CHAPTER I

THE FARM SHOP WITH TOOLS FOR WORKING WOOD AND IRON

FARM SHOP AND IMPLEMENT HOUSE

The workshop and shed to hold farm implements should look as neat and attractive as the larger buildings. Farm implements are expensive. Farm machinery is even more so. When such machinery is all properly housed and kept in repair the depreciation is estimated at ten per cent a year. When the machines are left to rust and weather in the rain and wind the loss is simply ruinous.

More machinery is required on farms than formerly and it costs more. Still it is not a question whether a farmer can afford a machine. If he has sufficient work for it he knows he cannot afford to get along without it and he must have a shed to protect it from the weather when not in use.

In the first place the implement shed should be large enough to accommodate all of the farm implements and machinery without crowding and it should be well built and tight enough to keep out the wind and small animals, including chickens and sparrows.

The perspective and plan shown herewith is twenty-four feet in width and sixty feet in length.

The doorways provide headroom sufficient for the highest machines, and the width when the double doors are opened and the center post removed is nearly twenty feet, which is sufficient for a binder in field condition or a two-horse spring-tooth rake.

One end of the building looking toward the house is intended for a machine shop to be partitioned off by enclosing the first bent. This gives a room twenty feet wide by twenty-four feet deep for a blacksmith shop and general repair work. The next twenty feet is the garage. The machine shop part of the building will be arranged according to the mechanical inclination of the farmer.

A real farm repair shop is a rather elaborate mechanical proposition. There is a good brick chimney with a hood to carry off the smoke and gases from the blacksmith fire and the chimney should have a separate flue for a heating stove. Farm repair work is done mostly during the winter months when a fire in the shop is necessary for comfort and efficiency. A person cannot work to advantage with cold fingers. Paint requires moderate heat to work to advantage. Painting farm implements is a very important part of repair work.

A good shop arrangement is to have an iron workbench across the shop window in the front or entrance end of the building. In the far corner against the back wall is a good place for a woodworking bench. It is too mussy to have the blacksmith work and the carpenter work mixed up.

Sometimes it is necessary to bring in a pair of horses for shoeing, or to pull the shoes off. For this reason, a tie rail bolted to the studding on the side of the shop near the entrance is an extra convenience.

In a hot climate a sliding door is preferable because the wind will not slam it shut. In cold climates, hinge doors are better with a good sill and threshold to shut against to keep out the cold. Sometimes the large door contains a small door big enough to step through, but not large enough to admit much cold, when it is being opened and shut. Likewise a ceiling is needed in a cold country, while in warmer sections, a roof is sufficient. Farm shops, like other farm buildings, should conform to the climate, as well as convenience in doing the work. A solid concrete floor is a great comfort. And it is easily kept clean.

The perspective and floor plan show the arrangement of the doors, windows and chimney and the placing of the work benches, forge, anvil, toolbench and drill press.

Figures 3 and 4 show the perspective and floor plan of a farm shop and implement house 40 x 16 feet in size, which is large enough for some farms.

SHOP TOOLS

Good tools are more important on a farm than in a city workshop for the reason that a greater variety of work is required.

_Measuring Mechanical Work._--In using tools on the farm the first rule should be accuracy. It is just as easy to work to one-sixteenth of an inch as to carelessly lay off a piece of work so that the pieces won't go together right.

The handiest measuring tool ever invented is the old-fashioned two-foot rule that folds up to six inches in length to be carried in the pocket. Such rules to be serviceable should be brass bound. The interior marking should be notched to sixteenths. The outside marking may be laid out in eighths. The finer marking on the inside is protected by keeping the rule folded together when not in use. The coarser marking outside does not suffer so much from wear. Figure 5 shows a 12-inch rule with a slide caliper jaw.

In using a two-foot rule to lay off work the forward end should contain the small figures so that the workman is counting back on the rule but forward on the work, and he has the end of the rule to scribe from. In laying off a 16-foot pole the stick is first marked with a knife point, or sharp scratchawl, and try square to square one end. The work is then laid off from left to right, starting from the left hand edge of the square mark or first mark. The two-foot rule is laid flat on top of the piece of wood. At the front end of the rule the wood is marked with a sharp scratchawl or the point of a knife blade by pressing the point against the end of the rule at the time of marking. In moving the rule forward the left end is placed exactly over the left edge of the mark, so the new measurement begins at the exact point where the other left off, and so on the whole length of the stick. The final mark is then made exactly sixteen feet from the first mark.

