, plant a new flowerbed? Oh yeah. That's the house Dad passed away in with his beloved view over the Columbia. Inheritance taxes where so high Mother had to sell her house and move to Idaho. She wouldn't talk about it but I think she got less for it than it cost. 

Sorry, I have kind of bitter feelings about how Wa. treated the family and "the clans" have been there since before there was a USA west of the Mississippi. I LOVE the state, especially the Columbia gorge and channeled scab lands. The exposed geology makes epic too mild a term by orders of magnitude. Lava bed exposures literally miles thick and flows from  individual vents / eruptions thousands of feet. The Columbia gorge was cut by some accounts in weeks by biblical floods, "the Bretts Flood". Places like Horse Shoe falls and Potholes are formations caused by very deep VERY fast water literally sucking blocks of bedrock out of the basalt lava beds.

Sorry, I won't go on a ramble. This will give you a brief idea in typical WIKI fashion. Maybe George will jump in, flood basalts are part of his professional field. 

What would it cost to shovel out muck and replace it with gravel? If you do it a couple buckets at a time you might slide under permits, re-assessments, etc. The chickens should keep it pretty well camouflaged. 

Unless you muck it out below the plastic level and fill it with compacted gravel with planned dry wells to allow ground water drainage or surface drainage around it and cover, a 2" slab won't stop movement and will break up in a couple seasons IF you're lucky. Rubber mats will be like walking an a waterbed. It would be crazy expensive but laying down treated 2x lumber like joists and covering it with 3/4"+ treated plywood would provide a reasonably flat solid surface or what we'd call a "floating foundation", sort of.

What will happen if you slowly displace muck with crushed gravel a little at a time is the gravel will be pushed into the mud, the mud will be forced to the surface and once you reach a point where there is more crushed gravel than muck it will form a concrete like soil and not move much. If it does move, scrape up the muck on top and spread more crushed gravel.

Crushed gravel because the sharp angular pieces will key together and not slip and slide past each other like alluvial (river) gravels WILL. If you want an example put half a dozen marbles in a cloth bag and kneed it in your hand, you can feel the marbles shifting. Compare that to putting half a dozen Jacks in the same bag, the jacks won't move without special handling because they KEY together.

Frosty The Lucky.

Well it's fabricated 

Hi Nat, I must've been all absorbed in my own chatter and missed your last post. 

How does your new flatter work? I can't tell from the picture but the edge on the left working face looks sharp. If so you'll want to ease the edge just like for a hammer for the same reasons. You don't want your flatter making sharp cuts in your work, they can cause cold shuts. 

Frosty The Lucky.

Sorry, off-topic. We were talking about kimchi. I tried it for the first time in Saigon (then Ho Chi Minh City) a few years after the end of the war between North and South . At that time, half the ships from the Soviet Far East sailed to Vietnam. The only thing I remember was the vodka with a snake in the bottle. I couldn't even drink it.

We docked in Wonsan, North Korea, but they wouldn't even let us off the ship. Two soldiers with machine guns stood by the gangway. 

This is from modern times, so I can't vouch for its authenticity. The first North Korean restaurant opened in Moscow. The funny thing is, they ask for your passport at the entrance.

Ask for your passport at the restaurant, GOOD one Alex! I just caught a quick piece on the news about pay toilet paper dispensers in public restrooms though I don't remember where.

I'd have to pass on vodka with a snake in the bottle too. I have however had Mescal with the worm in the bottle but not from the bottle just in case. Supposedly if my high school friends can be trusted you're supposed to swallow the worm with the last drink in the bottle for luck. And NO, I never took the last drink, just in case.

I wonder why so many of the world's weirder traditions have to do with distilled liquor?

Frosty The Lucky.

4 minutes ago, Frosty said:

weirder traditions

Off the top of my now sober head, because they were thought up after consumption of said "distilled liquor". 

"No wine for me though, strange enough things happen when I am sober!" Mattrom Cauthan 

A sentiment I now share with one of my all time favorite characters of all time, from the book series "The Wheel of Time"; not the tv series  

 

I've never read that series so looked it up. I remember reading Robert Jordan many years ago and wondering where the next book was, but then it just got to be like a rerun and I just stopped buying new ones. A lot of us who worked in the soil lab talked and traded books at lunch and I don't recall Jordan lasting long as a work topic. 

It was a wildly eclectic group and many of used to get together after work Fridays and play D&D 1-2 times a month. We rotated dungeon masters fairly often, sometimes somebody found or wrote a module or campaign and wanted to run it. We spent 2-3 hours per session and talked about anything but work. 

