Phase 02 — Stone, bone, wood and fibre toolkit / About year 1
02.05
Pitch glue
hot-melt glue for hafting
AWhat it needs
Needs 6 other products in all, 1 of them directly.
View
- 02.05 Pitch glueMaking Year 1 needs 6 products
- 01.08 First fire and stone hearthMaking Year 1 needs 5 products
- 01.06 Tinder and kindling storeMaking Year 1 raw materials only
- 01.07 Bow-drill fire setMaking Year 1 needs 3 products
- 01.03 Sharp stone flakeMaking Year 1 needs 1 product
- 01.02 HammerstoneMaking Year 1 raw materials only
- 01.05 Twisted plant-fibre cordMaking Year 1 needs 2 products
Open a box to see what it needs. A dashed box is a product already drawn in full: click it to jump there. In the org chart, drag to move around.
BWhy
A stone point is no use until it stays on its shaft. Pitch glue is a hot-melt glue: soft when warm, hard when cool, and it can be softened again to reset a loose blade. It fixes points, blades and axe heads, and waterproofs seams.
CYou need
- Resin: the hard lumps and sticky runs from wounded pine, spruce or fir
- Charcoal from the hearth (01.08), crushed to a fine powder between two stones
- A little dry dung from grass-eating animals, or finely shredded dry plant fibre
- A flat stone or a large shell, and two sticks
DSteps
- Put a flat stone at the edge of the fire, where it is hot but no flame touches it.
- Melt the resin on the stone until it runs like honey. Pick out bark and dirt with a stick. Do not let it boil or catch fire: burnt resin sets brittle.
- Stir in charcoal powder, one part to three parts of resin. Charcoal makes the glue hard and stops it running in the sun.
- Stir in a pinch of the dung or fibre. It holds the glue together so it bends a little before it breaks.
- Test it: lift a drop on the stick and let it cool. It should be hard and dull, and bend very slightly before snapping. If it shatters like glass, add more fibre or a little fat. If it stays tacky, add charcoal.
- Roll the warm glue round the end of a stick, layer on layer, into a lump the size of an egg. This glue stick keeps for years.
- To use: warm the glue stick and both parts to be joined at the fire, dab on glue, press the parts together and hold while it cools. Warm it again to adjust.
EIt worked if
- A cooled blob cannot be dented with a thumbnail and does not shatter when dropped on a stone.
- A flake glued to a stick cannot be pulled off by hand.
FWhat goes wrong
- The joint falls apart in the cold. The glue is brittle: too little fibre, or the resin was scorched.
- It softens and creeps on a hot day. Too little charcoal.
- It will not stick. The parts were cold, wet or greasy. Warm and dry both.
GSafety
- Resin burns fiercely. Melt it beside the fire, never over it, and keep a handful of sand ready to smother a flare.
- Hot pitch sticks to skin and keeps burning. Cool a splash at once in water; do not wipe it.
HIn the story
Wren knows where the wounded pines are because she has been climbing them to look for nests. She and Kofi come back with resin in their hair, and that evening the first stone point is fixed to a shaft. Hiro, watching, asks how thin a layer will hold.
IFigures
not drawn yet
not drawn yet