In sawing the ends the saw kerf is cut from the waste ends of the stick. The saw cuts to the mark but does not cut it out.

In using a rule carelessly a workman may gain one-sixteenth of an inch every time he moves the rule, which would mean half of an inch in laying off a 16-foot pole, which would ruin it for carpenter work. If the pole is afterwards used for staking fence posts, he would gain one-half inch at each post, or a foot for every twenty-four posts, a distance to bother considerably in estimating acres. It is just as easy to measure exactly as it is to measure a little more or a little less, and it marks the difference between right and wrong.

WOODWORKING BENCH

In a farm workshop it is better to separate the woodworking department as far as possible from the blacksmith shop. Working wood accumulates a great deal of litter, shavings, blocks, and kindling wood, which are in the way in the blacksmith shop, and a spark from the anvil might set the shavings afire.

A woodworking bench, Figure 7, carpenter's bench, it is usually called, needs a short leg vise with wide jaws. The top of the vise should be flush with the top of the bench, so the boards may be worked when lying flat on the top of the bench. For the same reason the bench dog should lower down flush when not needed to hold the end of the board.

It is customary to make carpenter's benches separate from the shop, and large enough to stand alone, so they may be moved out doors or into other buildings.

Carpenter benches may be well made, or they may be constructed in a hurry. So long as the top is true it makes but little difference how the legs are attached, so long as they are strong and enough of them. A carpenter bench that is used for all kinds of work must be solid enough to permit hammering, driving nails, etc. Usually the top of the bench is straight, true and level and it should be kept free from litter and extra tools.

Good carpenters prefer a tool rack separate from the bench. It may stand on the floor or be attached to the wall. Carpenter tools on a farm are not numerous, but they should have a regular place, and laborers on the farms should be encouraged to keep the tools where they belong.

WOODWORKING TOOLS

Every farmer has an axe or two, some sort of a handsaw and a nail hammer. It is astonishing what jobs of repair work a handy farmer will do with such a dearth of tools. But it is not necessary to worry along without a good repair kit. Tools are cheap enough.

Such woodworking tools as coarse and fine toothed hand saws, a good square, a splendid assortment of hammers and the different kinds of wrenches, screw clamps, boring tools--in fact a complete assortment of handy woodworking tools is an absolute necessity on a well-managed farm.

The farm kit should contain two sizes of nail hammers, see Figure 15, one suitable to drive small nails, say up to eight penny, and the other for large nails and spikes; a long thin-bladed handsaw, having nine teeth to the inch, for sawing boards and planks; a shorter handsaw, having ten teeth to the inch, for small work and for pruning trees. A pruning saw should cut a fine, smooth kerf, so the wound will not collect and hold moisture.

Farmers' handsaws are required to do a great many different kinds of work. For this reason, it is difficult to keep them in good working condition, but if both saws are jointed, set and filed by a good mechanic once or twice a year, they may be kept in usable condition the rest of the time by a handy farm workman, unless extra building or special work is required.

A long-bladed ripsaw is also very useful, and what is commonly termed a keyhole saw finds more use on the farm than in a carpenter's shop in town. It is necessary frequently to cut holes through partitions, floors, etc., and at such times a keyhole saw works in just right.

Handaxes are necessary for roughing certain pieces of wood for repair jobs. Two sizes of handaxes for different kinds of work are very useful, also a wide blade draw shave, Figure 16, and shave horse, Figure 9. A steel square having one 24-inch blade and one 18-inch is the best size. Such squares usually are heavy enough to remain square after falling off the bench forty or fifty times. A good deal depends upon the quality of the steel.

Steel squares differ in the measuring marks, but the kind to buy has one side spaced to sixteenths and the other side to tenths or twelfths. The sixteenth interest farmers generally, so that special attention should be given this side of the square. The lumber rule on some squares is useful, but the brace rules and mitre calculations are not likely to interest farmers.

Screw-drivers should be mostly strong and heavy for farm work. Three sizes of handled screw-drivers of different lengths and sizes, also two or three brace bit screw-drivers are needed. One or two bits may be broken or twisted so the assortment is sometimes exhausted before the screw is started.

