Monday, June 6, 2011

The "Tree Nails" have arrived!

The Trunnels (Tree Nails, pegs, or whatever you want to call them) have arrived and they are some dandies! 342 - 1.5" diameter Oak Trunnels (32-4",  98-6", 40-8", 48-10", 124-14") that's a lot of pegs!
The plan is to layout and drill the trusses here in Darlington. Then the trusses will be un-clamped and the pieces taken to South Wayne where they will be re-assembled and fastened together with the Trunnels. Because of the camber the trusses will have to be assembled in layers. That is the reason for the different lengths of Trunnels. In an earlier blog post it was explained how the shorter Drift Trunnels will be driven out by longer ones as the layers are added. In Milton's book he talked about using "heavy cup grease" to aid in the process.


We used a bottle brush to apply petroleum jelly but have come up with a nice applicator and some Biobased Lithium Grease for the real job. Above you can see the 1.5" diameter hole BEFORE greasing.


Above is the applicator I made hooked to a power grease gun, and next you can see it being pulled from the hole.
The results speak for its self in the picture above. A nice even coating of grease throughout the hole. Pretty "slick"!

Puzzler - How many different length of Trunnels are needed to make a Town Lattice Truss?

Tech Vocab - Tree Nail - Trunnel - Cup Grease - Gin Pole - 20:1 Ratio - 2nd Class Pulley - Choker - Worm Gear - Falsework

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