Starting small community in ozark mountains

Alright!
I look forward to hearing about your progress!
Although, in my experience with the Ozarks, a Soil Structure Survey might do you a bit more good than a chemical analysis, hehehe.

 

You know with the food trend and economy and stuff I think we better more plan for opening up campground and being there for the hut, teepee and camper people because I live where we make food? We knew that this would be coming but it happened twice as fast as we thought it was going too. We're going deeper in the forest on the rebuilding too and the prayer chapel, kung fu temple, blacksmith shop, hearth kitchen and water house have to go first it is just that I thought we'd have a few more months and I guess more of it is gonna be raw natural materials than I thought.
Y'all that are going to check out a comunity shouldn't wait. One hing we do out here is eat. We eat, vist awhile getting high and eat. Keyword is Eat. I am not trying to be alarmist but the trickle down from our origen point of food is gonna hit by next month and carry on instead of next year like we thought out here. The scramble out here is already on for the better cattle and such. So if you been sitting on the fnce just go ahead and hold that nose and jump because not only do we need you for sure now you need to eat - and be away fom a scene that don't seem like it's gonna get any better to put it softly.
I put the link to this thread on my old one to guide people here. There seem to be a lot more knowledgeable folks and resources on this thread and it is an experiment in starting the communication and networking thing. This community is growing faster and our gears have pretty much switched to Wanted: Red Eyed Kung Fu Park Rangers since the food news broke. We are gonna need to be ready for anything as well as quadruple medicine and food production. But we'll still be largely forest and hobbit holes.

 

Closer to Late than Mid I guess.

**edit** Heh, I had completely missed the last page where Chris made it back.
I'll blame Strawberry Cough before Coffee this morning.

Or a Good spike maul and some Chisels / Shingling hatchet heads. lolz

 

Hey OddApple, how far along are you with the Blacksmith shop? I mean in terms of Anvil / Hammers, Chisels & punches?

I guess it's not a crucial concern if your neck of the woods is anything like the neck I was in towards Licking MO. as far as rural "flea markets" with bucketfulls of old hammer & Axe heads.

 

Most basic stuff is to hand and I never really thought about it a lot because we make most of the chisels and forming irons but you are right - the 'zarks are still full of good smithing tools in buckets and the sellers often enough don't even know what they are. But anvils are getting hard to come by and old style blowers harder.
Ha! I was more worried about coming up with a new torch set and some makita grinders than I was the hand tools. Anvil we got...that'un too hard to make!

 

If ya' mean the Bellows I have a couple patterns around somewhere, just find an old leather couch for the large piece off the back & some plywood. Just need a couple check valve's.

Got plans for a torch head too. (Procedures in Experimental Physics has allot of cool projects, so does Wagner's.)

I've had an itch to cast an anvil out just using Thermite or as fill for broken Iron hunks, might work, might shatter, but it would be fun to try eh? I'd imagine Annealing / Tempering wouldn't hurt.

:2thumbsup:

So how many of those 20 acres have been tilled, terraced or turned to a fish pond so far?
Steady water source?

And how deep does your dirt go?

 

I think they more dirt in that picture than our whole forest. The clay dust we have for dirt does have a thin covering of annual leaf mulch - but being literally on top, that all immediately washes down to the bull shoals lake to enrich the yards of retired alcoholics who garden fantastically and think it's them. But to shop talk:

<<If ya' mean the Bellows I have a couple patterns around somewhere, just find an old leather couch for the large piece off the back & some plywood. Just need a couple check valve's.>>
I can build a bellows in my sleep. Make the check valves too. They do fine but a lot more work than other blowers. I meant hand cranked fan blowers like the farriers used - they're great for permanent forges and less ummph for sure than a big bellows.

<<Got plans for a torch head too. (Procedures in Experimental Physics has allot of cool projects, so does Wagner's.)>>

That's intriguing. That will be a challenge in a rough time i.e. cutting and welding, point focused temps like that which won't go on the forge etc. Hand cutting hot or cold and forge welding have design and physical limitations.

