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Update on Cluckingham Palace

Built the trap door for the nesting boxes yesterday and the people door today. The people door is a 2x4 frame with 5/4x6 trim and the panel is recycled pallet slats. That’s a very heavy door. It’s gotta weigh at least 80 pounds. I thought I should make the nest box trap door the same way, but don’t want it getting the nests wet or holding water when the nest box is installed. Still gotta seal the two back corners and get some screen on the eaves and the outside will be done.

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I think I could have been competitive in the first few seasons, now? Hell no. That Damascus took me about 12 hours to do. A normal monosteel knife? Yeah with the tools they provide I could totally pull it off.
 
Hawkbox said:
I think I could have been competitive in the first few seasons, now? Hell no. That Damascus took me about 12 hours to do. A normal monosteel knife? Yeah with the tools they provide I could totally pull it off.
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It's definitely a different competition from when the show started. I guess Discovery/History Channel made 'em step up the requirements to give away the prize money. Dunno. Some of the stuff they try to do on there would turn out so much better if they had more time. Rushing is the biggest enemy of working steel. They rarely do mono-steel blades anymore, unless it's some alloy that's stupid hard to work. I've seen some GORGEOUS mono-steel blades made on that show, which in truth would have been more likely to be historically accurate, especially for mass production in manual forges. Making things pretty is a pretty low priority when you're trying to arm a large army. Damascus by itself throws in a LOT of variables in the strength and hardness of a blade. It's hard to put a clean edge on Damascus, at least one that's durable. I'm no expert at all, I just find the whole process very intriguing.

I've got a couple friends that do a bit of smithing, but no one I know does it for competition. Best I can say I've ever done is beat on a horseshoe when my step-dad's father was teaching me what a farrier does. Black/Blade smithing is a pretty unique talent. Certainly one of love. Gotta love it enough to keep doing it when you hear that PING while you're quenching a blade you just spend so much time making. That's a lot of disappointment to absorb.

I like twisted Damascus, but ball-bearing Damascus can be pretty eye-popping too, if a good variety of bearing sizes are used. I like your idea of San-Mai technique which puts the purty on the outside, but keeps the edge clean mono-steel for the best and most reliable edge.
 
For your average knife it will never matter, but I liked the idea as a concept so I went for it. Honestly just making the bloody damascus took forever and a day. And it's purely for looks, a good monosteel blade is easily as durable.
 
Hawkbox said:
For your average knife it will never matter, but I liked the idea as a concept so I went for it. Honestly just making the bloody damascus took forever and a day. And it's purely for looks, a good monosteel blade is easily as durable.
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Yeah, but what a look!
 
Oh absolutely, it makes a beautiful knife. But making the billet itself can take longer than the rest of the knife combined.
 
Dude, that is fantastic and I want to know more.
 
Hawkbox said:
Dude, that is fantastic and I want to know more.
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if you were refering to me, I can give you the schematic and arduino code. wasnt too hard to make.
 
I was, but Adruino kind of scares me off. I need big iron! I have an RO filter system that I just use with a tap right now.
 
Just think of an arduino as a phone. The hang-on-the-wall kind. Put a couple wires onto it, load the software with usb (put these files there...) and it just sits there and does its thing. How it does it isn't your concern. Or at least doesn't have to be.
 
Donoroto said:
Just think of an arduino as a phone. The hang-on-the-wall kind. Put a couple wires onto it, load the software with usb (put these files there...) and it just sits there and does its thing. How it does it isn't your concern. Or at least doesn't have to be.
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Some arduino are pretty sophisticated, including Bluetooth, wifi and fast procs. This one just has DIO and a few analog pins. simple controller runs @16mhz, which is plenty fast for running ladder logic in machine code
 
Interesting. I'm not sure I care enough when the Canadian Tire 3 minutes away sells jug refills for $2 but I love the concept.
 
Hawkbox said:
Interesting. I'm not sure I care enough when the Canadian Tire 3 minutes away sells jug refills for $2 but I love the concept.
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We used to get refills @ walmart. But the machine would be broke for weeks and it did require toting 35lb water jugs to/from the store. They are only $1.88 for 5gal refill, but after the initial cost of the filter, it costs me about $0.05 to fill 5gal from home
 
That's a good reason to do it. I'd probably want to get a bigger RO system than my little 3 gallon sink tap if I were to take this on but it's good information.
 
west1m said:
View attachment 27877
This little box has an Arduino computer in it. It tells me how much beer is left in the keg, CO2 left in the bottle , fridge temp and I put the name of the beer on it when I install a new keg.. The little Arduino computers are amazing.
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Nice! Is that off the shelf or did you make it
 
Hawkbox said:
Oh that is neat. My masking tape labels are in for some competition.
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This is mine. Just a tablet accessing a website. Gets level info from 3 plaato keg units

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