Nessmuk Knives

Okay, I've wanted a Nessmuk knife since I started reading his turn-of-the-century articles on ultra-light camping and canoeing when I was in my early teens. George "Nessmuk" Sears wrote about a three-edge system that covered all of the tasks that come with camping and travelling for extended periods. He suggested a good multi-blade pocketknife of the stockman pattern, a curved fixed-blade knife of his own design, and a small double-bit hatchet.

The fixed-blade knife became known as a "Nessmuk" knife. It served primarily for skinning and cooking duties. The hatchet went to heavier cutting, especially brush or wood-gathering, and the stockman handled the rest.

A couple of weeks ago I finally got my hands on a custom Nessmuk. I found it on that electronic bazaar ebay, a beautiful Jeff White cherry-handled, high-carbon masterpiece. It came out of the shipping box wickedly sharp, and thus far has proved a most useful kitchen knife.

With any luck, I'll get to try out its skinning capabilities in a couple of weeks.

An Itty-Bitty Dream House

So For the past couple of weeks the Missus and I have been scheming to build ourselves a little house on the farm I own in Mercer County. We had tried to leverage the loan last year, but getting loans last spring was tricky at best, and despite both of us being well-employed and reliable folks, we just couldn't swing the loan, mostly because it was a construction loan, not a mortgage, (I intend to build the house myself) and the bank wanted a licensed contractor to do the work. I was in construction for a decade and a half, and I know what I'm doing. By building myself, I'll save a chunk on the finished house (nearly 40-50%).

So, this spring we're going to try again. I've been talking to a more understanding banker, and he tells me that the farm will collateralize the construction loan, even if I am the builder, and there shouldn't be any problem at all. I own the farm outright (60 or so acres) and the farm values at roughly twice what I'll need to borrow.

So, new bank, new year, and hopefully a new house.

I spent today roughing out an architectural model from the floorplans and elevation drawings (entirely my own design and drawing). Here are a couple of photos of the rough. I'll post more pix as I move the model closer to completion, and if all goes well, you'll get blogs about me building this jewel come May.

From Fritz in Afghanistan

From Fritz in Afghanistan:

"We finally have a reliable connection for outgoing mail, so I thought I would write a few letters before the mail trucks begin getting bombed. It really sucks out here; all we do is drive around and get blown up. A roadside bomb hit my truck about a month ago, but I walked away with only a concussion. The bomb was 60 pounds of HME, and the blast ripped the back axle clear away from the 'mine-resistant' truck. Every day my hatred for this place deepens. In January it got well below freezing at night, and now the noon temperatures push 140, while the nighttime temps drop to 110. I've been away from running water and electricity for months. We take baby-wipe baths every few days. When any of us get blown up, if we survive, we get to use the sat-phone for 15 minutes. I should be leaving this place in two months or so. I can't wait to get out of here. How are things back in Kentucky? We are literally cut off from the rest of the world here. I hope this letter finds you in good health and spirits."

Fritz

A VERY pleasant surprise

So, I've been trying to buy American. It isn't easy. Today, I went to the gun show in Lexington, and had a great time. I stopped by a knife booth that carried Kershaw knives. Now, I love Kershaw knives. They are, hands down, the best production knives made. They are manufactured by Kai Cutlery of Japan, which doesn't fit my buy-American resolution, but I love the Kershaw Ken Onion designed "Leek" model. It's clean, efficient, and surgically sharp. Everything I want in a knife. I wanted the plain model, but the seller - from my native Harrodsburg no less! - was out, left only with models sporting various decorations.

I chose the model with an American flag on the handle - something I love dearly - and commented to the seller on the irony of buying a Japanese knife with an American flag logo.


He smiled, turned the knife over, and showed me the "Made in USA" tag on the blade. No kidding. My favorite knife is made right here at home. Kai holds the patents involved, but at least some of the Leeks are made domestically. I got exactly what I wanted and got to support an American manufacturer and a small-business entrepreneur from my hometown.

What a fantastic day!

Home-made fly-tying vise

Sure, I could buy a fly-tying vise, but why would I? I'm cheap, and I'm a tinkerer. I'd rather make one. More importantly, I need to find uses for some of the junk my relentless scavenging/salvaging produces. I'll admit it; I'm a hoarder. Other, sensible, folks (including my wife) see junk for what it is: crap that gets in the way and needs to be disposed of. I, however, see a potential tool or widget waiting to be born. To protect my reputation as an eccentric (not a lunatic) I need to put some of my salvaged junk to use every so often. This was an opportunity.

