Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
where it is found best to utilise the side edge of the axe blade, gradually utilis-
ing the centre of the blade as one crosses the full width of the brick face.
Tests on working mouldings also served to confirm the two methods proposed
above. For 'squints', 'cants' and 'shouldered-bullnose' brick shapes, the axing
method would remain diagonal to the stretcher and header faces; but like all
individual craft techniques, however, they could vary and be worked vertical, and
occasionally some bricks studied show a very random cavalier use of the brick
axe. For more ornate profiles, such as curved and projecting enrichments, the
axe strokes would either be horizontal, vertical or parallel to the shape produced
(Fig. 25). This would be achieved by working the outline of the desired profile at
either end of the brick, having first cut out waste shapes with the hand saw, and
then axing the profile required at either end, treating them as draughts. Once
exact, the whole brick face is axed and abraded to shape from one side to the
other.
Figure 25
Cut-moulded voussoirs
displaying various
styled axing strokes at
Kirby Muxloe Castle
(Leicestershire), 1483.
With the rope mould for the chimney brick, described above, the first stage
is to remove all the waist brick above the scribe lines and either roughly axe
the straight sections, or simply cut them off with the small hand-saw. The saw is
then used to cut a series of parallel vertical slots finishing each just above the
scribe lines, allowing these slender sections of waste to be easily snapped off.
The brick axe is then used to hew out the general shape, using increasing care
as it gradually works the surface close and true to its templet shape. The final
sequence being the dressing or finishing of the face with the axe strokes run-
ning parallel to the angle of the rope mould, as shown in Fig. 22.
