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2 1/2 hours of knapping, (Photos) (Read 4414 times)
LukeWebb
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2 1/2 hours of knapping, (Photos)
May 12th, 2011 at 5:33pm
 
Hey, I thought I would post these up here.  I knap mainly glass and some flint ships ballast I find and though it took me about an hour and half to make a point from a bottle base when I was learning it only takes me about 30-45min. now unless it's a really big and difficult piece.  I made these 4 up this afternoon, it took me about 2 1/2 hours.  They are made from 3 different kinds of clear glass bottle bases I collect off the beach and at least 2 of them will be becoming arrowhead necklaces in the near future and perhaps the big one a small knife.  To make the base into a preform, (remove the cup on the bottom of the bottle base and the hump on the top,) I used a small copper cap fitted on the end of a soft maple branch about 5in. long for percussion work, if you weight it or use anything heavier like a hammerstone you will get step fractures and end up snapping the point in two to boot! Then I used my preference of pressure flaker to shape them and do the final thinning, my preference being a soft steel boat nail, (similar to a horseshoe nail,) set in a short hardwood handle.  To notch them I used a finishing nail pressure flaker.

  The clear glass is the trickiest I find as it has a greater tendency to be brittle and step fracture so you have to be really gentle with it.  Green is my favorite, or blue if I can find it, those colors knap better and brown is pretty good too but not as good.  I do find some clear bottle bases though that knap a lot better and are not near as brittle, the largest point is one of those.  It's hard to explain but it has a very smooth almost oily feel to it, the good clear glass does.
  I hope the pictures are o.k. I took them in a rush.


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Mauro Fiorentini
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Re: 2 1/2 hours of knapping, (Photos)
Reply #1 - May 12th, 2011 at 6:15pm
 
Glass is always a pleasure to knap, and a pleasure to see.
Congratulations on your efforts, I'm light years from your skills  Smiley
Mauro.
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Re: 2 1/2 hours of knapping, (Photos)
Reply #2 - May 12th, 2011 at 6:22pm
 
Great stuff there luke, it makes me want to go knap some arrowheads of my own.  Smiley
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LukeWebb
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Re: 2 1/2 hours of knapping, (Photos)
Reply #3 - May 12th, 2011 at 8:08pm
 
  I've only been at it about 6 months actually, but I knap about every other day.  It was really hard during the winter though as we get quite a cold winter and we had a lot of snow.  I was sitting in a chair in the back yard with snow halfway up to my knees that I had to shovel a space to sit in bundled up in a ski mask and winter coat...I would come in and I couldn't feel anything from the waste down.  I have been selling them as necklaces at a local market so I had to knap sometimes no matter how nasty it was.  Never try and knap in rain or fog though, especially with glass.  It makes the pressure flaker slip but worst of all it makes it so you can't clearly see the scars left by the pressure flaker.  That makes it really hard to do a good job it if you can't see your roadmap.
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Bill Skinner
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Re: 2 1/2 hours of knapping, (Photos)
Reply #4 - May 13th, 2011 at 5:18pm
 
Those are really good.  What are you using for tools?  I have to admit to a love/hate relationship with glass and obsidion.  It make great looking points but I ALWAYS cut myself and I really hate getting the fragments out.  You can't see them but you can feel every time the metal probe (the tip of my knife) hits them, so you keep digging until it pops out.  Bill
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LukeWebb
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Re: 2 1/2 hours of knapping, (Photos)
Reply #5 - May 13th, 2011 at 6:54pm
 
  I wear a pair of thin nylon gloves that have a rubbery coating on the palms and fingers. It stops me from getting cut by the flakes and they fit so tight and have good grip that they don't hinder my knapping abilities.  To work the glass I use a steel boatnail for a pressure flaker tip and a small copper cap on the end of a soft maple dowel about 5in. long for a bopper. 

   Here are some more points I made this afternoon.  I was able to put about 4hours into it today so I came up with these.  The long blueish one is 1/2 in. plate glass, and all the rest except the tiny clear knife blade are bottle base points.  The tiny knifeblade is made from a shard from the side of a thick old soda bottle.

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Re: 2 1/2 hours of knapping, (Photos)
Reply #6 - May 13th, 2011 at 7:13pm
 
You should haft a few of those heads Luke, they'd look very nice.
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Re: 2 1/2 hours of knapping, (Photos)
Reply #7 - May 13th, 2011 at 7:41pm
 
second from the left/ right next to the green one is my favorite. looks like an excellent cutting edge.
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LukeWebb
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Re: 2 1/2 hours of knapping, (Photos)
Reply #8 - May 13th, 2011 at 11:42pm
 
  I've made a few like that, I make them into knives.  I will be making the green one into a knife as well.  If any of you are interested in an arrowhead necklace, a knife with a display stand or anything else let me know and I can quote you a price.
  They are very sharp knives, a bit more for a collection than for use but for small applications like gutting a fish or skinning a rabbit they would work well.  To sharpen them you would have to know how to knap somewhat so that is the drawback to using one, but I would think they would take a while to get very dull.
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