I have about a dozen sets of hemostats I picked up at a gun show for 8 bucks - after a little haggling... I chose one of the short-nosed sets with an exceptionally stout spring. There's my vise. Next, I needed a way to fasten them to the top of my desk in a stable fashion. I scrounged an old footless clamp used to hold an architect's lamp to a table top out of the trash on an afternoon walk last fall. My wife rarely accompanies me on these walks. I can't fathom why. I also salvaged the non-functional lamp. The lamp needed re-wiring, which took me an hour. Rather than use the included-in-the-garbage clamp base, I made one of a block of wood that I screwed to my workbench.





The footless clamp was ideal, except that had no bottom screw-foot, and was not made to hold a hemostat. I made a non-scuff foot by soldering a flat-washer to a short section of brass tubing that will slip over the screw shank. I then had, for all intents and purposes, an aluminum C-Clamp.




Next I filled in the tube in the spine with epoxy and a wood dowel.

The next step involved cutting the loop from one side of the hemostats.




Afterward, I drilled the lamp base to admit both tines of the cut hemostat handle. Notice that I also notched the top of the tube. This gave me three points of contact between hemostat and base, making the attachment quite sturdy.

I epoxied the hemostat to the base and let it cure overnight. I finished the affair off with a coat of black paint to the base and a swatch of adhesive-backed felt to keep the base from scuffing my table top.



I've used it to tie a dozen or so new flies, and I'm pretty satisfied with it. I only hope my flies work as well...

Rifle / Pistol Cleaning Kit.

I've already written a short bit on modifying gun cleaning kits to have a straight wood handle as opposed to the horrible plastic T handle. This next bit is about making a storage tube for the new, streamlined kit. This is simple.

Take a cardboard poster mailing tube (my wife orders the occasional poster for her classroom, so these are in no short supply at my house) and cut it to the length of the longest rod, leaving about 3/4 of an inch extra for the cap and space. The cap on one end is usually stapled securely in place, and the other end taped. Cut from the taped end.





After cutting to length, seal the freshly cut end by running a band of plastic packing tape around the tube, leaving 1/2 inch or so overlapping past the end of the tube.





Cut the overhanging tape into 1/2 strips, then fold them over, sticking them to the inside of the tube. This helps keep the business end of the tube from fraying so quickly.





That's all there is to it. A 1 1/2 inch tube will hold a pistol rod and 3-piece rifle rod, with room left over for brushes, jags, and patch loops. Best of all? It takes up very little room in my range box.

Jim Moyer Knife maker

I like this guy. He reminds me of my Dad. Jim is a knife maker in Idaho City, Idaho, and he turns out some of the prettiest damn knives I've ever seen. His work is art, pure and functional. His video is such a pleasure to see, because it's a rare treat in life to be able to watch a craftsman ply his trade.

The best thing about Jim? There's no b.s. in him. He isn't a "bladesmith," "armourer," or some other such foolishness. He's a knife-maker. He's been a knife-maker most of his life. He's one of those happy men who takes pride in his work, and rightly so.

I could order a knife from him by phone - I love that he doesn't sell many knives on the Internet! and I may do just that after the gun shows this weekend and next. In any case, I want to see him work firsthand. Watching Jim make knives - watching a man of his skill work - is an experience one only gets a handful of times in life.

In short, I'm going to Idaho this summer, just to spend a day or two around his shop. I'll bet I can learn more in two days of watching Jim work than I could learn from reading a hundred books on the subject.

In the meantime, enjoy his video!

Watch this video on VideoSurf or see more Steel (The Twilight Videos or Blade Videos

If I were President...

Ugh. I should be in politics. There are days I feel like the last man in America with any measure of common sense. Let's fix the economy in three easy steps, ready?

1. Reduce the tax burden on American corporations. If they have more money, they'll expand, hire, and pay dividends to stockholders.

2. Create an American-made friendly marketplace by taxing the hell out of imported goods. This levels the field so the American worker can earn a decent wage and compete with the 12-cents-a-day sweatshop workers in China.

