In years to come thousands will claim to have been there but in truth a select bunch of six scythe folk turned up to Sprint Mill in Cumbria for International Peening Day. Huge numbers was never my objective and our group spent a really enjoyable and productive day together. Though it wasn't a true teaching event I was of course happy to answer questions and help everyone out with their blades. There's a lot to learn in peening; it's a real skill which takes time, practice and timely advice to learn. It's great to see people who've been on my 'Learn to mow' courses and are still mowing and I want them to continue enjoying it.
During the day we also took some time out to try a variety of push mowers, including a new Al-Ko 380HM Soft Touch Lawn Mower which Rochford Garden Machinery have kindly supplied for me to test over the year as a complementary tool to the scythe.Around Europe people were peening their scythes including the UK's Scythe Association chairman, Richard Brown who managed to peen his blade while waiting to go sailing, Michael (Stibs) Stibane in Germany and Christiane Lechner in Austria who practised peening with an original 'Triplex' machine. I was especially pleased to hear from Adolf Staufer, one of my peening tutors, who sent a photo from Austria of himself peening among the early cowslips.
Chris Riley of Wiltshire, UK wrote:
Hi Steve
Thank you so much for the incentive to get peening today. My mainstay grass and ditch blades are now ready for action.
While Peter Vido, of Scythe Connection in Canada wrote:
I applaud your instigation of the 'Global Day of Peening' and in solidarity, I'll spend most of April 1 peening scythe blades. I presently have well upwards of 100 blades to ready so it will be a righteous excuse to 'keep the hammer at the anvil'.
See you there next year!
Nice one Steve!
ReplyDelete[...] Day’ and you can find out a lot more about these activities on his Scytherspace Blog here 1st International Peening Day Share this:StumbleUponFacebookTwitterLike this:LikeBe the first to like this [...]
ReplyDeleteHi Steve,
ReplyDeletethanks for organising this, a good effort. Late to the party as usual, I did just manage to swing a hammer and cut (some blades of grass on) the lawn before the end of the day. Don't know why it's so hard to get around to it as it's something I really enjoy. Apathy? Lethargy?
Nice push mowers. I totally agree with you on the combination and we have an old Webb Whippet for ours.
cheers
Mark
[...] peening to dozens of beginners and improvers around the UK and Europe. In 2012 he established International Peening Day to promote the skills [...]
ReplyDelete[...] peening to dozens of beginners and improvers around the UK and Europe. In 2012 he established International Peening Day to promote the skills [...]
ReplyDeletewas peening ever used for other types of blades in history It is very interesting to run across this technique here in America but it looks like it just evolved from the techniques of a blacksmith
ReplyDeleteMy father was from the Old Country but he only used a stone with the scythe here and back in the 20's to 40's the county road maint men here only used stones to sharpen their scythes
hi John,
ReplyDeleteBronze tools seem to have been sharpened by peening. I taught my mate Robin Wood to peen his scythe and afterwards he used the skills to peen the tools when he was involved in the Dover Boat project this year: http://greenwood-carving.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/bronze-age-woodworking-adzes-and-axes.html
Scythes over here were mostly sharpened with a grindstone too; peening seems to have been a particular thing in Europe which is why it's such a young skill here.
Steve
[...] Last year was great fun with group of us getting together in Cumbria to sharpen up our scythes and push-mowers while others took part across the UK, in Germany, Austria, the USA and more. [...]
ReplyDelete