Every year at the end of August flint knappers gather at Letchworth State Park for the annual Stone Tool Show. People come from all over to watch, learn and buy. There is a primitive camp and folks in period gear. everybody has a good time.
Flint Knapping
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Gordoncourtney
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Well Erwin just saw you there a happy new year to you and to everyone on the forum. We would be in France now but you have banned us. Ha ha. It’s time we flooded the tunnel, in return, don’t get me wrong I have great French friends and we were so welcome all down your west coast We were at Shoreham today for a breath of sea air 52 miles from Esher but well worth it. It was my intention to get some flint today from the white cliffs east of Brighton on the way home but it turned cold and the rain came down at 3 pm. I’ll pick a more sunny day. We have flint 15 miles from us but most is broken up. I see later in this string flint arrows and have kind of napped a few as they make nice presents when fixed on a wood shaft. So far I have not been able to make blades mine are mostly chips finished with pliers , but they work well A load of waste is to be expected. But a most enjoyable skill making a pile of mess which ends up in wife’s flowerpots I’ll always bring you some English flint if coming your way. Lead is not a problem In Uk so far not payed for it but the scrappy wanted £3/ kg. Not so bad. My friend gets his lead from an airgun club a window maker and a share out from the back stop I cannot openly comment on BP for obvious reasons but it’s quite difficult to make fast stuff , another great forum discussion. It looke easy on eBay Ha ha you try making itThat a good idea, but difficult to do...
I'm born in a country with a good reputation for the flints, I tried, tried and tried again and you know what : I buy all my flints made by a knapper : when I do that by myself, I have more waste than good blades, and it's a pity : it's the same excellent flint as the English black flint.
To cut good blades and then to cut them correctly is long to learn and there is a lot of waste...
Good luck to you.
Photos of shoreham i pity those who have never seen the sea or the ocean the air is so good for you , also the new Sussex yacht club , we sail to visit several clubs on Frances west coasts and they come to us. Sometimes racing or just cruising. My 50ft catamaran looking sad on the mud I built it in 2006 when I was younger and dreamed of sailing into the sunset
droned on enough super string love napping let’s have more of it. Happy new year
ps. I just cut the old apple tree down now I can plink away in the garden to 70 yards with my bsa Scorpio see target. Still not shot a mL in years too old at 78 no police permit and they will never give me one. It’s not nice to shoot intruders so it seems. But I shoot recurve and compound bows. More deadly than a 13 bore. Ha ha. I do wish you well
joan and Gordon. Remember my family comes from Courtenay SE of Paris got a big french nose too still after 1160. My Rapido motor home is french as you well know
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A good magazine-size paperback book by D.C. Waldorf, "Art of Flintknappin" is an excellent book to get started with. At the very end of his book, he gets into how gun flints are made and they are made quite differently than arrowheads, spearheads, knives, and axes. You really need a core to strike off long flint shards and then you can get two or three gun flints out of each shard. He also had a video out demonstrating many of the things in his book at his cabin in the boonies with a bird that would often come walk around on the table while he was knapping.
I'd also recommend buying a starter kit. It should have tools to do both percussion and pressure flaking. You'll also want about a 12" square of 9-oz. leather (thick) to drape over your knee when percussion knapping and a smaller piece of leather that you can fold into about a 1/2" leather pad or a slotted rubber hand pad for doing pressure flaking in your hand. And, so you don't go through tons of bandaids, get some nitrile gloves that are thin enough to let you feel what's going on but strong enough to protect your fingers from cuts. Be aware that flint shards are extremely sharp, especially obsidian.
There are basically two approaches to flintknapping. One is known as "Abo knapping", which is short of aborigine tools flint knapping. Abo tools include deer antler tines for pressure flaking and either the root of an antler that has been rounded off or round-edged river rocks for percussive flaking. The advantages of using antler is that they tend to throw longer flakes because the compress slightly as they hit the flint and then spring back as the flake starts to release. Using a rock to flake doesn't throw as long of a flake because a rock doesn't compress and then release extra pressure link and antler will.
Round edge River Rock for Percussion Spawling and flaking depending upon size.
Deer, elk, or moose antler root billet for percussion flaking (use rounded end)
Deer, elk or moose antler tine pressure flakers.
