Retirement Projects
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A belated Christmas present for my son. The dragon twist is something I've seen done before and thought it would be fun to try as a tapered twist and call it a dragon tail. Little did I know how difficult it would be to pull off. Guess I should have started before Christmas Eve.1
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Skills development...d_thomas02 wrote: »A belated Christmas present for my son. The dragon twist is something I've seen done before and thought it would be fun to try as a tapered twist and call it a dragon tail. Little did I know how difficult it would be to pull off. Guess I should have started before Christmas Eve.
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Today was a good day.
Should'a spent the whole day working on reassembling the engine on our 48" walk-behind mower but after lunch played hooky and went over to a fellow blacksmith's workshop who I just met online yesterday. Had no idea there was another blacksmith so close (under 7 miles).
We worked on making a pair of tongs to hold 1" square stock. Forged out the nibs and boss, then cut that off the parent stock to forge weld onto smaller 1/2" round stock for the reins. We then worked as a striker team to draw out the reins.
Four hours went by like that [snaps fingers].
Now I have to forge the other half of mine, clean them up, and then rivet them together.
I'll be carpooling down to Arkansas Saturday with my new acquaintance to attend a blacksmith meet put on by Blacksmith Organization of Arkansas (BOA), Northwest Chapter. Technically, I live in Missouri but the Blacksmiths Association of Missouri (BAM) is mainly around the St. Louis area which is a three hour drive from my place. The Arkansas group is (slightly) closer.2 -
I enjoyed my trip to BOA's blacksmith's meet yesterday.
An early start to a crisp winter morning. John picked me up about 5:45 AM and we started to Arkansas with the stars behind a full moon to guide us. We stopped in Harrison at a local dinner and watched the sunrise as we waited for breakfast. Two eggs (sunny-side up), three strips of bacon, hash browns (crispy, if a bit greasy), and two slices of wheat toast, along with a bottomless cup of black coffee. Typical greasy spoon fair. Delicious but about as far away from healthy as you can get. Loved it.
Rolled into the driveway of the blacksmith hosting the meet just after 9 AM. He gave a demo on a few techniques using a guillotine tool mounted on a treadle hammer along with his traditional blacksmith's forge and bellows.
Amazing results.
That is not a leather belt. It is entirely steel, forged and fabricated, to resemble a leather belt. Actually a strap to hold down his hot-rod's rear mounted gas tank; a modified '06 Jeep body on a Ford F150 frame.
The oldest member, 79, brought in these samples of his work.
As much as I enjoyed the meet, I probably won't join the club nor go back for another one unless it is much closer. This one was over 120 miles away, 2 hr 14 min travel according to Google Maps. Four and a half hours travel round trip for a 6 hour meet is a bit much.
I might give Missouri's club (BAM) a try next winter but that's a 230 mile trip, 3 hr 28 min according to Maps, and then back again. That'll be a long, long day.1 -
d_thomas02 wrote: »
Two eggs (sunny-side up), three strips of bacon, hash browns (crispy, if a bit greasy), and two slices of wheat toast, along with a bottomless cup of black coffee. Typical greasy spoon fair. Delicious but about as far away from healthy as you can get. Loved it.
You need to add fake pancake syrup, some doughnuts, and at least some links and patties if you REALLY want unhealthy. Or some biscuits and gravy.d_thomas02 wrote: »
That is not a leather belt. It is entirely steel, forged and fabricated, to resemble a leather belt. Actually a strap to hold down his hot-rod's rear mounted gas tank; a modified '06 Jeep body on a Ford F150 frame.
That is really cool! If only you could make something similar to go on the wheels, you could have steel-belted radials.
:drinker:
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d_thomas02 wrote: »I enjoyed my trip to BOA's blacksmith's meet yesterday.
An early start to a crisp winter morning. John picked me up about 5:45 AM and we started to Arkansas with the stars behind a full moon to guide us. We stopped in Harrison at a local dinner and watched the sunrise as we waited for breakfast. Two eggs (sunny-side up), three strips of bacon, hash browns (crispy, if a bit greasy), and two slices of wheat toast, along with a bottomless cup of black coffee. Typical greasy spoon fair. Delicious but about as far away from healthy as you can get. Loved it.
