Archive for March, 2008

Mar
1

Life is just getting better and better.

10 years ago mobile internet access was just a dream. Nowadays things are just so easy that accessing your friends page on LiveJournal is as easy as a few button presses on you mobile phone. Not only can you access web sites but you can also contribute, post blogs, upload pictures, and loads me other things.

More and more mobile friendly websites are appearing and the need for accessing a computer is becoming a thing of the past. Even the Rowany Community Forum is mobile phone friendly these days.

Don’t you just love technology? ;) This post is also sent from my mobile.

Mar
2

Theories and supposition on Medieval Souvenir production.

What follows is just some thoughts and theories only, based on my own pewter work, and understanding of production and manufacturing techniques. It is by no means researched and even my own experience does not compare to technology that would have been available.

I have of late been making largish batches of tokens, particularly for Rowany Newcomers, and this has given me pause to think of production techniques that might have been employed to allow production of a large number of tokens rather quickly.

Given the numbers of finds of tokens and souvenirs through Europe, I personally believe that there would not have been someone who specifically just made these tokens. If there was, they would have most likely only done it as a part time thing, specifically for a coming event. They might be a jeweller, though the skills required such as a steady hand, artistic flare and patience mean that it really could have been anyone, much like it is in the SCA.

The quality of the carved moulds varies greatly which seems to indicate to me that some might have been jewellers who are skilled in carving, whilst other moulds are rather rudimentry and might have been made by some other person with suitable carving skill.

There are indications that numerous moulds of the same pieces were made, though there isn’t much evidence as to whether this was to replace moulds that broke, or wore out, or was to speed up production. My guess is they were made to speed up production, as most souvenirs would have had a limited window of opportunity such as an event or such.

In my practical experience I’m guessing that production was either done in stages, with quality control between stages. With child labour not being an issue, I’m guessing that the work would have been broken up between various workers, one pouring the molten metal, one collecting those castings and checking whether they were acceptable, then possibly clipping off the excess, and possibly even one worker finishing off by cleaning up the piece to a sale-able item. The use of a second and even third worker here makes the process one that can continue at a reasonable rate.

In pouring the casting I believe that there would have been no waiting for the button to cool, the caster would have poured in molten metal, waited a second or two, then poured back out the molten button before it completely set. Through experience when casting tokens and small flat items the first second or two is enough to have the actual item needed set within the mould, and the button is just excess metal that would be better suited back in the pot to continue the casting process. It’s also quicker to pour this back into the pot whilst it’s still molten rather that let the button cool, cut it off then have to re-melt it. This would be a key to producing large numbers of castings, and having a second person to do quality control means that the person pouring the castings can just keep churning them out, whilst the other person is sorting and throwing bad castings straight back into the pot whilst they are still hot.

Here ends my theories and suppositions… If you have opinions please feel free to comment.

Mar
0

Continued Arrow making…

Yippee!  A mate loaned me his 6 slot arrow making jig for a couple of days, so I managed to get 20 arrows fletched for Festival with yesterday and todays efforts. 

Today I also finally got to use the fletches I made at New Years with Cate in Polit.  They look great on the shafts, and whilst they aren’t quite finished yet, I hope to have them all ready to use at Festival.

I have also experimented with standard precut feather fletches, and making them look more period by stripping the first and last 10-12 mm from the spine and binding them in place.  Makes them look slightly more period, but you can still tell they are precut. 

Shall edit later and add photo’s…

Mar
2

Ahhhh, the feeling of the wind through my head…

Yes…  From one ear to the other….

This afternoon whilst doing other bits and pieces around the house, I decided that I wasn’t going to participate in the worlds greatest Shave after all, and shaved my head.  Does that make sense?  Some may say not, so let me tell you the whole story…

In November I decided that I was going to participate, so I sent them Leukaemia Foundation an email asking when the official site was up and running and what they could do to help me as I wanted to do some fun stuff building up to it.  They were all keen for it and  told me I could sign up and start advertising.  Early in December I went to update my “My Shave Page” only to find that I couldn’t get in.  Seems that when they told me that I could sign up, the website wasn’t ready properly and when they updated the whole things properly, they deleted my password.  This was fine, I thought it was a simple thing to fix…  But turns out that it takes them almost 3 months to fix a little password issue.  In this they continued to tell me all about how I could raise money for them.  Thing is, I had a plan, and their IT Support staff were the only ones stopping it.  Stupid thing was, I told them what the issue was multiple times, but it was just a low priority, so in turn me trying to get sponsorship became a low priority.   After all…  Yes, I know that fundraising isn’t an easy job, but the idea of a group getting together to do these large ones is to make it so easy for people that they

And here we are today…  two weeks out from the Shave weekend, and I have no sponsors, and no longer any real interest in getting any.  I also had a head of hair that I had been growing specifically for the purpose of making money when it came to shaving, which was now quite surplus to requirement.  So off it came today….  and Ahhhhh  I feel so much better.

Shame it didn’t work out…  But Meh!  It feels so much better with out the hair. ;)

Mar
0

Ahhhh, Arrow making!

Today I went down to Woolongong to a friends place to make arrows…  Lots and lots of arrows were made…  though I didn’t quite get to finish the ones I wanted to…  Guess I’ll have to do that tomorrow.  Mmmmm  Target arrows for Festival…  think I might just hide at the Archery butts all Festival…  Well…  When I’m not drinking ginger beer that is. :)

Oh, today is also my birthday….  Happy birthday to me, I guess… ;)  Yes, birthdays are something I’m rather apathetic about…