3. Rethink many of our bloated social-welfare programs. I've seen too many healthy people drawing SSI disability. It makes me physically sick. I'm not talking about people so physically or mentally damaged that they are incapable of working, but the losers milking the system.

Welfare, foodstamps, etc. (everything but Social Security and Medicare) should be considered TEMPORARY arrangements, a little help until the individual can get his/her life together and become a productive citizen. My Dad had polio. He couldn't walk without a leg brace and walking sticks. He worked every day of his life (most of it in construction) until he retired at 60. I have zero patience for the belly-achers who do nothing but wait for the first of the month and their government check.

Will my three little steps fix everything? No. But it would be a dandy start.

It's time for us, as Americans, to collectively suck it up and get moving. The alternative is to give away everything those who came before us worked so hard to build and earn. Wow, there are two words I don't hear much these days.

Pure Classic: (The ad and the rifle)

Printable Targets

Here are three printable targets. They're simple affairs, but simple often works. Click on the image to get the full-size printable target. These are pixel-shaded, so they're photocopier friendly, which I believe to be cheaper than buying pre-printed targets.

The Resurrected Henry Rifle Company : An American Legend

So, I'm liking the Henry Rifle Attitude. Here are two of their newer ads. I love the notion "They get made here or not at all." A Henry U.S. Survival is definitely in my near future :)




I also like the ads themselves; they remind me of the best gun ads that used to appear in magazines like National Geographic and Field and Stream.

Ode to Plaid Redux

An Ode to Plaid

Oh plaid,

How you comfort me.

You are a non-glowing,

Satisfyingly earth-toned,

Never neon,

Un-guy-liner-ed,

Not-pastel,

Why-yes-this-is-a-BELT,

Symbol of my status

As a man.

I will wear shirts of you year round

with white tees underneath,

and adorn the pockets with the finest inexpensive pens.

I will cherish you in weather hot and cold.

I will seek out and purchase handkerchiefs

Cut from your cloth,

And tuck them away in my pocket

For the little emergencies.

I will celebrate your perfection

By carrying my plaid lunchbox

And plaid Thermos

To work,

Filled with bologna sandwiches

And Beenie Weenies,

Or the occasional can

Of Potted Meat (with saltine crackers).

Happily bygone are the days of salads

Or apples

Or low-MSG foods.

I will associate only with other of your faithful,

Consorting with well-groomed men

Of uncertain age

And hostile disposition

In restaurants and bars,

stores and malls,

Complaining of the ignorant masses

Who’ve yet to discover your subtle joys,

The constancy of your fashion sense,

The eternal un-hipness of you.

I will seek high office

So I can redesign our state flag,

In adoring homage to you -

A glorious plaid field

With a rifle and burning cigarette (rampant)

In the foreground.

And in the evening,

I will don pajama pants of you,

In pleasing blues.

And sleep like the man I am,

Snoring,

Farting,

Drooling,

Blissfully dreaming of shooting small furry animals,

Until dawn graces the East.

How greed got us here

I've been mulling over something I said in a previous post; that I missed high-quality, American-made outdoor gear. I still miss it, but I've been chewing over why it isn't made anymore. I think I have an answer. We're greedy. I don't mean to sound preachy, because I'm just as guilty as the next guy (or gal).

When I think about my parents and grandparents, and the things I inherited from them, I realize that the precious heirlooms I've inherited are especially precious because they were relatively few. Simply put, my parents and grandparents didn't accumulate "stuff" they way I and most of my contemporaries do. Let's face it; as modern Americans, we're addicted to "more."

I'll give an example. My Dad owned a good shotgun, two good rifles, and two good pistols. They're still the prize pieces of my collection (and the reason I invested in a really good gun-safe). In my lifetime, I've owned close to a thousand guns. I buy junkers, clean them up, get them working, make them presentable again, then trade them off. I like trading junk guns, because I like tinkering on them, and I get real satisfaction from restoring old, unloved things. Beyond my constant rotation of junkers, I own several nice rifles, pistols, and shotguns, and I'm always looking to buy more. I collect them, you see.