Regardless of what Gary Gygax said D&D was more than loosely based on Tolkien's Middle Earth stories and different authors in the genre were frequent topics, we adopted, adapted and used much. However I do not one time recall Jordan's name or the Wheel novels come up. We even used stuff from the Shannara series and much to my dismay bits from the Dragon Rider series.

Boy am I in a rambly mood. 

The closest I came to the shop today was trying to get pics of some sort of alien invader creeper plant. I just sent half a dozen pics to the State plant guy and have my fingers crossed.

Frosty The Lucky.

Best to stay away from the snake whiskey. It's not always vodka, although it's usually some sort of high-test clear liquor or grain alcohol, although some places use wine. But they also often milk snake venom into it before they put the snake in, often drowning the snake in the process. It's used both to "enhance virility" or prove machismo, and as a traditional medicine. Supposed to cure almost everything, going back to antiquity. It costs too much, tastes kind of fishy, and the venom makes your mouth feel weird...or erm, so I've heard.

Figured on gravel over sand for drainage, the soil is pretty much just packed sand and gravel when you get down far enough, but in the winter it doesn't drain for anything. Probably because ducks seem to poop scotch guard. I hate having them in with chickens (because of the eagles) and I'll be glad when the last one finally goes kaput.

How far down to get to sand? 

If you excavate a couple few feet into the sand and fill with gravel it will increase the area for water to perk into the sand. OR if that doesn't do it poke a couple few perforated pipes a few feet into the base and fill over them with gravel. As a last step lay a geo textile about 4" under the finish grade to prevent water carrying fines into your drain field. Yes, duck, chicken, cow, horse, etc. dung will plug a drain field. Water carries the fines into the ground until soil particles slow the flow enough the dung particles aren't being carried out of the voids between aggregate particles and stop moving. One poop particle meets another and sticks, soon the drain field is plugged. Sand is a champ at getting plugged. The larger the aggregate gradation the faster water drains and fewer fines get trapped.

Geotextiles are made to stop anything but water from passing through. The invention of the stuff really changed road design. 

Yeah, I worked in the State soils lab, designing road beds was our daily job.

Frosty The Lucky.

14 hours ago, Frosty said:

Hi Nat, I must've been all absorbed in my own chatter and missed your last post. 

How does your new flatter work? I can't tell from the picture but the edge on the left working face looks sharp. If so you'll want to ease the edge just like for a hammer for the same reasons. You don't want your flatter making sharp cuts in your work, they can cause cold shuts. 

Frosty The Lucky.

 hi frosty i didnt tried it only made it with mild steel and leaf spring, i will test it later, i will have to file eye more or drift but I think i will file it cause hole for eye is too small.

Flater is like 3 inches by 3 inches wide about 7 cm.

But as i said eye seems to be too small.

 

I think 3" x 3" is a good size, you over lap blows anyway and you have to hit larger flatters harder to get the same effect. That's mostly a matter of personal preference though. I think it will do what you want, you'll like it.

Frosty The Lucky.

Good Morning Nat,

The Spring has a good radius on 2 edges, copy that for the other 2 and make sure the corners don't  have any sharps. I would heat the whole thing in a gas Forge and let it cool slowly. That will take the stress of the Welds away. Sometimes it is easier to whittle the Wood Handle to fit the Handle Hole. I clean up the Handle Hole with a Die Grinder or a Die Grinder cutter in a high speed Drill. It will serve you well!!

Neil

The only thing I've been doing in the shop for the last few days has been packing up everything I'm taking to sell at Quad-State. 

I really hope someone buys the chop saw and the drill press. I do NOT want to have to reload them in the car and bring them back home!

Good luck selling your stuff John. Maybe I'll make a Quad State someday, not that I spend much time at the anvil anymore but I'd like to shake hands with folk I've known for years and swap lies over a brew. 

Enjoy, 

Frosty The Lucky.

7 hours ago, natkova said:

i will file it

I applaud the spirit! My first year I did as much as possible with hand tools, I wanted to learn how to shape the metal in a controlled manner before getting carried away with power tools. I had a good assortment of hand files and used these more than my angle grinder while profiling hammer/tool faces, this lets you focus on what you are removing and WHY, i.e., while you round the edges of your flatter you will try to break the edge without taking too much flat off the face. Profiling a store bought hammer would be a better example though, trying to blend the different radii isn't as easy as it sounds, whether or not the steel is hardened; even more so when it comes to a cross pein. 

If filing the eye larger is your only practical option might I share a thought? Instead of a wooden handle how does a doubled over 1/2" round bar fill the eye, can you to give it a "rodded handle", with a little tack weld?