<<I've had an itch to cast an anvil out just using Thermite or \as fill for broken Iron hunks, might work, might shatter, but it would be fun to try eh? I'd imagine Annealing / Tempering wouldn't hurt.>>

Oh I believe if you got it real clean you could cast it. Be curious to see how ya weld the face on because you need a rolled and harder steel face on the cast body at least what 9/16 or more thick? That'll be more of a daunt than casting your body in my mind. I think thermite and a mass/heat like that is a fearsome thing you sure aren't gonna be able to be close to that like the fiery furnace ha! Have you ever lit of thermite like that in a contained weld or such? If you do that tape it. I think you get like "automatic wizard" or something for a reaction like that. Don't be within 200 feet of a gas line right? Lol!
:2thumbsup:

<<So how many of those 20 acres have been tilled, terraced or turned to a fish pond so far?>>
Ha! like a 20'x500' strip on the ridge? We are gatherers, wild harvesters and we cultivate in small natural patches and sometimes containers. Ha! Thiis is not flatland farming, we are savages and only done very little terracing of any kind, like just to hold the straw up in a mushroom patch or something. The big garden didn't even get done this year because right now I am it on site and we had too much going on last Fall to even think about that too. It gotta be tilled this Fall though for next year - if there is one.

<<Steady water source?>>
Well is perfect water. Better than town's. I think flow is 32? 200' of standing water down a 400' hole.
We're on a tank right now because we just don't have the money for a deep well pump and the 400' feet of wire and water line. We will, just a couple other things to cover first about $2,000 and then the 3k+? to put a new pump down and all.

<<And how deep does your dirt go?>>
Like I said, what dirt? Ha ha! What we do get and make tho is forest mulch based and some pretty great stuff if you keep it up. We make great dirt, it's keeping it that's the project

Oh yeah, fish pond - gonna put a small dam down the back holler mostly to keep some water for the wildlife and poor mushrooms. If we're suprised and it holds better than we think, we'll raise the dam and have swimming and hot water fish. Neighbor across the holler had a deeper pond dug. They went as far as they could without actually blasting! But it should be deep enough for some fish population that need it a little cooler than we'll get in the woods. The "lake dam" we could put in is about a million dollar project (not literally but yeah) and that would make something that could be 20+ feet deep and enough area for a real ecosystem and fish population.

 

Sounds like you're planning on more Terracing?

Use much Char in that Mulch yet?

And why do so many people knock blasting this stuff?
I was aiming to just try splitting blocks off with about a flintlock loads worth of black powder but was lacking the hammer drill to get in there with it.
Figure some layers of old carpet should be sufficient for protection as the charge would have been 2' or deeper and pointing up like the hole



Went about 3' down, didn't loose much, if anything it made a good leaf catcher.



As far as the steel facing on the Anvil, I was thinking if one tags on some anchor posts it could just be cast in from the start but I seem to recall the real answer to that problem being in Machineries handbook (Was in 12th ed. iirc.) I'll check later.

I think I may need to come for a peek soon somehow.

In case it's not apparent to most with all the digging and whatnot I do, I somehow think I'm a Tolkien-esque Dwarf trapped in the frame of an Elf.

**edit**
NOW I remember what I thought I read and where.
One of the "lost titles" I forgot the title to but just found.
He was using a piece of track for the Anvil not casting one out but described some ideas for casting them.
http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Complete_Modern_Blacksmith.html?id=em2Xmi1_-GcC

 

Hi there, I am very interested in getting my life in line with what my mind has Been screaming my whole life. I am a lic. Massage therapist and am very good with anything green as well as mushrooms and love working farm type chores. Please let me know anything you can about your plans and hopefully this blossoms! Thanks for your time! Adam.

 

Hey guys, I'm looking for communal living. I'm currently living at the lake of the Ozarks in Missouri. I would love to come down and at least see what y'all are about it.

 

I grew up in the Ozarks, and I still do. I used to live in Mansfield. It's right near Ava, Mo. It's so beautiful. <3
I might be interested. =) Just have to convince my husband.

 

Lemmie guess iAtlas, you know Mike? rofl

 

Rosewood is located at 400 Whitetail Trail, nine miles north of Yellville, AR
My name is Dr. Karl Buchanan, but I have lost the knack of it because they have all but a very few called me "Doc" for so long that it takes me a second to catch when someone calls "karl" - ie if it's a code and I'm asleep yell "Doc!" not karl to get the spring up effect. Behold the power of nicknames long term huh?
As long as you harm no living thing or disrupt the status of "things of beauty left undisturbed" I can't imagine why I wouldn't be glad to see you and there is plenty of room to go camp far from the office camper and critters. I don't want to be the why that kept you from getting out and breathing a lil free air.
The very Best Wishes Always! to you in your traveling, self-friends ~
When we can afford phones: 870-656-6114 or 870-656-1301

 

I know no 'Mike'

 

I can find you guys at the above address?

 

It's a matter of public record and yup, no worries. I know you can GPS it because Matt Wyman at the Center for Enlightenment found us that way coming over from NC.

 

bump!

hey chris, various people are trying to reach you, man. you have real interested parties if you can get back with em!