Rolled into the driveway of the blacksmith hosting the meet just after 9 AM. He gave a demo on a few techniques using a guillotine tool mounted on a treadle hammer along with his traditional blacksmith's forge and bellows.
Amazing results.
That is not a leather belt. It is entirely steel, forged and fabricated, to resemble a leather belt. Actually a strap to hold down his hot-rod's rear mounted gas tank; a modified '06 Jeep body on a Ford F150 frame.
The oldest member, 79, brought in these samples of his work.
As much as I enjoyed the meet, I probably won't join the club nor go back for another one unless it is much closer. This one was over 120 miles away, 2 hr 14 min travel according to Google Maps. Four and a half hours travel round trip for a 6 hour meet is a bit much.
I might give Missouri's club (BAM) a try next winter but that's a 230 mile trip, 3 hr 28 min according to Maps, and then back again. That'll be a long, long day.
Wow, that belt is really refined and detailed, right down to contrast in surface textures: I don't know the craft, but I have to believe that requires a lot of long-developed and highly-refined skill, patience, and care!1 -
The steel belt is cool... and I've never seen a hotrod like that Jeep/Ford hybrid! Fascinating!!1
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Quick update from the smithy.
Been trying to learn forge welding, a useful skill to have for a blacksmith especially when welding on reins to tongs. First pair on the right, next pair on the left is waiting to be welded up. Been going over to John's every so often during this winter's slow season for blacksmithing "lessons". He's showing me how to forge weld but I appear to be a thickheaded student. You'll probably hear me this coming Sunday afternoon if I get one to stick by myself.
I'll also be taking this hunk of 304 Stainless Steel that got mixed up into a box of 4140 drops I bought. 1 1/2" round by 3 1/2" long (38 mm x 89 mm), about a pound and three quarters (800 grams roughly). Thought I'd make a light 'soft' hammer out of it. 304 doesn't have enough carbon in it to heat treat into a good hardened hammer, but it does work harden so the more I use it, the harder it will get.
Been working on the treadle hammer too. Got a few pieces ready to stick weld. These will be the tool inserts and holders on the anvil and hammer assemblies. I still have to forge the upper tang for the tool insert.
And finally a tool I've been wanting to make for some time. A blacksmith's guillotine. About half done. Ran out of wire for my MIG welder so C clamp to keep it together for now.
That's all for now. I'll check back in first of March when our busy season starts.3 -
Been almost two years, what with COVID in 2020 and then the crappy employee situation in 2021.
I have managed to make it into the smithy once or twice during this time.
Forged this kissing horses heart from a horseshoe for a friend to give his sister for a wedding present.
And a little progress on the treadle hammer.
After I retire again at the end of this season I should have more time for the smithy.
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I'm to the point in my renovation of putting in baseboards & trimming windows... Not a big fan of this kind of fussy work but it needs to get done.
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Last winter’s big project was the completion of my Bear River Redbird canoe. Had a few great trips in it this summer. I’ll be building two kayaks over this winter.4 -
That is a gorgeous boat. I wish I had shop space. Or even space to store more canoes and kayaks.1
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Lot of inside cuts on the forms for one of the kayaks I’m working on. I used to do this the hard way by hand. Little ingenuity adapting the jigsaw to the router bench. Made an insert plate for the router recess, a couple cleats to hold the jigsaw, and now have a much easier cut process for these forms.
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Lot of inside cuts on the forms for one of the kayaks I’m working on. I used to do this the hard way by hand. Little ingenuity adapting the jigsaw to the router bench. Made an insert plate for the router recess, a couple cleats to hold the jigsaw, and now have a much easier cut process for these forms.
That is brilliant! Well done!!1 -
I've developed an interest in mushrooms and since I've not had any luck finding them in the wild so far, I decided to look into farming mushrooms at home.
I did my research and started putting together an indoor hobby mushroom farm. This is what I've come up with to grow mushrooms in my mostly unheated basement/shop/garage.
Note the table itself is totally repurposed used materials. steel door with pallet lumber for legs.
