Anvils are very expensive, besides bring a large lump of steel, second hand anvils are often quite old, so despite being beat up and damaged they attract a premium. I eventually plan to acquire a new anvil,

I have been experimenting with some locally available plant to extract fibre to make string and rope for fun. I have always been interested in self sufficiency and wondered how rope was made, it is something

I needed a heavy stand to hold an anvil and had some old red gum fence posts and treated pine laying around. The wood grain came up nice after a bit of sanding but I didn’ try to hard as it will get banged

I have been been working on some recipes to make a homemade refractory fire brick. Initially I was building them with sand and clay and they would just crack when I fired them. Then I discovered sodium

A flamingo sleeping maybe, at the Adelaide Zoo. I think there used to emote but one died just recently.

Grass tree in full flower. Hops creeping up a steel pole. Bark on a gum tree.

I have recast the top panel institu and it seems much more successful. No sign of cracking like last time. A toilet roll holder makes a good mould for the burner hole. I tested its heat resistance by using

The refractory set and I successfully stripped out the cardboard mounds. It came out pretty good except for the roof panel, which has cracked a little and is in no way a close enough fit, so will have

I started with a small foundry to melt aluminium, but I have grown out of this for a number of reasons. Firstly summer is here and open charcoal fires don’t mix well in Australia. Also, the refractory

I was cleaning out a part of the yard and deciding what to do with some scrap timber. So I thought I would finally get around to making a gold rocker cradle on a nice Saturday afternoon. I have been

I came across a tiny little busy bee in the garden yesterday, it was buzzing around what we call sour sops here. It had unusual markings on it, not sure if it is a type of native bee but very similar to

Was looking around in the garden and found a fly with iridescent wings sunning itself on a lemon!

I was looking at some bees flying around some flowers in the garden and I noticed this little guy hiding in plain sight. Does anyone out there in steemit land know anything about spiders and what type

Image credi Ok, so here is a wild theory not based on any fact at all, it is pure conjecture! So what if North Korea, being possibly tied up in the dirty side of bitcoin such as money laundering etc, seeing

I came across this old stump that has really interesting patterns in the wood!

Walking through a conservation park at the weekend I came across lots of wildflower, just starting to bloom, Spring is coming! Hakea Grevillea

So after successfully melting aluminium and copper, I thought I would try to melt some rocks to make home made lava, although I expected glass of some type. I got the furnace nice and hot, I had to get

I love this time of year when the wattles start to flower and light up the bush. This is a closeup of the golden wattle. The Kangaroo Thorn wattle is a scrub rather than a tree. It's flowers are much more

I have been using this faucet for a couple of months, it is basically the only faucet I could find for NEM tokens. The payouts are based on a random percentage and they are low most of the time, but I

So, after a couple of previous attempts, and a slightly larger foundry - a 12 litre steel bucket instead of the 10 litre one I had before, with a better placed air intake, I have great success melting