[TheForge] A-Frame Cooking Iron

[Jerry Frost]

Wider feet would help for sure, just a matter of how wide. Looking at the 
pic again I'd say they weren't too concerned with trip hazards anyway so 
make them a couple feet to a side.

Spiking it down is even better and this is the POPE'S traveling cook kit. 
Did he care what it weighs as long as the food was good?  He traveled with a 
small army including I assume at least one blacksmith so losing a spike 
wouldn't be an issue either.

There's another thing about the pic; the lack of a cross tie between the "A" 
frame legs. Without a cross tie or spiking it down it would be entirely too 
easy for any single leg to kick out on hard ground collapsing the whole 
cookin match.

You just have to take these things with a grain of salt. The artists making 
the woodcuts probably knew very little about how things worked. For example 
the stand with the cookpot in the foreground has all four legs in view. The 
back legs are skewed around so you can see the kabob hangers. If we took 
this woodcut literally and made the pot rack as represented it'd just fall 
over backwards.

One final point. We knew people made these things and they worked. We know 
how much variation people put into their work now, even those taught by the 
same person. Keeping that in mind there's nothing wrong with looking these 
historic pictures over then tweeking them so they'll actually work. It's not 
like I'm suggesting a computer controlled, electric over hydraulic, self 
leveling system. <grin>

Frosty (who thinks coherency is over rated)
------------------------
If it ain't forged
it ain't real.
Wrought iron is.
The FrostWorks

Meadow Lakes, AK.

From: "Phlip" <phlip at 99main.com>



>
> Lessee if I can type this one like a coherent human being ;-)
>
> One of the things Rob and I were discussing was that he thinks that what
> isn't shown is holes in the feet to insert pegs to stabilize the feet. I 
> was
> wondering if they might have step pegs, like we put on torch holders and 
> the
> like- he felt that step pegs wouldn't be versatile enough- I feel that
> assorted pins, different sizes for different types of ground, like he was
> suggesting, would mean more stuff to haul around and get lost. Another
> option might be wooden pegs, which are fairly easy to replace, but would
> mean the holes would hafta be pretty large, AND would be something else to
> trip over- not something you want by a fire you're heating hot liquids on.
>
> Still looking at it and thinking about it... Don't think wider feet would 
> do
> much of a job, either.
>
> Saint Phlip,
> CoD
>