The main kit is the grow tent. Inside the tent is a heavy duty storage shelving unit. To the left are the tent environmental controls. A three gallon humidifier, humidistat, two thermostats and automatic timer for the lights.
The automatic timer controls a strip of LED lights inside the tent. Mushrooms don't need light to grow, but it is a key motivator to fruit. It is currently set for 10 hr per day.
The humidistat controls the humidifier directly. It is currently set to maintain humidity between 80 and 85%.
The main thermostat indirectly controls the temperature inside the tent via a inline water pump that pumps water from a heated reservoir (small aquarium with second thermostat controlling a heater set currently to maintain 70F) through a radiator inside the tent and then recycles back into the reservoir in a closed loop.Two 12V fans are mounted on the radiator that run all the time keeping the air moving inside the tent. The thermostat keeps the temperature inside the grow tent between 61 and 62F. The reservoir is currently inside the tent but I’ll be moving it outside as soon as my first crop is harvested.
I purchased a three block “Table Top Farm Set” from an on-line supplier to start with. Pre-inoculated and incubated hardwood sawdust blocks arrive ready to fruit. You just open the blocks according to the instructions and wait a few weeks before starting the harvest.
My set includes Shiitake, Chestnut, and King Oyster mushrooms.
The king oyster block is on the bottom left. (The heated reservoir is on the bottom right wrapped in black plastic.)
The chestnut block is on the left while the shiitake block is on the right.
So far, so good. Now I just gotta sit on my hands for a couple of weeks. Maybe take the time to organize all the controls neatly on a control panel.
I also purchased two other blocks. One for Maitake (Hen of the Woods) and one for Chicken of the Woods. Cultivating these are a bit different. I have enough sawdust spawn to inoculate six small oak logs each after each log is run through a pressure cooker to kill any wild competition. After the logs are inoculated, they’ll be incubated for two to three months before being planted in my wife’s hosta garden on the north side of our house. In one to two years I should be harvesting those in the fall for several years to come.
Maitake on the left Chicken of the Woods on the right.
Now I just have to wait for nine inches of snow to melt.2 -
d_thomas02 wrote: »I've developed an interest in mushrooms and since I've not had any luck finding them in the wild so far, I decided to look into farming mushrooms at home.
<snip>
I have a close friend who has worked for a company that cultures and grows the spawn for commercial mushroom growers and for the companies that sell the kits to amateurs like us. A few weeks ago, she gave me some dowels that were inoculated with shiitake. In the past, she's given me logs that she inoculated and stored until they were close to ready to fruit. I inoculated a new oak log, and it might fruit this spring/summer, or it might be a year later.
Shiitake doesn't grow wild here. It never will. It isn't very aggressive, and it will not grow if there's competition from other fungus. That said, she advised me I don't even need to bother with capping the plugs with wax. Just be sure not to pound them in past the cambium.
I wonder if she grew the spawn that was used to put your kit together. That would be cool. Shiitake is her favorite. She's not a fan of sawdust growing; she likes logs. She hates all the plastic involved in part of what she does. She's been teaching me a lot.
My logs weren't cooked to kill other organisms. They were green. They had lots of sapwood. I drilled holes and pushed in the plugs. Now the trick is to leave them out in the rain, but not all the time. They can get too wet. In summer I just water them or soak them every week or three. This time of year, when it rains all the time, I leave them out when they "feel light" and put them back in the carport when they're saturated. She has stacks in her yard that she covers with an upside down kiddie pool to keep some of the rain off during the winter. I think she uses that to soak logs in the summer when it doesn't rain. She's the friend that found the Sparassis when we were out stomping around looking for Candy Caps a couple months ago. Yum. I was the officiant at her wedding; her husband literally wrote the book on truffles.
Three months to Morel season! There's still littlefoot (winter) chanterelles out. Maybe I'll find some soon.
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Though I feel like my hobbies are not quite standard here lately, I'm going to put my stake in the ground, and share something(s) quite different:
One of my hobbies is experimenting with which houseplants I can manage to kill (or occasionally not), including some orchids. The one above is Gerberara 'Snow Ballet', which just opened (in my remarkably cold foyer), bloom about 2" across. There are more buds.
