Interested in Joining an Ancient Woodworking Project?

could you just make a numbered kit
and send it to me
i used to be able to paint by numbers lol

seriously
thank you mike
i think it is a great idea
will we learn to make our own plane too
that would be great for many of us

and maybe someone with the proper wood
might be able to sell us some
for those of us that don’t have it

-- david - only thru kindness can this world be whole . If we don't succeed we run the risk of failure. Dan Quayle

Are you sure we can’t just buy these tools someplace? Mads???????

-- Homer : "Oh, and how is education supposed to make me feel smarter? Besides, every time I learn something new, it pushes some old stuff out of my brain."

Hi Mike,
I sign in.
It will be interesting to learn, someting new and old.
Since I’m a complete idiot I have no doubt I will make a bucket that will hold nothing but my word, but if this is good enough, I will join you.
I hope it will be by the net since my money are small, so I can not travel to Norway now.
Best thoughts and thank you for this exelent idea and offer.
Mads
Kelly, this is where I have to spank you in public! The answer is no! There will be no shortcuts here.

-- Mad F, the fanatical rhykenologist and vintage architect. Democraticwoodworking.

Homer – the first step to failure is trying! heheh
if this opportunity is what i imagine it to be, it’s a grøtambar!! (well for me :))
count me in!
i imagine some instructions, but not so specific as to take away the personal aspect :)
look forward to it mike!!! seriously!

-- Flemming. It's only a mistake if you can't fix it.

Do you have the Willow or Mountain Ash branches? they would be my short comming.
Did you say that the bottom would be held with dowells?
I have a coopers plane that I collected that was made to cut the bottom ring in a barrel to hold the bottom boards.
I assume the whole thing is made of green wood and soaked to expand and seal all jionts.
I am vice pres of a woodworking club and have tried several to get these guys to do a challenge project at least 3 times a year, but there is little interest.

Mads- I have to buy the tools or I can’t build the bucket. And yes, you can spank me… LOLOLOLOLOL
Surely I can buy those tools someplace? Jigsaw John wants to use a plane and not dowels…........... so I want to buy the tools….... PLEASSEEE

-- Homer : "Oh, and how is education supposed to make me feel smarter? Besides, every time I learn something new, it pushes some old stuff out of my brain."

Hi Mike
I think it is a great offer and would be interested in participating. i have a couple of miles of a creek bottom loaded with willows that I will ante up for anyone that needs some when the time comes.
A tutorial led by you, that advanced maybe at a week a step, with participants posting a picture of progress would help keep everyone up to date. Good luck organizing. I still have the reel plans in the background for a future project.
Jeff in MT

David Here is your kit. Please note that the numbers are denoted by the number of dots you see on each stave. However, the kit you see there is dated to 1050AD and we don’t have anything newer in stock. So you might want to make your own parts to insure the quality.

““

Rivergirll Not to worry. You can do this! Also, you can cheat a lot, but I don’t recommend it since you will learn nothing new. Half the fun is making the tools.

Mads We all know that you are definitely not an idiot, complete or not.

Flemming There are no rules as they would be unenforceable anyway. It’s up to you to do it however you want, but once again I hope you will do it the hard way for enjoyment and a great learning experience.

John I have Mountain Ash in my yard and my MIL has some willow at her place. I will try to suggest some alternatives before we get started. It would be preferable to use dry wood for everything but the bindings which should be soaked in water before use. That way the staves will swell when exposed to water and the. bindings which should be put on as tight as possible will shrink while the staves swell giving a very tight bucket. The bottom is made-up of several boards (3 for example) with dowels to keep them aligned like for for a tabletop glue-up. There are also dowels between the staves. The bottom will fit in a groove around the inside of the staves. The first photo shows the details.

Jeff Good to hear from you! Your suggestions were pretty much along the lines that I was thinking. I would like to see if others like that approach.

My thanks to all of you who have responded thus far. I’m going to bed now as it is midnight here, and I will check for new comments tomorrow morning and try to answer any further questions. Have a nice evening everybody!

-- Mike, American in Norway

I am new here and this is a project that looks to be well beyond my capabilities, However I have more resources than anyone in 400 BC and since my passion is doing things that no one else does; this is right up my alley. I’m In.

-- Trying to find an answer to my son’s question: “…and forming organic cellulose by spinning it on its axis is interesting, why?”

1059 AD

Wow this project is taking you long enough.

Norm could do it in 30 minutes. :)

I’m up for it, could be fuin.

Jamie

-- Who is the happiest of men? He who values the merits of others, and in their pleasure takes joy, even as though 'twere his own. --Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Interesting idea Mike…
I watched a Roy Underhill episode many years ago in which his guest was a Master Cooper. During the show, he constructed an oaken bucket in much the same way as you’re describing, but it took him significantly more tools than you’re allowing!! LOL
They included a shaving horse, concave and convex planes and drawknives, and a special Routing plane for cutting the groove (which was actually more like a furrow) for the bottom of the bucket, much like Jigsaw John described above. He even had a huge sort of stand-up floor plane, for jointing the staves together!! He pushed the staves down the plane, rather than pushing the plane over the staves… It had to be 4’ tall, an antique “cordless” jointer!!
He had iron hoops too, but they were only used for construction purposes, and were replaced lastly by Willow…
It was a long time ago, but I found it interesting that while they worked, they were discussing wine barrels that had recently been discovered in a Spanish shipwreck off the coast of Virginia. They were real “hogshead” barrels,
weighing over 600 lbs., but were still sound after sitting on the ocean bottom for some 400 years!! Of course, I don’t know whether anyone sampled the contents, but I thought that was pretty remarkable… An iron-hooped barrel would have disintegrated in a very short time…
I haven’t the tools for this challenge, nor the know-how to make them, but I’ll be very interested to see what this clever group can come up with!! Good Luck!!

-- Mike in Concord, NH---Unpleasant tasks are simply worthy challenges to improve skills.

Every time I open up LJs it’s another challenge. I’m already falling behind. For the last three weeks I can hardly keep up with what’s going on because of my job. Yeah sure I would be interested but I don’t know if I can scrape up the time. I don’t know if I can do it. How do you do this? What do you need? How long will it take? At 60 years old I don’t even know if I’ll be around long enough to complete it. Hell fire, I ain’t even completed rivergirl’s tool box. So what is this all about? It sounds interesting.

-- If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away. Henry David Thoreau

Hi Mike, Glad to see you are getting a positive response.

-- "some old things are lovely, warm still with life ... of the forgotten men who made them." - D.H. Lawrence Wake Up America!! Please read; http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/01/26-0

Looks great, I’d love to participate in this.

-- Rob, Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario

“To have a little fun and laughter.” Now I can handle that one. We need a little fun and laughter around here. :)

”*HOW WOULD THE GROUP FUNCTION?
I would like to hear your comments on that.”

Most likely it would be utter chaos, but that would lend itself to to the “fun and laughter” if the group was a bunch of of light hearted crazy excentric people who wanted to build a wooden bucket that might take weeks when all you’d have to do is get in your truck and go to the hardware and buy a perfectly sound bucket far 12 bucks that would probably hold all of the beer that you could drink in several days unless you got a little tipsy and accidently knocked it over while having fun. I would still be interested – I don’t have time and maybe not even the know how – but, hey, I am a crazy excentric – so I guess I’m partially qualified. I’ll just wait and see what the others have to say and what becomes of this before I commit myself to such a crazy scheme. :)

-- If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away. Henry David Thoreau