32" 1/2" round bar doubled over with the bend at the handle end, leave a 3/4" gap between the bar for as long as you want your hand held portion, i.e., 5-6", close the bars together and twist the remainder up to the end, (like the handle of a fly swatter), place twisted end in the eye, wedge tight if needed and then weld..... anneal and normalize the whole thing.

 

That would make a rigid handle and may be overkill so feel free to giggle and then disregard,  lol.

Trevor,

Lone Tree Forge

"Forging the Future's Past"

Something to remember before putting a lot of work into handles for top tools. A flatter is not a hammer, you won't be swinging it, all the handle needs do is hold it in place. It doesn't need to be tight, fit your hand, look good, anything, just be a handle to keep your hand away from HOT steel. I made my last several top tool handles from hockey sticks I picked out of the high school guy trash can by the locker room door. 

You can whittle down a stick, carve a board, twist some 5mm round stock around it, most anything works just fine. It's a little different for top cuts, those need to be positioned precisely and held solidly so tighter more rigid handles ARE called for.

Frosty The Lucky.

The only qualification I would add to Frosty's advice is that you want something with some degree of strength and flexibility. I once used a couple of old branches that turned out to be from some wood prone to brash failure, and I had a lot of top tools flying across the room at inopportune moments.

Brash failure? . . . Oh DUH, you got me good John! I was visualizing smart alec handles or tricksters, eg. Loki wood handles. Had the reply about one sentence along and got it when I read it. 

What away to start the week! At least this was good for a laugh, unlike anticipating how much it's going to cost to track down TWO intermittent electrical problems in the SUV. <sigh>

Frosty The Lucky.

Well, looks like i am out of commission for a while. Just got back from the dr. and my wrist is broke. 

A piece of cable on handled tools works great if using a power hammer. 

Most of mine are just pieces i cut out of the honeysuckle behind my shop. 

2 hours ago, Trevor84 said:

I applaud the spirit! My first year I did as much as possible with hand tools, I wanted to learn how to shape the metal in a controlled manner before getting carried away with power tools. I had a good assortment of hand files and used these more than my angle grinder while profiling hammer/tool faces, this lets you focus on what you are removing and WHY, i.e., while you round the edges of your flatter you will try to break the edge without taking too much flat off the face. Profiling a store bought hammer would be a better example though, trying to blend the different radii isn't as easy as it sounds, whether or not the steel is hardened; even more so when it comes to a cross pein. 

If filing the eye larger is your only practical option might I share a thought? Instead of a wooden handle how does a doubled over 1/2" round bar fill the eye, can you to give it a "rodded handle", with a little tack weld?

32" 1/2" round bar doubled over with the bend at the handle end, leave a 3/4" gap between the bar for as long as you want your hand held portion, i.e., 5-6", close the bars together and twist the remainder up to the end, (like the handle of a fly swatter), place twisted end in the eye, wedge tight if needed and then weld..... anneal and normalize the whole thing.

 

That would make a rigid handle and may be overkill so feel free to giggle and then disregard,  lol.

Trevor,

Lone Tree Forge

"Forging the Future's Past"

I don't see other solution, won't be first time to file , back day in school they made us file 1/2 " 12 mm round bar to hexagonal so it would be centerpunch .

That's how they msde us do, I need only now to enlarge hole better it's goes to come Chapel I must admit, one side is narrower then other side of eye.

But I can feel in my hand that wood Is too weak , and I like wood on my tools , I can use some rod and weld it even I can pass it through that eye and wrap it around , but that's not my intention.

Just to widen eye a bit I would use round file I would try with it 

Other solution can be using cold chisel and first drilling small holes using drill Press with good Hss drill bit then chipping it out by hand .

It can be done 

I rarely use flatter but it was nice project to make.

 

I Didint light forge in months, and I can tell you I had lots of midges and mosquitos who were gone when smoke arrived and fire in shop.

Cause I usually do some woodworking projects , it was summer and for blacksmithing  I need more preparation (buying fuel, lightening forge, getting dirty)

With woodworking I can approach to work exact time, no need to light forge , gather fuel etc.

And it was hot summer. Sometimes I need to "make up (like what to forge today )" projects, and my shop look like is hybrid of woodworking and blacksmithing , I myself sometimes have to swipe some wood shavings under forge for safety measures .

 

Will see what I will do with flatter ism not in rush to be honest I only find it twice or once useful and thought what if I had flatter and it was when I was drawing out axe, so I have less hammer marks, at places and times when I want surface realy flat I might test it.

But as frosty said I need first to hone face of flatter that leaf Spring part and eye is weak spot .