For some reason - maybe because I did some dividing over the summer? - I've had a good Winter for orchids reblooming. I've also got a cute little cactus that's bloomed multiple times (I think a Mammilaria), in addition to the usual indoor bloom-y things like Christmas Cactus (Schlumbergera) and Peace Lily (Spathyphyllum). That's in addition to a bunch of foliage things, a couple of which are rapidly becoming expansive window treatments . . . and others of which are objectively dying at varied speeds.
Another hobby - as I think I've reported here previously - is jewelry making. Since having multiple vision problems, that's become more fraught, and I'm still not doing thing that involve off-loom beadweaving of tiny beads. This was a simple stringing project, made for a close friend as a Christmas gift. There's some agates, some jaspers, some glass, some gold-filled wire/findings in there, plus a (purchased) ceramic focal.
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Update on the Mushroom Farm. Five days after installing the table top blocks in the grow tent.
Shiitake, day 0 and then day 5.
King Oyster, day 0 and then day 5.
Chestnuts look pretty much the same as day 0 but they are slower to fruit than the others.2 -
WOW! Didn't know mushrooms grew so fast!
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I harvested the King Oyster mushrooms today, 8 days after going into the grow tent.First flush was 872 grams or 1 pound 9 ounces. enough to fill two paper lunch bags. Not bad at all for my first ever mushroom harvest. The block has been flipped and returned to the grow tent for a second flush. We'll have to see how long it takes for it to pin.
King Oysters have a long and thick stem. They say if you cut the stem into inch long pieces, they closely resemble scallops when sauteed, so I gave it a try using olive oil and a dab of butter. Also gave slicing the stem length wise to resemble chicken strips a try and sauteed those too. I just sliced the caps and sauteed them. No other seasonings at all. They say you can shred the stems and have a convencing "pulled pork" looking dish. We'll have to try that next.
The "scallops" were very good (I'd have to try them side-by-side with real ones), the "chicken strips" were great mushrooms but so-so as chicken.
We only cooked up two of the mushrooms as my wife does suffer from a wide range of food allergies, so I put the uncooked (probably still a pound and a half) and the leftover cooked ones in the fridge. An hour after eating and no adverse effects. I think we can try king oysters as a main dish tomorrow night.
My wife is happy with my new hobby.
Shiitakes are still a few days away from harvesting. Chestnuts are just beginning to pin.
I’ve ordered supplies to begin cloning mushrooms. Hopefully those supplies will come in with time for me to start cultures of these three varieties.
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I thought I'd post a photo of the Chestnut mushroom pins. These are about the size of those sewing pins with the round colored plastic heads, all in clusters.When ready for harvest they should look like these.
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I
I like mushrooms but my knowledge of them is very limited. My stepson is far more knowledgeable but he prefers to wild-gather. Not sure why.d_thomas02 wrote: »I thought I'd post a photo of the Chestnut mushroom pins. These are about the size of those sewing pins with the round colored plastic heads, all in clusters.When ready for harvest they should look like these.0 -
Some of the mushrooms David is growing don't occur in the wild around here. Shiitake are not very aggressive. I have some logs inocculated, and my friend found a couple more logs. I still have a few plugs to try. They have to be cared for in a way that prevents competition from other fungi. One of the mushrooms he is growing does occur in the wild where he lives, but not where I do.
Growing mushrooms on compressed sawdust or grains is much faster than logs. I grow logs because my friend who grows spawn is a big proponent of them. There's a lot of waste that goes along with growing on sawdust or grain. Her company sells the spawn, either in those compressed blocks or as dowel plugs. She would love to get a small autoclave so she can continue to grow various mushrooms as a hobby after she retires.