The other way to knap flint is by using modern flintknapping tools. Modern flakers typically use a copper welding rod that has been filed or sanded to a point or a copper nail that is embedded in wood or Delrin. These don't throw as long of a flake as antler tips will but rarely need sharpening and are very consistent in their results.
Instead of an antler billet for pressure flaking they use "copper boppers" which come in all sizes from about ¾" to 2" in diameter. These have dome-shaped copper endcaps with lead inside the copper cap for weight.
Google "flintknapping near me" (or near your city) to see if there's anything going on near you. I found a spot about 35-minutes away where they have regular "knap-ins" and that was very helpful.
yes it would be! I wonder if the INDIANS back made points from discarded whiskey saloon bottles. it had to start some where?
it isn't addictive for long, when SILICOSSIS set's in. Weare a mask and be safe.
book's are great, but remember that you cannot learn to milk a cow from a book, you have to pull t!ts.! to get the milk. that is what a farmer told me many, 70+ yrs ago. and it worked by golly!
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My understanding is that by the time there was contact that would create a supply of bottles, there were lots of metal points being traded. Of course there were points made from bone and, if nothing else was around, a broken bottle might have been tried. I have heard of a point made from a cast iron pan, ground to shape on rocks!
wilded
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Telegraph companies had trouble with Indians stealing the insulators to make into arrowheads and knives.
Howdy, So I was sitting there, while wearing shorts, knapping some obsidian when I saw these Bright Red Spots about the size of a penny on the canvas I'd set down to catch the debitage. What the ????, then I noticed a shard sticking out of my right leg just behind the Knee. Twas about 1/2" x 1/2" sticking out of my leg and just dripping blood like there was no tomorrow. It was about 18" between where I was knapping the blank on my left leg to where the shard tried to bury itself in my right leg. I pulled it out and saw that it had penetrated about 1/2" I didn't feel a thing as it went in or out.
When I went to the doc in a box the Dr. who came into the room to put stitches in remarked "Boy that is a really clean cut!" It was indeed a really clean cut! Oh yeah, the only pain I felt during the whole affair was when he stuck me with the needle used to numb the area.
There are a couple of lessons to learn here. 1. Obsidian can be REALLY SHARP and B. DO NOT KNAP OBSIDIAN IN SHORTS!
Good Luck YMMV
Erwan
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i learned long ago to use HEAVY leather chaps. it is amazing how sharp obsidian shards can be.
i have for years gone to my spall box for a piece of obsidian when skinning a deer.
last cut i received from obsidian was a 1/4 inch flake that went through heavy leather glove into my thumb. didn't know i was cut until the blood came dripping out the cuff of that glove. had to get a magnifying glass to even see the piece so i could pull it out! wife just handed me the box of bandaids, walked off muttering something that sounded like "old fool".
Johnstone is just the toilet points. The ones from bottle bottoms, we used to call Old Milwaukee Points.
Not sure where in tarnation all of mine are at the moment, but here’s one in novaculite and one in deer bone.
Jay
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don't NAP WHEN FLINT KNAPPING!, pay attention!
How did they get all that GOOD flint from Brandon, Suffolk to texas..0.D.
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People who do lots of knapping should wear masks; tiny particles of flint inhaled over a long time can result in lung damage. Cool to read that this ancient art is being practiced by new recruits even today!
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Well, if you miss a good shot at game, you can just say that 'shot was in the crapper'!
And that is very true!!
Like anything else that takes skill, you have to develop the skill. With D.C. Waldorf's book, "The Art of Flintknapping", you will understand how it works. But it will take you a lot of practice and broken spawls to become good at it.
As he mentions in that book, for the beginner the best thing to do is to start with pressure flaking the bottom of glass bottle. You can get the bottom to separate pretty nicely by using a thick 4" to 6" nail carefully inside the bottle, then put on your gloves, hold it over a box to catch the pieces, put your thumb over the opening of the top of the neck of the bottle to seal it, and shake the bottle straight up and down. Often, one or two shakes will do it. If not, just keep shaking it up and down until the bottom pops out. That will give a thick piece of glass with about the same properties as obsidian to practice your pressure flaking on.
After you get some basic skill with it, find a "knap-in" you can go to where you can sit next to folks who are good at it and knap along with them. You'll find most knappers share their knowledge pretty freely and can spot things you're doing wrong that you didn't realize. Hopefully, you'll find yourself breaking fewer and fewer spawls in half while you try to knap.
