A half dozen bow drills

Combo #84: Wood bow, modified iron nail drill bit,
and antler socket

I just finished up a set of 216 bow drills for the Nunatsiavut archaeologists to use in school programs in northern Labrador.  Ok, maybe that's a bit of hyperbole, but the six bows, six spindles, and six sockets are all interchangeable, which means there are 216 possible combinations.  Since the kit is going to be out of my hands I'm not going to be able to do my usual maintenance on the sets.  The nephrite can be difficult to sharpen when it gets dull.  A wet lapidary wheel, diamond file, or abrading stone is needed to touch up the nephrite bits when they get dull.  Not every rock is going to work as an abrading stone, but finding one that works is part of the fun.  We went with three nephrite bits and three modified nail bits.  The iron bits are also traditional for the area and will be a little easier to keep sharp using conventional whetstones or metal files. 

The full kit.  The top two bows are antler and the rest are wood.  five of the sockets are designed to be handheld, while the one on the left is a mouthpiece.  The top three drill spindles have nephrite bits and the lower three have modified nail bits.

The nephrite bits.  I made one extra, just in case.

An unmodifed nail (L) and one hammered and ground into a drill bit (R) 

The assembled drill spindles before lashing the bits into place.

This is my first time experimenting with iron drill bits and I wasn't sure if they would want to twist out of the wood spindle, so I added a little 90 degree spur at the proximal end to lock it in the shaft.  I did this on three of the drills and left the fourth one straight.  In retrospect, I don't think its necessary and I believe that the square cross section of the wrought nails will prevent the bits from twisting in the handle.  Although I won't be there to make repairs if that belief is wrong, so its probably better to be safe than sorry.

Assembled.  I went with epoxy and artificial sinew for the binding.  These are going to get heavy use by people of all skill levels and I won't be there to make repairs.  As much as I dislike using artificial bindings, I think it was the right decision for this particular set.

I tested the spindles out with a class of Open Minds students at The Rooms yesterday.  Look how clean they were in the previous photo.  It doesn't take long antique them when you turn them lose on a classroom of grade 5 students.  I'll have to remember that the next time I need to make something look world weary and aged. 

Combination #173: Mouthpiece socket, antler bow, and nephrite spindle

 

Ready to pack and ship north.

Photo Credits: Tim Rast

Ulu kits for students

During the last half of this week I've switched my focus to education, especially hands-on learning.  I helped facilitate a ground stone tool making workshop at The Rooms yesterday, where I took this photo of the tools and materials that we use in the Open Minds program.  Over the coming weeks and months I will be doing work with a couple northern organizations that would like to bring a program like this into schools in Nunavut and Nunatsiavut.  In the workshop, I'll be making bow drill sets for archaeologists in Nunatsiavut to use in school programs in northern Labrador and, in the office, I'll be working with the Inuit Heritage Trust to write up the instructions and assemble the materials for teachers to use in programming in Nunavut.

Tools and materials used for the slate ulu making workshop. A) Rubber mat to protect the table, B) File for sharpening the slate, C) Sandstone abrader for grinding the slate, D) Bow drill bow, E) Bow drill spindle with nephrite bit, F) Bow drill socket (mouthpiece), G) Ulu handle, H) Ulu slate blank, I) Scissors, J) String, K)Assembled ulu

Photo Credit: Tim Rast

Hafting Nephrite Drill Bits

Is this the right way to haft one of these nephrite drill bits?  It works and it seems to suit the design of the originals, but I've never actually seen one hafted into the drill shaft to say for sure.  I make a step cut in the wood shaft and tie the drill in place with a bit of glue in between.  But its just a guess.

This design seems to work fine, but I don't know if it is ethnographically correct.  

This is one of the artifacts that I use as a reference for these Labrador Inuit style drill bits.

The drill bit itself is round, but they are set with a square or rectangular base.  

They aren't thinned at all , so I don't think they would have been hafted into a split shaft socket like a chipped stone drill bit (top).