We have been way short on rain, but it's in the forecast for tomorrow. I need to go toss my logs outside so they can get wet. I bring them under cover so they don't stay TOO wet, but that hasn't been a problem the last few weeks. I may go ahead and bring the bonsai back out from under cover, too. I'll probably have to water them though if I put them out in the sun. They've just been dormant for a month or so since we had VERY cold weather. When the soil is frozen, if the sun shines on them it can kill them because they are trying to photosynthesize but their roots can't pull any water out of the tiny block of frozen soil they're planted in. It's worse if there's wind AND sun and the soil is frozen.1 -
I
I like mushrooms but my knowledge of them is very limited. My stepson is far more knowledgeable but he prefers to wild-gather. Not sure why.d_thomas02 wrote: »I thought I'd post a photo of the Chestnut mushroom pins. These are about the size of those sewing pins with the round colored plastic heads, all in clusters.When ready for harvest they should look like these.
I'd prefer to wild gather too, but it seems my area is just too dry most of the time. They do grow in areas that retain moisture, river bottom and such, but I live on the ridge tops (no worries about flooding).
@mtaratoot I'm not sure what you mean by "a lot of waste" when growing on sawdust and grain. All of the spent blocks, paper products, and other media are composted while the plastic can be recycled.1 -
I harvested my Shiitakes yesterday, ten days after going into the grow tent. They started out looking great but stalled around day five and I'm not sure exactly why but I'm guessing they need a higher humidity than the 80-85% I was keeping in the grow tent since the plastic bag is stripped completely off for fruiting. I'll try 90-95% next time.Day 5I only got sorry looking 9 ounces off the first flush. The block will need to be left out to dry for two to three weeks and then soaked in a bucket overnight before being cold shocked in the fridge for another night. Back into the grow tent after that for a second flush.
Day 10
They still tasted great.
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d_thomas02 wrote: »I
I like mushrooms but my knowledge of them is very limited. My stepson is far more knowledgeable but he prefers to wild-gather. Not sure why.d_thomas02 wrote: »I thought I'd post a photo of the Chestnut mushroom pins. These are about the size of those sewing pins with the round colored plastic heads, all in clusters.When ready for harvest they should look like these.
I'd prefer to wild gather too, but it seems my area is just too dry most of the time. They do grow in areas that retain moisture, river bottom and such, but I live on the ridge tops (no worries about flooding).
@mtaratoot I'm not sure what you mean by "a lot of waste" when growing on sawdust and grain. All of the spent blocks, paper products, and other media are composted while the plastic can be recycled.
I suspect very few people compost the spent grains/sawdust or recycle the plastic. I think the plastic has to be washed first. I'm not even sure where I would recycle them if I had them. Where I live we used to have much more comprehensive recycling programs, but the last few years since China quit taking most of our recyclable items, mostly because we as end users couldn't do a good enough job of avoiding contamination, many things that CAN be recycled aren't. Some are collected and transferred to the landfill. The only recyclable plastics we can get back into the system are "bottles, jugs, and tubs," and even with them, no lids. We can recycle aluminum foil if it isn't contaminated. At least cardboard that is contaminated with food, or any food waste, can go in our green cart to be composted along with yard waste.
There's also a lot of waste on the production end. I am the happy recipient of lots of used grain bags. They can't be recycled, at least not where I live. I use them for trash hauling on river trips or as bags for used cans to keep them from damaging the raft. They are fairly strong and last a few trips, but even then they still end up in the landfill.
Once you start culturing your own mushrooms to grow them before fruiting, you'll cut down on some of the waste. It will take longer, but you'll be more hands-on. Kind of neat actually. The company my friend works for has over 350 different strains. Sometimes she has to just re-culture them to keep them alive. They are otherwise stored in liquid nitrogen. The petri dishes they use for culturing can't be recycled either, or reused.
It's also possible that my friend is hyper-sensitive to the amount of waste generated.
I put my logs out in the yard yesterday afternoon. It started raining overnight. I'll leave them out until tomorrow or Wednesday and put them back in the carport once they're "heavy" again. The oldest one might be spent, or it might have one more flush. The middle one should fruit at least twice this summer. The newest one might not even fruit yet this summer; maybe fall. It should go a couple more years. I have a few more dowels left, and I think we've found some more oak to inocculate, so I'll have a fourth log that starts right before spring. Almost perfect.2 -
I was enjoying a pint with my mushroom friends the other day, and I asked more about her disdain for sawdust block growing.
