22 June 2010

Spring Vice ver 1.0

The spring vice is done, at least for the prototype stage. We had it with at Derbyshire, but the very low quality coal we got made almost anything a huge challenge. Jessie busted his butt just trying to keep it lit and trying to get enough heat to draw points.

The coal we had was not only low in quality, but was also about 30 percent driveway gravel. It also had some charcoal mixed in, just for fun. Charcoal burns well enough, but tends to spark and pop under high heat. This, mixed in with coal, makes for an ashy, spitty fire. Add rock to the mix, which acts as a heat sink, and it's just miserable to try to do anything with.

The early tests with the vice are promising. It holds fairly firmly, with about 100 lbs of downward pressure on the stock. A few minutes of clean up on the vice will bring it to presentable, so we should have pics up soon. Once it's ground clean and painted we will see about pics of it, and get some "action shots" to show how it can be used.

The helve is still in progress, so more info on that later.

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