I've been thinking about how to improve the smelts from iron bacteria, mainly the differences it has from bog iron ore. Here is a process I came up with.

-Make lye solution from wood ash

-Simmer the bacteria ore in the solution while stirring (careful not to breathe it in), let it settle and throw away the liquid

-Wash the ore, let it dry

-Form the ore into marble sized balls

-Roast the ore balls as they are

-Ground the balls back into powder for smelting.

Lye will eat away the organic compounds and dissolve them into water but will not affect the iron oxide. Roasting the ore as balls will help avoid contaminating it with ash.

Also for the volute shaped blower, a teardrop shaped smelter would be better with the blower at the pointy end, as in a square smelter there are dead zones where no air is being blown to. Additionally, the bottom of the smelter should have a recline towards the round part of the teardrop, with leaf shaped channels at the tip of which a bleeding hole can be opened to let out the slag once all the ore have made it to the bottom. After the slag is bled, a log can be used to stomp the remains to consolidate them into a bloom. At which point the smelter should be opened to remove the bloom while its still yellow hot to be consolidated further with a mallet.

https://preview.redd.it/pfx14ot7o2pc1.png?width=700&format=png&auto=webp&s=3b4f3bd83bcd10d1cc60f96e740afdaa7cfe2227

I'm open to criticism.

it was a bit hard but after wetting it i was able to draw with it like wet chalk. the color was pretty consistent when i broke it in half

After I ask about how to make cold drinks in summer, I thought, how about air-conditioning, Can I use the same principal of the Zeer pot to a room but bigger? or is it better to just live near a waterfall or anybody of water or on top of a mountain?, I realized that fire is the easiest thing to do in a primitive world even in winter, but in the other have ice is harder if you leave in a sunny place.

It got me thinking while drink a cold soda, how can we make something cold in summer in a primitive era, I know snow and low temp mountain have some ice the can be stored but if you don't have access to natural ice, How can we make anything cold? Do we really need to wait for season to change just to have ice?

Ever since he started working on collecting iron from the stream I have been wondering - is this the first time in human history anybody has tried this? Previous to this, most of what he's been doing has been recreating technologies created by various people around the world around the millennia, but Googling around, I am not finding any stories about people getting iron this way. The closest I've found is bog iron, but that naturally forms prills that you dig out of the peat. This idea of starting from slime - is that original?

To get something useful from these experiments he has to:

Build enough containers to harvest the raw material from the bacteria.

Harvest the bacteria.

Build the furnaces.

Harvest raw material for fuel.

Refine the raw material for fuel into charcoal.

Store enough of it for initial smelt.

Smelt harvested raw material.

Gather slag.

Pick out prills from slag.

I'm sure I'm forgetting stuff along the way.

(repeat all of the above as many times as needed to get sufficient material).

Build furnace capable of very high temperatures.

Gather enough fuel to heat prills to melting temperature and burn off impurities and hold them at that level for a long enough time.

Ultimately he's going to need a way to forge the iron bar into something useful. It isn't going to be an anvil.

And then ends up with a very small amount of metal if this was done enough times. . .maybe enough to produce a small knife or arrowhead?

Not saying that any step here is impossible. But when you add it all up together, it's a whole lot of work for one person. If he had a labor force he could assign tasks to everyone and then cut a whole lot of time out of the process.

But is it realistic to jump into the Iron Age as an individual?

I have tried a few times but I didn't know what to make and most of the builds are pretty hard. Is there a guide somewhere or some information on how to start the hobby?

I’m trying to process wild clay- I’ve gotten to the point where I poured off my clay water and let it settle, then poured the soupy clay into a cloth to let it drip dry. But the thing is the water that is dripping out definitely has clay in it! I used an old shitty tee shirt, so maybe that’s why. What fabrics have people used that work better? Preferably one that is easy to find around the house, since I don’t exactly wanna go out and buy new fabric just to ruin.

Man he makes it look easy

Was originally made from greenwood, so wasn't sure if it the wraps would hold due to shrinkage, but I guess if you keep heavier stuff on the shelves as pressure, over time the wraps will settle due to the weight.

PS it’s very sharp! (The stone is a flint cobble)

I am just wondering how to make natural glues from trees etc? Im from NZ. Thanks, anything helps.

Have you ever tried to glaze your pottery? Just curious if you have a natural way to do this.

I'm been thinking in any place with a bamboo forrest is it gonna be easier to live there? Bamboo is easy to chop well the thin ones, and it is already hollow enough to make containers and you can eat the small baby bamboo shoots. Boiling water is easier too. Is there any cons for being in a bamboo forrest? It has to have cons its too good to be perfect.

In theory could you use spider string to make cordage and bow string ?

I'm from Alabama, and the local natives to my area were the Muscogee. I'm hoping to find information on what they might have used to color their art and clothing.

What can you make out of bone ? In survival situation can you make crossbow bolt tip out out bone or horn ?

If you are with a group of 100 people and only you have modern day knowledge and you're the leader how long can u make those? What are the step by step in making those? I know copper is needed and making copper wire will be easy if you found some reserves and when you have enough iron to make hammers, a good crucible forge and anvils but magnets are hard to make, is there a generator without magnets?

Has anyone tried to make a chisel or anything out of chicken bones? Obviously they won’t be as strong as antler but idk how strong a bone need to be for something like a chisel.