One thing she said that sort of made sense, especially when I saw what you've set up for your grow chamber, is that growing on blocks is much more difficult because the blocks are more finicky than logs. With the logs, you just inoculate and toss 'em out back. It does, however, take a lot longer. You also have to FIND the logs. For shiitake, they need to be fresh, and ideally they are both big in diameter and mostly sapwood. They will also grow on maple, but they love oak. They can grow on other hardwoods, but ones with thick bark/cambium are best. That's where the mycelium grow.
She brought me a couple more logs. I have some dowels left. I'm going to go drill the big one and pound in the dowels. If there are enough dowels left, I'll do the small one. If not, she'll bring more plugs. Maybe I will expand to growing some other species. I sure don't want to do it as a business, but I love to eat mushrooms. I think they are delicious and come in so many variations of flavors and textures.
I probably don't really need more hobbies, but hey - why not? I doubt I'll ever make beer again. Wine or mead, maybe. I'll continue to make fermented foods when the temperature isn't too warm. I'll keep growing fruits and vegetables. I'll keep paddling canoes and kayaks and rowing rafts. I have thought for years that when I retire I might like to take up ceramics. Now I'm thinking about maybe having a very small business where I cook food for others. Not a restaurant; just make more food than I can eat and sell it to other people who don't like cooking but like to eat. I will use a lot of mushrooms....
I did pull a package of chanterelles out of the freezer yesterday. I was going to use them in some beans, but decided not to. I might make a leek and potato soup today; they'll go good in that. I like to make sure to use them throughout the year but not so often I run out before they fruit again in the fall.
Mmmmm..... Mushrooms!
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I was enjoying a pint with my mushroom friends the other day, and I asked more about her disdain for sawdust block growing.
One thing she said that sort of made sense, especially when I saw what you've set up for your grow chamber, is that growing on blocks is much more difficult because the blocks are more finicky than logs. With the logs, you just inoculate and toss 'em out back. It does, however, take a lot longer. You also have to FIND the logs. For shiitake, they need to be fresh, and ideally they are both big in diameter and mostly sapwood. They will also grow on maple, but they love oak. They can grow on other hardwoods, but ones with thick bark/cambium are best. That's where the mycelium grow.
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Mmmmm..... Mushrooms!
I guess I can see her point.
Both growing methods have advantages and disadvantages. The grower using blocks may have to change certain growing conditions depending on what species he wants to grow, but that really isn't hard to do. Mostly it's a matter of adjusting the mix of the substrate base (50%/50% wood pellets to soy hull pellets or 80%/20% straw to wheat bran, that sort of thing) and raising or lowering the humidity and/or temperature. The block grower has a near endless variety of species he can cultivate. And he can grow hundreds of blocks in a limited space. Think two car garage size or basement. Blocks usually colonize fast, two to six weeks depending on species. Spores from mature mushrooms just before harvest can be problematic but a good ventilation system and PPE can take care of that.
The log grower is limited to species that grow on logs and, as you mentioned, has to wait for the log to colonize (several months to maybe a year) and must keep them outdoors for the most part. While they can be stacked, sort of, moving the blocks around would probably be problematic. I’m guessing harvest would be smaller per unit but the log would continue to produce far longer than the block.
Spent logs would certainly be easier to get rid of. Just throw them on the compost heap. Blocks have to be stripped of their plastic first before disposal and then there is the plastic waste. I’ll have to check with my local recycle center to see if the bags would have to be washed first. They do make “biodegradable” plastic bags but I hear those aren’t as successful as had been hoped. I don’t know if mushroom bags are available in “compostable” plastics.
Spent blocks are either composted on site or sold to others. There are folks that buy spent blocks, rehydrate them to grow a third and maybe even a fourth flush. Depending on the substrate (straw and wheat bran for instance), some blocks can be ground up and used as roughage in livestock feed. Vermiculture is a good industry in need of spent blocks for their worms. Also mealworm and superworm breeders can make use of spent blocks as food and bedding.
No sense throwing away something others are willing to pay for.
I think my Chestnuts will be ready to harvest tomorrow. I'm seeing a few second flush pins on the King Oyster block. And I'll be rehydrating the Shiitake block later this week before starting it's second flush.
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