Whatsit?

[LadyArowana]

Ok. try this

Is it a handle for winding something? or for making cheese?

 

[JoceAndChris]

Cheese!! Again! :lol:

Knowing Gareth, does it come out of a windmill?

Spot on again Worms.

Just one more and then has someone else got a 'Whatsit' somewhere?

This one is about 2ft 6in or so long. I'll get another picture tomorrow.

View attachment 1

Is that a railing?

 

[worms]

Is that a railing?

Perhaps we are falling into the trap of being shown both ends and assuming there is nothing significant (such as the cheese-making bit) in the middle!

 

[DJH]

Well now Gareth, I don't have one of those and I need one My guess is that it's a handle for something going by the large square hole and the two smaller holes hmm :?

Here's the other pictures of my Whatsit showing the middle bit used for making cheese and a close up of the working end...

 

[Gareth Hughes]

Jocelyn is closest, in that that particular example did come out of a windmill. It's a thrift, the handle that holds the interchangeable metal picks used for sharpening millstones. Here's one in use:

 

[DJH]

It looks a lot bigger when you see it in someones hands. I see in the picture the chap has a bag he's resting on to use the thrift so I would imagine he's just kind of chipping away gently at the stone.
I once worked on a Crown Estates property near Taunton where they had an undershot (?) wheel. The place was a model farm for the old estate there and I was fascinated by all the drive shafts which extended away from the wheel through tunnels to serve the different buildings. The place was on the top of a hill and was fed by a pond that took at least a couple of days to fill and drove the wheel for about four or five hours. I love them..

Will you hazard a guess for my last whatsit? It's a hand worked thingy and the end offset is in it deliberately...

 

[LadyArowana]

I bet you could stir a vat of curds and whey with it :lol:

 

[JoceAndChris]

Is it a nice old shoe horn Doug? Or is it a blacksmith's tool for shaping molten iron into something?

You'd have been interested to see this house in the 70s I'm sure, with the lovely old wheel still on the house that you turned to get the well water up to the attic tank. We still have pretty much the same ( not on mains water) but the old 19th C hand pump is replaced by an electric one.

Lovely picture of the thrift Gareth, he's doing that job so carefully. Which windmill is that?

 

[DJH]

Barking up the wrong tree there my Lady...

I remember having to pump water up from a well when I was five or six using a semi-rotary pump and I thought it was fun..

Doug

 

[Jellyfire]

Elephant's toothpick??

 

[angrybird]

It looks a lot bigger when you see it in someones hands. I see in the picture the chap has a bag he's resting on to use the thrift so I would imagine he's just kind of chipping away gently at the stone.
I once worked on a Crown Estates property near Taunton where they had an undershot (?) wheel. The place was a model farm for the old estate there and I was fascinated by all the drive shafts which extended away from the wheel through tunnels to serve the different buildings. The place was on the top of a hill and was fed by a pond that took at least a couple of days to fill and drove the wheel for about four or five hours. I love them..

Will you hazard a guess for my last whatsit? It's a hand worked thingy and the end offset is in it deliberately...

it looks a lot bigger when you see it in someones hands. :lol: oh i say! :lol:

 

[DJH]

Ha ha :lol: :lol:

Not a toothpick but I'll take a tanner for it........... :wink:

 

[Gareth Hughes]

Hmmm. For lifting hides out of a tan pit? Though I can't see that it would be any better suited to that than any random stick.

 

[Jellyfire]

Separating the hide from a carcass? (Which is a bit similar to a toothpick now I think about it)

 

[DJH]

That's very close Jellyfire. There are some more clues dotted around the forum here.. :wink:

 

[Jellyfire]

I have some fairly gruesome images of prising dogs ribs apart to boil down for glue in my head now, don't think I'll go back and look for the clues again!

 

[DJH]

OK. I knew this was going to be an obscure item. It's a barking iron used to remove bark from oak trees ready to be used in the tanning process.

I've got a few more things but does anyone else have a Whatsit they could have a guessing over? I don't want to hog this all to myself.

Doug. Tipperary

 

[agbagb]

I though it looked a bit whoof. :roll:

 

[Sonyaclegg]

Don't worry. It's lots of fun

 

[DJH]

That's all I needed to hear :twisted:







Doug