Tim's lost pictures....

It's interesting as there seems to be two different styles of shaving horses. One is like as shown in Jim's pics with a cross bar to grab the workpiece. The other style is more like a hammer head, which might be slightly more limiting on length of the workpiece that can be shaved. I am building the hammer head style right now, but I can see where the cross bar style might be a little more suited to furniture builders.

The hammer head may make it easier to get the stock in and out, this is for long stock such as canoe paddles and axe handles and such. For pegs I like the set up I use. In a "real" shop one should have both styles. I hardly use the hammer head with legs I have, and it is hard to drag into the kitchen.

Tim

Hey, thats not the way we are suppose to stack timber. Are you introducing camber into some 8X?

Are those shavings too green for tinder?

Oh and that is a cool horse. I always start in the background when I look at pictures. I saw somebody's foot too.

Mo, are you making fun of my stack of timber? Photo shop will fix it right up. When I want to introduce camber into a timber I use the sawmill and chase the shape of the log with the band, most every frame has one or more of these.

My daughter's foot. It doesn't take long for them to dry enough to kindle a fire, sometime the same day but usually a few days is enough.

Thanks, Jim.

Tim

I have never seen pins driven through a die in an old frame. My impression is it is a more southerly technique (such as Pennsylvania), and for bridge builders in the second half of the 19th century.

I have seen one frame with turned pins from c. 1855 in New Hampshire.

There are three types of horses. This one is in the collection of the Davistown Museum here in Maine. It is made of maple. I made two like it of red oak, but I have a problem with the pegs slipping out from under the head. I nailed some leather under the head but it still needs work.

http://www.davistownmuseum.org/pics/tab1012.jpg

Horses are useful for making tool handles and for scarfing clapboards. I also use mine as a workbench to saw boards on.

Jim

A long while back we used to make thousands of pegs a year, mostly for other framers (a gig we sort of inherited from the Timber Bee) I busted the blanks, from billets cut from veneer grade butts, (in our regional case, pignut hickory because there is no real market for it here, and it can be had for short money) then stacked the blanks crib-like crosshatched to dry and shrink (one of the surprising aspects of this thread for me was the green wood thing, I want them dry for the same reason, to my mind a dry pin will act as a spring in the drawbore, a green one will just take a set and dry bent) for a week to ten, Then it was usually Molly riding the shaving horse - The final tally of all three ops, had us spitting out a pin on an average of every eight minutes.

At that, a peg cost more than most folks were willing to pay, so we now only make what we need. The only drawback being we don't need to buy strait clear butts with any regularity, so no logger is putting them aside on the landing for me anymore, so they're a bit harder to get when I do need one. That said, I still prefer to go that route, I want quick strait grained pegs not expensive kindling.

A really good Froe is a hard thing to find and a joy to use, a bad one is just hard to use. In my experience it should be wedge shaped top to bottom, not be simple flat stock with a bevel ground into one side like a cut edge.

Jim – I too have only found turned pegs in two historical barns, though turned 1” pegs are found relatively commonly in bridges, and specialty lathes to turn them were produced in fair numbers by various companies, sold primarily to bridgewrights and boatyards.

Brad - That head style is known as a “Dumbhead” I've built several of each type over the years, and prefer the “Bodgers” head.

Interesting, I seem to be the only one using a die to finish the pegs to size.
The dies work very well to ensure the pegs are the same size. If I come across a tight peg in use it is not because the peg is too big.

Thane

Will, I was implying to make the peg green for easier shaving. It can be dry when you go to put it in. They seem to dry fairly quickly after you're done.

Thane, how about a pic, or better yet a video?

Will, I am in need of a good froe for this purpose. Gransfors sells one, but the website doesn't give any info on it's construction. I've seen a couple of other on ebay- new made from flat stock with ground edge, antique I've seen are too rough a condition and not useable or are too short.

Since we are on the subject, how long of a blade on a froe do you need for splitting blanks? Is 12.5 inches long enough? Also, how do you know you have a veneer grade piece before you start splitting? Do you just see that there are no knots and no discernible twist in the bark, and then do your first split to see what the grain looks like?