Pinch bars and claw bars are very useful in a farm tool kit. Farm mechanical work consists principally in repairing implements, machinery, fences and buildings. Always a worn or broken part must be removed before the repair can be made. A pinch bar twenty-four inches long, Figure 21, with a cold chisel end, and another bar eighteen inches long with a crooked claw end, Figure 22, for pulling nails and spikes comes in very handy. These two bars should be made of the best octagon steel, seven-eighths of an inch in diameter.

A wooden carpenter's level, Figure 23, two feet long, with a plumb glass near one end, is the most satisfactory farm level, an instrument that is needed a great many times during the year.

Good brace bits are scarce on farms. They are not expensive, but farmers are careless about bits and braces. Two sizes of braces are needed, a small brace for small pod bits and twist drills, and a large ratchet brace with a 6-inch crank radius for turning larger bits.

Twist drill bits will bore both wood and iron, and they are not expensive up to three-eighths inch or one-half inch. But for larger sizes from one-half inch to one inch the finest lip wood boring bits will give the best satisfaction. Extension bits are used for boring holes larger than one inch. Two extension bits are better than one bit with two lip cutters. They will bore holes in soft wood in sizes from one inch to three inches.

Other cutting tools such as jack plane jointer and smoothing plane, also an assortment of chisels, belong to the farm equipment.

All cutting tools should be of the best design and the best steel. If they are properly used and taken care of, the different jobs of repair work can be handled quickly and to great advantage.

FARM GRINDSTONE

A grindstone may be gritty without being coarse so it will bite the steel easily and cut it away quickly. A good stone is a very satisfactory farm implement, but a greasy stone is a perpetual nuisance.

There are grindstones with frames too light. The competition to manufacture and sell a grindstone for farm use at the cheapest possible price has resulted in turning out thousands of grindstone frames that possess very little stability.

Grindstones should be kept under cover; the best stone will be injured by leaving it in the hot sun. The sun draws the moisture out of the upper side and leaves the lower side damp and soft so that in use the stone soon becomes flat sided. The wet side freezes in winter, which is a disintegrating process.

The best stones, with good care, will become uneven in time. The remedy is to true them with a quarter-inch soft iron round rod used like a lathe tool over an iron rest placed close to the stone on a level with the center of the stone. The rod is held against the stone in such a way as to cut away the high bumps and make the stone truly round. The stone cuts away best when it is dry. A small rod is better than a large rod. It digs into the stone better and takes out a deeper bite. Large power stones in machine shops are trued up in this way frequently. Farm stones often are neglected until they wabble so badly that it is difficult to grind any tool to an edge. If the grindstone is turned by a belt from an engine the work of truing may be done in a few minutes. If the stone is turned by hand the work of making it round takes longer and requires some muscle, but it pays.

The face of a grindstone should be rounded slightly, and it should be kept so by grinding the tools first on one side of edge of the stone, then on the other, with the cutting edge of the tool crosswise to the face of the stone.

For safety and to prevent a sloppy waste of water the stone should turn away from the operator.

The best way to keep a stone moist is by a trickle of water from an overhead supply. Troughs of water suspended under the stone are unsatisfactory, because the water soon gets thick and unfit for use. Such troughs are forgotten when the job is done, so that one side of the stone hangs in the water. An overhead supply of water leaks away and no damage is done.

Grindstone frames are best made of wood 3" x 4" thoroughly mortised together and well braced with wooden braces and tied across with plenty of iron rods. A good grindstone frame could be made of angle iron, but manufacturers generally fail in the attempt.

There are good ball-bearing grindstone hangers on the market, both for hand crank stones and for belt use.

The belt is less in the way if it is brought up from below. This is not difficult to do. A grindstone turns slower than any other farm machine so a speed reducing jack may be bolted to the floor at the back of the grindstone a little to one side to escape the drip. This arrangement requires a short belt but it may have the full face width of the pulley as the tight and loose pulleys are on the jack shaft.

_Emery Grinders._--There are small emery wheels made for grinding disks that work quickly and cut an even bevel all around. They are made in pairs and are attached to the ends of a mandrel supported by a metal stand which is bolted to a bench. The same rig is used for sickle grinding and other farm jobs.

BLACKSMITH SHOP

The furniture in a blacksmith shop consists of forge, anvil, half barrel, vise bench, drill press and tool rack. A farm shop also has a heating stove, shave horse, a woodworking bench, a good power driven grindstone and a double emery grinder.

