Phase 02 — Stone, bone, wood and fibre toolkit / About year 1
02.09
Stone adze
hollows and flattens wood
AWhat it needs
Needs 13 other products in all, 3 of them directly.
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- 02.09 Stone adzeMaking Year 1 needs 13 products
- 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
- 02.06 Sinew thread and rawhide lashingMaking Year 1 needs 9 products
- 01.15 Fire-hardened spear ⚠Making Year 1 needs 6 products
- 02.03 Stone knives, scrapers and engraving pointsMaking Year 1 needs 3 products
- 02.01 Knapping kitMaking Year 1 needs 2 products
- 02.07 Ground stone axe headMaking Year 1 needs 2 products
- 01.02 Hammerstoneshown above ↑← shown at left
- 02.04 Sandstone grinding slabMaking Year 1 needs 1 product
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
An axe cuts across the grain. An adze has its edge turned sideways, like a hoe, and shaves along the grain. It flattens a log into a plank, hollows a trough or a canoe, and squares a post. It is the woodworker's main shaping tool until iron.
CYou need
- A ground stone blade made like the axe head (02.07), but narrower, with one face flat and the other ground to the edge
- A handle cut from the place where a branch leaves a trunk, so it has the shape of a bent elbow: a long arm for the grip and a short foot, a hand long, to carry the blade
- Pitch glue (02.05) and wet rawhide strip (02.06)
DSteps
- Cut the handle from a tough tree: the long arm as long as the forearm and hand, the foot meeting it at a little less than a square corner.
- Scrape the underside of the foot flat, to make a seat the same width as the blade.
- Lay the blade's flat face on the seat, with the cutting edge sticking out a thumb-length past the end of the foot and lying across the line of the handle.
- Warm both, bed the blade in pitch glue, and hold it until the glue sets.
- Bind the blade to the foot with wet rawhide strip: many tight turns, crossing over the back of the blade, covering all but the last two fingers of the edge.
- Dry it slowly in the shade. The rawhide shrinks and clamps the blade down.
- To use: stand over the work with feet apart, and swing short strokes toward yourself, letting the edge skim off thin chips. Work with the grain, from the high spot downhill.
- For hollowing, char the wood first with coals and adze out the charcoal.
EIt worked if
- It takes off long thin shavings and leaves a surface flat enough to sit on.
- The blade does not shift after an hour of work.
FWhat goes wrong
- The blade twists on its seat. The seat is not flat, or the binding is too narrow. Scrape the seat true and bind wider.
- The edge digs in and stops. The blade is set at too steep an angle. The flat face should lie almost along the surface being cut.
- The foot breaks off. The grain does not run round the bend. Choose a real branch joint, where it does.
GSafety
- The swing comes toward the legs. Keep feet wide apart, strokes short, and never adze toward a knee.
HIn the story
Bjorn makes the adze the day after the axe, and that evening the camp has its first flat thing: a slab of ash, adzed smooth, set on two logs by the fire. People keep touching it. Sofia puts food on it. It is a table, and it changes how the evenings feel.
IFigures
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