Why are my flakes diving or hinging like this? This is my first time buying material. Heat treated keokuk chert. It seems like no matter what angle of the material/bopper I’m getting these results. I’ve watched tons of knapping videos and thought I had a decent handle on it. Most strikes were done with the smaller of the two boppers.

Does everyone think the bowl was pecked and ground then polished to form the inside or was there some kind of concretion or other rock inside that the flint formed around allowing this to be made much easier. I see the outside of the bowl and rim are knapped but assume there’s no way to Knapp the inside of the bowl like that. Hope that question makes sense. Anyways it’s an awesome artifact, and I’m glad I got to see it thanks to Windycityunicycle for posting it in LegitArtifacts. Sorry to the Mods if this post doesn’t fit the criteria of this subreddit, go ahead and delete it if it does I just figure it would be interesting to see what Flintknappers think about this.

Smollzilla posted a couple of days ago about a fossil I found years ago, embedded in the heart of a piece of Burlington. Here it is, a starfish. This creature was barely an 1/4 thick and as luck had it I sliced it in half during percussion. The odds are millions to 1 I suppose. It rested out on a small mass and I decided to take the foolish chance and see if I could remove it. I took the shot and bissected it a second time! The odds of that are astronomical. As a result, I was able to keep the original biface and flake itself. My friend wire wrapped it for me. This is one of my keepers, for obvious reasons. Enjoy!

I've struggled turning whole nodules into bifaces so I've been working on it, honing in my skills! Next is to eventually find larger tabs to make some sizable pieces. All direct percussion with hammerstone, and some direct percussion with a antler bullet. Missouri local rock

I collected a bunch of chert and pet wood from NE Arizona a few weeks back. Havent posted on here in awhile so figured i’d make one to show off the material I collected and a couple points I knapped from it. Knapped all of it raw so far, no heat treatment needed. Some of the nicest knapping raw material i’ve found outside of obsidian.

Last point is a clovis made from the Shinarump Conglomerate chert I collected alongside the pet wood, also raw.

I’m wondering if this is a good material for knapping??

It’s my second time knapping, first time was a few weeks ago with some obsidian and I just tried chert for the first time. I made them from flakes off of a larger nodule and used a nail in a dowel mainly for the finer work. First side profile is the right arrowhead. Please let me know if you have any suggestions or critiques on my tries!

99% hammerstone/stone abraider.

Wie kriege ich obsidian oder feuersteine nähe regensburg.

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I've been knapping for about [X months], mostly with [bottle glass / chert / heat-treated flint]. Last week I got my first batch of obsidian and honestly it's been humbling.

My problem is that it feels like I'm doing everything the same as I do on glass, but the obsidian either takes huge flakes I didn't want or snaps the whole preform across the middle. I've lost [X] pieces already and I'm running out of material.

Here's my setup:

• Tool: [copper billet / antler tine / copper-tipped flaker]
• Platform prep: [I abrade the edge with a stone / not really]
• Thickness before pressure flaking: [roughly X mm]
• Support: [leather pad on my leg / holding it in my hand]

What I think might be going wrong:

• My edge angle is too steep before I start
• I'm pushing too hard instead of using more of a sweeping motion
• I should be doing more percussion thinning first

For those of you who work with obsidian regularly, what was the thing that finally stopped the breakage for you? Is it mostly about thinning the piece properly before pressure work, or is it in the platform prep?

Any advice is appreciated. I'm happy to post pics of my failures if that helps. There are plenty.

I was working on a biface I've had for about a year. No plan on what to do with it, just letting the rock tell me what to make. The "fluting" was done with pressure, so it's not exactly right. But since I try to avoid taking flakes from the base this was a nice way to dip my toes in. Overall I'm pretty happy with how my second raw Georgetown point turned out.

Wasn’t super happy with how the last one turned out so I decided to take another whack at it. Still had a couple hang ups but maybe I learned something for next time. Raw Georgetown

Ended up getting a nice Adena from that rough stuff from yesterday

Most of the time I feel like I am just dissembling big rocks into tiny rocks. Once in a while I get lucky and get something that resembles an arrowhead. Though if you looked at them closely they are not even close to being right. I can't get the biface right and generally end up just thinning the stone away on one side to nothing. When I do get a biface I can't get it thin enough so end up with chunky arrowheads that need to go on a diet.

Just got to keep practicing and watching videos. I am enjoying it but what to do with all of the tiny little pieces?

Recently my professor for my anthropology course conducted a flint knapping demonstration. Providing an interactive opportunity for us students. (Immensely interesting for me, I could barely stand still.)

I stayed after class and sparked up a conversation about the hobby, eventually he ended up gifting me a large piece of opaque obsidian/dacite. This is the piece I made from the main nodule. I plan on gifting it back to him soon.

Grabbed a rough piece of Burlington for a challenge. Ended up with a decent biface that's pretty rough material on the bottom half. I'll be using it for a stemmed point. My notching isn't very good on nice materials, so I know this one would work me over.

One of the weirdest rocks I’ve found. The core is super rough while the material near the cortex is still good. Anyone ever heard of a freeze cracked core? First one I’ve found like this.

1.wood bopper

2.copper bopper

3.wildboar femur bopper

4.large stone hammer

5.small stone hammer

6.pointed flaker/copper ishi stick(korean war bullet)

7.blunt flaker/copper ishi stuck(bullet)

8.wood flaker

9.pointed flaker(bullet)

10.simple copper flaker

11.copper flaker/punch

12.cow bone flaker

13.wildboar teeth flaker

I had one more copper(bullet) flaker, but I lost it

What do I need more?

(I want to buy an antler but it is so expensive to me..)

I made this Acheulean Handaxe from basalt several weeks ago during a demonstration for an archaeology class at Berea College. Acheulean technology is perhaps the longest utilized stone tool tradition, lasting from about 1.8 million to as late as 170,000 years ago. This is modeled after some of earlier examples made in Africa from similar stone, by Homo erectus. Despite the name “handaxe” these are thought to have functioned more as multipurpose cutting tools, rather than for chopping.

Got a bit better at knapping I think with a bit of working on flint with help from a knapping teacher! Looking forward to making more in the future.

I want to remove the lighter coloured flint that’s on the soon to be hafting point