home made christmas present

[neralich]

I learned through trial and error and also through a series of books called The best of CHIPS. It covers so many useful articles by many different knappers. Most of it is eay to comprehend. I also bought a few videos,,ugh,,,VCR tapes. (Along time ago, lol)
Now you can get on youtube and learn just about any aspect of it in a matter of minutes.

Here is a link that you can find the books (scroll down about halfway)
I consider them to be the bible to self-taught flintknapping.

A bit expensive, but worth every penny,imo. Chock full of interesting reading.

Mound Builder Books ~ Products

For cheap/free practice material (if you can find it) Porcelain from toilets!
Also floor tile... I score the peices with glass cutter and snap to manageable sizes.
I usually use percussion on the tile cuz it's kinda tough, esp removing the material on the backside. Home depots/lowes sometimes will have boxes/buckets of broke tile they will sell super cheap and some of it resmbles natural stone/chert.

Also, if you have any broke in half preforms/bifaces of heat treated burlington,,Aw, man, does it knap like a peice of cake!!!

If you want, send me address and I'll hook you up with some high grade natural and heat treated Burlington. I haven't much experience with materials beyond all I've mentioned here, so maybe someone else will recommend something worth spending the money on. I suspect the rootbeer flint from TX would be worth buying!

[willybee]

knapping is a lot of fun and very addictive. its so easy a caveman could do it.

i learned from watching youtube and lots of trial and error. you can knap some nice stuff just by pressure flaking with a large ishi stick. i use a small section of escalator belt in my palm for knapping and a 22 inch flexible delrin ishi stick with a pin vice in the tip that holds 4 inch long copper nails.

the trick for running long flakes is using your legs for extra power. in a sitting position instead of knapping into your palm ON your lap, place the backs of your wrists against the inside of your knees.

squeeze your knees together as you take the flake-- for even longer and wider flakes lock your feet together and you can really bear down on it.

i knapped this large obsidian point last month when i was having no luck finding arrowheads. its knapped from a slab of tri-flow obsidian from california. i call it a CALFTON--calf creek deep notches and an afton blade.



this flake scar in the middle measures 1.75 inches long, and 1/2 inch wide at its bottom. i took this pressure flake using my knees with feet hooked.



the hardest part is not breaking it lengthwise-its only 1/4 inch thick-





although obsidian and glass are relatively easy to work with, they are by far much more dangerous than other types of stone. i would recommend dacite slabs for beginners-that stuff is like BUTTER and is not as dangerous as glass or obsidian.

neolithics dot com would be the website to get any stone from. its the best on the net.

willy

[gregory84]

Thanks willy, I need to either order or make an ishi stick, and I'm leaning towards making some copper tools also. As of now all I am using is antler and hammerstones which aren't the best on the thin glass I have to work with, not at this point anyway, maybe down the road. I haven't decided between dacite, novaculite or burlington if I do order some. Jason has been kind enough to send some burlington my way to play with and see how I like it, so as soon as I receive it and play around a little I will be a little closer to deciding. Thanks for all of the advice guys.

[gregory84]

Also awesome " Calfton" willy that thing is beautiful. I think that is one of the things that is such a big draw to knapping. You can make your own one off fantasy points.

[neralich]

Nice peice, Willy! I have about 4 Ishi sticks that I made from old pool sticks,,,I anticipated liking them so much I'd want more than one. Well, I just haven't been able to get use to them. I don't think I'm doing it right,,Think I need to watch someone,,,Any good youtube vids that demonstrate it that you know of???

Pretty sure you will like the Burlington, gregory84!

[willybee]

jason-
the best knapping videos on youtube are by paleomanjim. i have watched most of his vids-check out the one where he harvests a trailerload of pedernales flint from the banks of the pedernales river.

willy

[neralich]

Originally Posted by willybee

jason-
the best knapping videos on youtube are by paleomanjim. i have watched most if his vids-check out the one where he harvests a trailerload of pedernales flint from the banks of the pedernales river.

willy

Checked some of his vids. Great stuff and found some of him using the Ishi stick.

I understand a lil better now,,,As you explain in your previous post,,,It's your legs that do the work. I'll have to practice the technique again.

Thanks, man

[Rockit Man]

interesting/ informative thread... nice work by all, thanks for sharing.