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knappable material (Read 4067 times)
henryblowery
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knappable material
Dec 3rd, 2004 at 10:40am
 
i was wandering if there is any knappable material other than
flint becus i live in central north carolina and dont think that there is any flint there
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Douglas
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Re: knappable material
Reply #1 - Dec 3rd, 2004 at 12:14pm
 
Absolutely! Chert and obsidian are also good.
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slingafterdinner
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Re: knappable material
Reply #2 - Dec 3rd, 2004 at 12:45pm
 
wat do chert and obsidian look like?
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Re: knappable material
Reply #3 - Dec 3rd, 2004 at 1:21pm
 
the aboriginys knapped glass they kept taking it so the settlers had to give them glass as a n offering to get them to leave the glass being used
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english
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Re: knappable material
Reply #4 - Dec 3rd, 2004 at 2:51pm
 
Oh there are loads.  Glass is great, but crumbles some.  Chert is basically flint - and it probably is around your area, or near to it.  Novaculite is apparently ok, and you can even knap basalt if you wanted to.  But I'd give glass a try - it is perfectly homogenous (what you want), with pretty much no flaws.  Obsidian is volcanic glass, nearly perfect, but does often contain many flaws.  Still the best natural knappable material though.
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henryblowery
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Re: knappable material
Reply #5 - Dec 3rd, 2004 at 5:55pm
 
what does chert and flint look like if i was to pick it up in a feld or stream
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Re: knappable material
Reply #6 - Dec 3rd, 2004 at 6:30pm
 
ahhh.
chert

its petrified mud basically. it has a slightly grainy texture, and is gray.

around here we call it hornstone.

tried to get some flakes of f a cobble. i need some copper rod to get it done,
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britishslinger
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Re: knappable material
Reply #7 - Dec 4th, 2004 at 2:53am
 
i found ain teresting stone its chert on one side and flint on the other
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Re: knappable material
Reply #8 - Dec 4th, 2004 at 3:06am
 
My sister is going to school for jewelery design and is doing a project using obsidian. We talked about it today. Anyway, I told her that my dad has some pieces of artificial obsidian somewhere. They are red and yellow mixes in color. He got them in new mexico, they were created by the atomic bomb testing. The blast melts the desert sand into obsidian. If I can find a piece I want to make a knife with it. Anyone else ever seen this stuff??
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english
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Re: knappable material
Reply #9 - Dec 4th, 2004 at 4:33am
 
Now that would be cool.  A Los Alamos knife.  It's not really artificial obsidian, just obsidian made incredibly quickly.  Very cool if you could make a knife.
  Petrified mud eh?  I heard a slightly different idea, but it was regarding flint, which forms in chalk cliffs.  It has something to do with dead animals - it was in a book I bought from Will Lord, probably England's best knapper.  I'll see if I can find it.
  Chert is typically grey, flint is typically black, but you can get honey coloured flint, black chert, grey flint, and many other colours.  There isn't much difference between them, but flint is usually better quality, especially if it's pure black.  If there are no flaws, hitting it will cause it to ring like a bell.  There are usually many flaws.
  Flint/chert tend not to be pick-up-able from streams or rivers in large quantities.  It will not be good quality, and will likely be in the form of small pebbles or cobbles, rather than large nodes.  Where I live, walking through farmer's fields, you can pick up lovely big bits of flint, and a lot of the medieval and even Victorian architecture has flint inlaid, or even whole walls of flint.  It's such a waste.
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britishslinger
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Re: knappable material
Reply #10 - Dec 4th, 2004 at 5:17am
 
i went to cambridge and the walls are made of flint but there are so many flaws
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DCR
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Re: knappable material
Reply #11 - Dec 6th, 2004 at 1:56am
 
According to "FLINTKNAPPING: Making and Understanding Stone Tools" by J.C. Whittaker, flint and chert are compositionaly identical. Chert tends to vary in color from bone white to dark grey and usualy has more striations and inclusions. Flint usualy stays in the dark colors and is a little more homogenous.
  Obsidian, as mentioned by others on this post, is volcanic glass and is simply joyful to work with. It flakes beautifuly with nice, even scars.
I started the craft with pieces of broken mirrors and the bottoms of particular beer bottles. Commercially made glass flakes as well as obsidian but you have to experiment with the different kinds.
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Douglas
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Just give me a good stone
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Re: knappable material
Reply #12 - Dec 6th, 2004 at 12:13pm
 
Check out these guys:
http://www.ncgems.com/
They seem to be in your area. Even a phone call could answer some of your questions.
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english
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Re: knappable material
Reply #13 - Dec 6th, 2004 at 1:14pm
 
That's a really good book - goes into massive detail.  If you want to knap, or want to know about knappable materials, then buy that book.
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Re: knappable material
Reply #14 - Dec 6th, 2004 at 6:04pm
 
  English is right. I've looked at just about every stinkin' book on the subject and I must say that "FLINTKNAPPING" has got to be the bible of the skill. Over 300 pages with illustrations put together by anthropologists and enthusiasts who not only talk the talk, but walk the walk. Good stuff, Maynard!

  For anyone interested, the ISBN is 0-292-79083-X
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