Dad was happy with the guns he used. I own guns I've not even fired yet. Here's where this mentality gets me into trouble; I have some rifles I've not yet put scopes on. To get scopes on all of them on my budget, I'll have to go to cheaper scopes - that means imports. If I owned fewer rifles, I could upscale to nice American-made Leupolds (I have 3 Leupolds, and two of them are on Dad's old rifles, and one on a rifle he gave me for my fourteenth birthday.)

Like most folks, I don't earn an astronomical sum. Nor am I independently wealthy. My own greed gets me more guns, but not the beautiful pieces like Dad owned.

This same mentality follows me everywhere; more is better. I see it in my fellows too. We are a society of collectors. If we all agreed to buy fewer inferior foreign goods, and more quality American goods, we'd all be better off, right? It seems like this approach would create more American manufacturing jobs. It would certainly keep more of our money in our economy.

Starting now, I'm going to try this. I'm going to try to buy American as often as possible. We'll see how this works out for me. Perhaps I won't get depressed looking at labels like the one on my El-cheapo Simmons rifle scope (A Wal-Mart special). It says "Designed and Engineered in the U.S.A. - Manufactured in China." Maybe holding out like this will help me spend less, accumulate less, and feel better.

I'll keep you updated.

When technology runs amok

I'm a simple guy. Bells and whistles are occasionally useful, but mostly they just clutter up otherwise useful tools or space. Simpler is often better. I got a new gun cleaning kit last Christmas. A loving relative bought it at the Wal-mart, and I've used it for the past year.

It sucks. The spindly-ass brass-ish rod has popped apart on me at least half a dozen times. It came in it's own little aluminum briefcase that takes up too much room in my range box. It's a puzzle to assemble the thing; it has more fittings, adapters, and parts than a respectable plumber's toolbox, and at the end of a day's shooting, it feels like junk.

I hit a local sporting goods store today and bought a good, old-fashioned aluminum pistol rod and a 3 piece take-down rifle rod, both made by Hoppe's. Dad cleaned his guns with Hoppe's products, and they worked well.

The problem is that they still have the obnoxious swivel "T" handles. These seem like a good idea on paper, but are marginally useful at best, and suck to store. I fixed that. I took my brand new cleaning rods and cut the T-handles off. I replaced them with short sections of poplar dowel rod, making straight handles like the ones on screwdrivers.

I epoxied the rods into my new handles, and then cross-drilled the handles, pinning the rods firmly into place. Since I didn't want to puzzle over which was the pistol rod and which was the first section of the rifle rod, I made the rifle rod's handle a good inch longer. I finished them by sealing them with several coats of tung oil.

They're sturdy, simple, and drop into my range box, taking up less room than a flashlight. They also look home-made. Some of my best tools, my sturdiest, best-designed, most-often-used tools are the ones Dad made when he didn't have exactly what he needed. These mean more to me than anything I could go buy. My new cleaning rods fall into that category, and I love the way they look. I feel a little manlier for owning something so low-tech.

Here is the simple replacement and the original puzzle (The T-handle pistol rod is made up of 5 pieces, and that's not counting the brush/jag/mop that screws onto the end; my new rod is one-piece.)



My new philosophy? When I can't find exactly what I want, I'll just make it.

An Ode to Plaid

MicrosoftInternetExplorer4

Oh plaid,

How you comfort me.

You are a non-glowing,

Satisfyingly earth-toned,

Never neon,

Un-guy-liner-ed,

Not-pastel,

Why-yes-this-is-a-BELT,

Symbol of my status

As a man.

I will wear shirts of you year round.

I will cherish you in weather hot and cold.

I will wear you with a white tee underneath,

And adorn your pockets with the finest pens.

I will seek out and purchase handkerchiefs

Cut from your cloth,

And tuck them away in my pocket

For the little emergencies.

I will celebrate your perfection

By carrying my plaid lunchbox

And plaid Thermos

To work,

Filled with bologna sandwiches

And Beenie Weenies,

Or the occasional can

Of Potted Meat (with saltine crackers).

Happily bygone are the days of salads

Or apples

Or low-MSG foods.

I will associate only with other of your faithful,

Consorting with well-groomed men

Of uncertain age

And hostile disposition

In restaurants and bars, stores and malls,

Complaining of the ignorant masses

Who’ve yet to discover your subtle joys,

The constancy of your fashion-sense,

The eternal un-hipness of you.

