@ghostsofpompeii after you collect enough of it to make a batch the sap is filtered through a simple cloth to remove any debris or bugs. The sap is then cooked, and cooked, and cooked through a lengthy process, usually accompanied by multiple pipes and beverages, to boil off most of the water and condense the sugar. I recommend this done outside else your house will become a sauna. Once the sap is close to being refined to the point of syrup I finish it off on the stove inside where I have a bit more control. It will finally be ready for the pancakes after it passes quality control testing (my four year old daughter). It does have a slight sweetness to it straight out of the tree but the amount of sugar concentration is quite low. It takes about 40 gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup depending upon the year and maple variety. I have used the sap to make some coffee in my French press. Gives it a hint of mapley goodness. Don’t recommend doing that in a regular coffee pot else everything will need a good scrub. Speaking from sticky experience.
@MrMustache That sounds about as complicated as trying to make the old fashion hard fudge. But anything worth doing is worth doing right. Be honest now - did you come up with a product name for your home made maple syrup? Half the fun of attempting to make new tobacco blends was coming up with a name for it.
@ghostsofpompeii I agree with the doing it right! Can’t say I’ve ever thought about naming it. Just focused more on drenching it on a stack of flap jacks. Since you’ve brought it up though, I think Treecle might work.
A coworker wanted to know if I could make him a forming mandrel for his handmade leather pint glass coozies. He has been using a pint glass and was worried about having it break in his hands when forming the wet leather. I went to my lathe and freehand, knocked this out for him. We’ll see how it works for him. I think I see a leather pint glass coozie in my future🙂.
I finished it with a few coats of Super Glue and a buff and wax with carnauba.
I’ve been out tinkering with my old brass pressure stoves today. I have the Optimus No. 45 with a silent burner head blazing away. The flame tips are starting to clear up and the orange/yellow is fading to blue…as it should if it is burning correctly.
I always wish I had taken courses like wood and metal shop when I was in high school rather than the majority of business classes I majored in. You would have thought I'd be grooming myself for a career as a businessman when the reality was once I'd completed high school I'd be off to the steel mills like a majority of my male classmates living in Gary Indiana.
Had I taken things like wood shop I might be more more handy around the house, or at least be able to build a table or bookcase. Or maybe carved a pipe or two.
And as for all those business courses - I still have to go to H&R Block to do my income taxes.
@ghostsofpompeii Interestingly, I never took any shop or art classes in school, besides what we did as children in grade school. I did take a “basic machine practices” course one quarter in college using a lathe to help make a big “single point” bolt and matching nut, and a huge shaper to make some V-Blocks (I wish I had got to keep them🙁, I could use them occasionally now). I also took a very, very basic course in something like “manufacturing”? I don’t recall the actual name. In it we each made a dust pan (I remember one of my little brothers made one in Junior High shop class) not difficult, it took me something like 30-45 minutes, to make from scratch, if that. The other two projects were equally as simple. I wanted to take more advanced courses that would have included plastic injection molding, and sand casting metal, but I quit college before going further. I was originally working towards an Electrical Engineering degree, then decided to switch to Electrical & Electronic Engineering Technology. As it ended up, I lost the drive and bailed out completely….dumb, I know. P. S. I still do my own taxes, but they are very basic, and I’m cheap🙂.
I guess all of us, when we reflect on our past, can think of a myriad of "could of, would of, should of" scenarios. Fortunately, in this day and time, aspiring and becoming proficient in genres outside of our areas of expertise(s) is now much easier. It's called YouTube... 😁
I reflowed the solder on the leaking fuel filler neck on my old Optimus No.96 kerosene pressure stove today. This stove has a “lipstick roarer” burner”. It was an easy solder job, but then again, I’ve had a lot of experience with soldering. I filled up the fount and fired it up. A few yellow/orange tips to the flame again, but it has not been run in 30+ years…..and then it was mistakenly fueled with white gas…oops. It’s lucky I still have my eyebrows. I’ll run a tank or two through it and see if it cleans up the flame. I also polished it up a bit. I had to clean the solder mask (India Ink), and rosin solder flux off after the repair, so a Brasso shine it got. My larger Optimus No.45 with a silent burner that I was working on last time is working beautifully now as well. I fired it up earlier today for a few minutes and it was burning a nice clean pretty blue👍🏻.
Toasty 🔥, it’s already starting to clear up to a nice blue flame.
There is a reason it is called a “roarer burner”. Here, I’m standing about 50 feet away from the patio table where the stove is and I can still hear it plainly…and I’m partially deaf.
Figured i would post a few of the hammers I have made for Silver/Goldsmithing. They are French style pistol grip chasing hammers. They are used for repoussé.
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I went to my lathe and freehand, knocked this out for him. We’ll see how it works for him. I think I see a leather pint glass coozie in my future🙂.
NASA has been monitoring...
Interestingly, I never took any shop or art classes in school, besides what we did as children in grade school.
I did take a “basic machine practices” course one quarter in college using a lathe to help make a big “single point” bolt and matching nut, and a huge shaper to make some V-Blocks (I wish I had got to keep them🙁, I could use them occasionally now). I also took a very, very basic course in something like “manufacturing”? I don’t recall the actual name. In it we each made a dust pan (I remember one of my little brothers made one in Junior High shop class) not difficult, it took me something like 30-45 minutes, to make from scratch, if that. The other two projects were equally as simple. I wanted to take more advanced courses that would have included plastic injection molding, and sand casting metal, but I quit college before going further. I was originally working towards an Electrical Engineering degree, then decided to switch to Electrical & Electronic Engineering Technology. As it ended up, I lost the drive and bailed out completely….dumb, I know.
P. S. I still do my own taxes, but they are very basic, and I’m cheap🙂.
Fortunately, in this day and time, aspiring and becoming proficient in genres outside of our areas of expertise(s) is now much easier.
It's called YouTube...
😁
I filled up the fount and fired it up. A few yellow/orange tips to the flame again, but it has not been run in 30+ years…..and then it was mistakenly fueled with white gas…oops. It’s lucky I still have my eyebrows. I’ll run a tank or two through it and see if it cleans up the flame. I also polished it up a bit. I had to clean the solder mask (India Ink), and rosin solder flux off after the repair, so a Brasso shine it got.
My larger Optimus No.45 with a silent burner that I was working on last time is working beautifully now as well. I fired it up earlier today for a few minutes and it was burning a nice clean pretty blue👍🏻.