_Forge._--The old-fashioned forge laid up with brick in connection with an old-fashioned chimney is just as popular as ever. The same old tuyer iron receives the air blast from the same old style leather bellows, and there is nothing more satisfactory. But there are modern portable forges, Figure 37, made of iron, that are less artistic, cheaper, take up less room and answer the purpose just about as well. The portable iron forge has a small blower attached to the frame which feeds oxygen into the fire. There are a good many different sizes of portable forges. Most of them work well up to their advertised capacity.

Generally, farm forges are not required to develop a great amount of heat. Farmers do but little welding, most of the forge work on the farm being confined to repair work such as heating brace irons, so they may be easily bent into the proper shape, or to soften metal so that holes may be punched through it easily.

Sharpening harrow teeth, drawing out plow points and horseshoeing are about the heaviest forge jobs required in a farm blacksmith shop, so that a medium size forge will answer the purpose.

_Anvil._--An anvil should weigh at least 120 pounds; 140 is better. It should be set six feet from the center of the fire to the center of the anvil. It should be placed on a timber the size of the base of the anvil set three feet in the ground. The top of the anvil should be about thirty inches high. Holmstrom's rule is: "Close the fist, stand erect with the arm hanging down. The knuckles should just clear the face of the anvil."

_Bench and Vise._--The vise bench should be made solid and it should face a good light. The bench window should look to the east or north if possible. It should be about four feet high and eight feet long, with the window sill about six inches above the bench.

Two and one-half feet is the usual height for a workbench above the floor. The best workbench tops are made by bolting together 2 x 4s with the edges up. Hardwood makes the best bench, but good pine will last for years. The top surface should be planed true and smooth after the nuts are drawn tight.

The bench vise should be heavy. A vise is used for bending iron hot from the forge. Unless the jaws are large, the hot iron is likely to heat the vise sufficiently to draw the temper. Heavy jaws are solid enough to support the iron when it is being hammered. Often heavy hammers are used for this purpose. A heavy vise holds the work solid, because it may be screwed so much tighter than a light vise. A heavy vise will hold light work, but a light vise will not hold heavy work. Heavy vises cost more, but they are cheaper in the end and more satisfactory at all times. A leg vise with five-inch jaws weighs about sixty pounds; five and one-half-inch jaws, eighty pounds. A machinist's vise is made to bolt on top of the bench. It will answer for blacksmith work on the farm, but is not as good as the old-fashioned leg vise. A machinist's vise is very useful in the garage, but it would hardly be necessary to have two heavy vises. The pipe vise belongs on a separate bench, which may be a plank bracketed against the side of the room.

_Drill-Press._--The most satisfactory drill-press for use on a farm is the upright drill that bolts to a post. There is usually a self feed which may be regulated according to the work. The heavy flywheel keeps the motion steady, and because there is no bench in the way, wagon tires may be suspended from the drill block, so they will hang free and true for drilling. Often long pieces of straight iron are drilled with holes spaced certain distances apart. It is easier to pass them along when they lie flat side down on the drill block. To use a drill properly and safely, the chuck must run true. It is easy to break a drill when it wabbles.

Most drills are made on the twist pattern, and it is something of a trick to grind a twist drill, but anyone can do it if he tackles the job with a determination to do it right. In grinding a twist drill, use a new drill for pattern. Grind the angles the same as the new drill, and be careful to have the point in the center. A little practice will make perfect.

Mechanics will say that no one except an expert should attempt to grind a twist drill, but farmers who are mechanically inclined are the best experts within reach. It is up to a farmer to grind his own drills or use them dull.

In drilling wrought iron either water or oil is required to cool the drill, but cast iron and brass are drilled dry. Light work such as hoop-iron may be drilled dry, but the cutting edge of the drill will last longer even in light work if the drill is fed with oil or water.

In using drill-presses, some extra attachments come in very handy, such as a screw clamp to hold short pieces of metal. Before starting the drill, a center punch is used to mark the center of the hole to be bored and to start the drill in the right spot.

In doing particular work, the drill may be re-centered when it starts wrong. This is done with a small round-nosed cold chisel. If the work is not very particular, the drill may be turned a little to one side by slanting the piece to be drilled. This plan is only a makeshift, however, the proper way being to block the work level, so that the drill will meet it perpendicularly. However, by starting carefully, the hole may be bored exactly as required.