Disclosure: I normally use these with school kids, so I don't usually  haft them with traditional glues or lashings.  I use artificial sinew and epoxy for the added durability.  So I can't really say how they would hold up if I used something like real sinew and hide glue or baleen and seal blood glue.

Photo Credits: Tim Rast

Drilling with Nephrite

Reproduction drill bit and drilled slate

Nephrite is another name for Jade, a typically green stone known for its toughness.  It shows up in Palaeoeskimo, Thule, and Inuit archaeological sites in Newfoundland and Labrador.  The Palaeoeskimo ground and polished it into cutting and carving tools.  The Thule used it for endblades and drill bits.  All of the nephrite drill bit artifacts shown in this post come from Thule or Inuit sites in the Province.

Thule Nephrite drills at The Rooms

I find nephrite a difficult stone to work, especially for making things like knives and endblades that have a thin edge.  Its brutally hard to grind and as it gets thinner it can break apart in big kernels, kind of like styrofoam breaking apart.  Thicker tools like Burin-like tools and drill bits aren't so bad.  Nephrite drill bits typically have a cylindrical drill end with a bevelled point and a squarish or rectangular hafting end for mounting into a wooden shaft. (In the photo on the left, I use the bit that is the second from the bottom as the model for the bits that I make and use in my workshop.)

A long drill bit from Okak, Labrador

The bit end of the Okak drill bit

By the time the Palaeoeskimos came to Newfoundland and Labrador they'd stopped using drills - all of the holes that they made in their tools were gouged, so they tend to be long and narrow.  The Thule, on the other hand, drill holes in everything.  That's one of the first tricks that I learned when making Arctic reproductions - if you want something to look Thule, then drill a bunch of holes in it. The bow drill is such a surprisingly quick and efficient tool that its actually quite easy to make neat, cylindrical holes in wood, antler, bone, slate, and soapstone.

My workshop bow drill

I especially like using the bow drill with a nephrite bit on ground slate tools.  Holes drilled through stone tended to be drilled from both faces and meet in the middle at a slight bevel.  The holes are slightly narrower in the middle, so they have an hourglass shaped cross section.  Using a bow drill to drill the holes in the traditional way makes the reproduction a little more accurate and, in all honesty, it is quicker and less prone to chattering on the stone surface than using an electric drill.  The drills that I use in my work are the same ones that I use at ground stone workshops. You can see one being used in a video clip in this earlier post from the Ground Stone Family Fun Day at The Rooms.

My nephrite drills and the bevelled holes that they make in slate

Photo Credits: Tim Rast

Ground Stone Family Fun Day

Drilling through slate

Lori and I had a great time at The Rooms yesterday helping kids make ground slate ulus, Thule men's knives and soapstone carvings.  I'm not sure exactly how many people we saw, but I think we had at least 30 or 40 kids and 15 or 20 parents drop by.

Dad's were a big help

For the older kids we had slate blanks and wood handles prepared ahead of time that kids could file, drill, and tie together.  We used bow drills to make the lashing holes in the stone, which was great fun for the dads.  We'll have to keep this program in mind for Father's Day.  

Bow drill and examples that I prepared ahead of time

 Here's a quick clip of the bow drill in action - it can get pretty hot!

Soapstone Plummet

For the younger kids, we had a couple tables of soapstone that they could try carving.  We had a few examples of soapstone artifact reproductions, like a soapstone plummet and some animal carvings, but like Lori said this was more of an "Imagination Table", where kids could experiment and play freely with carving the soft rocks.

Soapstone carving at the Imagination Table

Great Job!

I think everyone was able to take away a project at the end of the day.  It was nice to have an activity that kids could get involved with and dirty.  Flintknapping glass or stone is just a little too sharp for big groups of young kids to attempt in a hands-on way, but the ground stone carving is much safer.  Its perfect for older elementary school age kids.  Its an especially good fit for the grade 5 curriculum in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Frederick and his amazing knives!

Photo Credits: Tim Rast