I will seek high office

So I can redesign our state flag,

In adoring homage to you -

A glorious plaid field

With a rifle and burning cigarette (rampant)

In the foreground.

And in the evening,

I will don pajama pants of you,

In pleasing blues.

And sleep like the man I am,

Snoring,

Farting,

Drooling,

Blissfully dreaming of shooting small furry animals,

Until dawn graces the East.

Restoration and Modification of my Remington 511 Scoremaster

About 3 years ago I bought a little Remington 511 Scoremaster .22 bolt action. I paid 75.00 at the time, intending to refinish and update the little rifle. Time and life interceded, but I finally made the time to rework it over the past week. I ground the stock down quite a bit. The factory Walnut was shaped like a club, an ugly club actually.

I'm sure that in the past, the Inuit used 511 stocks to bludgeon baby seals. It needed help.




I used a Makita random orbital sander and 80 grit pads to do the rough cutting, and a Dremel tool with a course sanding drum to do some of the contouring. I began by cutting away much of the bottom of the stock, from the magazine plate forward, leaving the last 3 inches intact.




After course cutting the height of the stock's fore-end, I thinned the sides of the fore-end from the magazine plate forward. I used the Dremel to cut a contour channel on each side of the intact know at the end of the stock, bringing the contour to a rough point, and shaping the stock's tip to something resembling an arrowhead. Afterwards, I I deepened the pistol grip to a more comfortable shape. I went back to the Makita, switched to 120 grit pads, and finished grinding the schnabel fore-end and smoothing the worst of my sanding marks out of the rest of the stock.




I finished the stock prep by hand-sanding with 330 grit paper, making sure to remove all of the previous sanding marks. I rounded out with medium steel wool.

I plugged the old swivel-stud hole in the fore-end, and moved the stud back to behind the schnabel.

I left the stock in its natural color, and finished with 12 coats of Formby's Tung Oil, buffing with 0000 steel wool between coats, and allowing 24 hours drying time between coats. Here are the end results.




My next trick is to drill and tap the receiver for a scope, and I'm considering cutting and crowning the barrel to get rid of the front blade sight.


The rifle's bluing was still good, age-browned, but even.

Collecting Field Gear

I'll readily admit to having some curmudgeonly habits, and I'll just as freely confess that I am becoming my father in a terrifying day-by-day upward spiral (I would say downward spiral, but I liked my Dad and believe I'm evolving, not devolving).

Lately my discontent has fallen upon two things; the dearth of quality American-made outdoor gear, and the seemingly endless tide of inferior overseas-made stuff being imported these days.

Don't get me wrong, I love usable 7.00 pocketknives as much as the next guy, and there is a freedom in using a cheap knife unavailable to those who shell out 50.00 or more for a quality knife; I don't cry if I shatter the blade of an imported cheapie. Neither am I suggesting that all imported goods are inferior to American-made wares; that's just ludicrous. I am saying, unequivocally, that I miss the era of high-quality American-made field gear. There are still some holdouts and renegades making good stuff with American hands, W.R. Case knives comes to mind, but even the venerable Marbles knives sent the production of their knives overseas, and is now in bankruptcy.

While Remington still manufactures several models of their rifles domestically, they also now import several new models, and I am uniformly under-impressed with the workmanship of the imports when I compare that workmanship to any of my old Remington 721s or 722s. Ruger still turns out high-quality American-made arms, and I'm an avid fan of both the resurrected Henry Rifle company and Heritage Arms.

All that being said, I have become a fan of the past. I collect older, American-made field gear, including knives and guns. With the older stuff I acquire not only goods of usually higher quality, but I also get the satisfaction of having something that traversed the American woods decades ago. If some of my rifles could talk, they'd surely have amazing tales to tell.

The only downside to picking up these relics is that they often require work to become serviceable again. I enjoy tinkering on things, so this aspect of my collecting is actually something of an asset to me, as I have a ready supply of projects to keep me busy on lazy Sunday afternoons. I'm sure my wife is grateful to get me out of her hair for a few hours on the weekends, and enjoy the run of the house, complete with watching the kind of television programs I complain about.

My advice to other sportsmen? Start collecting some of the old field gear like I do. It's fun, nostalgic, practical, satisfying, and provides the opportunity to at least daydream about being afield on days when the weather won't permit.