_Iron Working Tools._--Forge tools for a farm shop need not be numerous. Several pairs of tongs, one blacksmith hammer, one sledge, one hardy, one wooden-handled cold chisel, one pair pincers, one paring knife, one shoeing rasp, and one shoeing hammer will do to begin with.

Monkey-wrenches come first in the wrench department. The farmer needs three sizes, one may be quite small, say six inches in length, one ten inches, and the other large enough to span a two-inch nut. And there should be an ironclad rule, never use a monkey-wrench for a hammer. For work around plows, cultivators, harvesters, and other farm machines, a case of S wrenches will be greatly appreciated. Manufacturers include wrenches with almost all farm machines, but such wrenches are too cheap to be of much use.

For heavier work pipe-wrenches are absolutely necessary. The reason for having so many wrenches is to save time when in the field. It often happens that men and horses stand idle waiting for what should be a quick repair job.

For bench work a riveting hammer and a ball peen machinist's hammer are needed. A nest of S wrenches, two rivet sets, cold chisels, round punches and several files also are required.

The same twist drills up to three-eighths-inch will do for iron as well as wood. However, if much drilling is done, then round shank twist drills to fit the drill chuck will work better. Farmers seldom drill holes in iron larger than one-half inch. For particular work, to get the exact size, reamers are used to finish the holes after drilling. Screw holes in iron are countersunk in the drill-press.

For small work, twist drills with square shanks for brace use should range in sizes from one thirty-second of an inch up to one-quarter inch, then every one-sixteenth inch up to one-half inch.

For boring screw holes in wood the quickest work is done with pod bits. Not many sizes are needed, but they are cheap, so that a half dozen, ranging from one-sixteenth to one-quarter inch or thereabouts, will be found very useful. Pod bits belong to the wood department, but on account of being used principally for screw sinking, they are just as useful in the iron working department as in the carpenter shop.

Sheet metal snips for cutting sheet metal properly belong with the iron working tools. Snips are from ten to fourteen inches in length. A medium size is best for miscellaneous work. If kept in good working order twelve-inch snips will cut 18-gauge galvanized or black iron. But a man would not care to do a great deal of such heavy cutting.

_Pipe-Fitting Tools._--Recent farm improvements require a few tools that rightfully belong to plumbers. Every farm has some kind of water supply for domestic use and for live-stock. A great many farm machines require pipe tools for repair work. Every year more plumbing reaches the farm.

Plumbing work is no more difficult than other mechanical work, if the tools are at hand to meet the different requirements. One job of plumbing that used to stand out as an impossibility was the soldering together of lead pipes, technically termed "wiping a joint." This operation has been discontinued. Every possible connection required in farm plumbing is now provided for in standardized fittings. Every pipe-fitting or connection that conducts supply water or waste water nowadays screws together. Sizes are all made to certain standards and the couplings are almost perfect, so that work formerly shrouded in mystery or hidden under trade secrets is now open to every schoolboy who has learned to read.

The necessary outfit to handle all the piping and plumbing on the farm is not very expensive, probably $25.00 will include every tool and all other appliances necessary to put in all the piping needed to carry water to the watering troughs and to supply hot and cold water to the kitchen and the bathroom, together with the waste pipes, ventilators and the sewer to the septic tank. The same outfit of tools will answer for repair work for a lifetime.

Farm water pipes usually are small. There may be a two-inch suction pipe to the force pump, and the discharge may be one and a half inch. But these pipes are not likely to make trouble.

There should be a good pipe vise that will hold any size pipe up to three inches. At least two pipe wrenches are needed and they should be adjustable from one-quarter-inch up to two-inch pipe.

We must remember that water pipe sizes mean inside measurements. One-inch pipe is about one and one-quarter inches outside diameter. Three-quarter-inch pipe is about one inch outside. Two-inch pipe will carry four times as much water as one-inch pipe, under the rule "doubling the diameter increases the capacity four times."

The three-wheel pipe cutter works quickly and is satisfactory for most jobs. Sometimes two of the knife wheels are removed and rollers substituted to prevent raising a burr on the end of the pipe.

Threading dies are made in standard sizes. A good farm set consists of stock and dies to thread all the different sizes of pipe from one-quarter inch to one inch, inclusive. Not many pipes larger than inch are threaded on the farm. They are cut to the proper lengths in the farm shop and the threads are cut in town.