Canvas Wall Tents Peace Pipes Shredded Wheat Cereal Cannons
A wall tent is shaped like a cabin. It's tall enough and wide enough to stand up in and walk around. This type of tent is typically used as a base camp on overnight hunting trips. Unlike a smaller camping tent, you usually need to transport a wall tent by vehicle or by horseback. These premium wall tents are made of sturdy canvas. They have a zip-up screen over the doorway and windows to keep out insects. They also have a vent hole in the roof to accommodate a stove. They can be made with lightweight canvas for hunters who go out in the woods on horseback. Depending on the number of tent orders to be filled, the factory's expert fabric cutter layers up to 10 sheets of canvas on the cutting table. Following a pattern, he draws guidelines... Then aligns them one at a time on the track along which the cutting knife rides. He does the smaller cuts with scissors. Once he's cut all the canvas pieces for one tent, he hands them off to a sewer. She overlaps adjoining pieces by less than an inch and, using a double-needled sewing machine, binds them with two parallel lines of stitching. This produces a durable, weather-resistant seam. Next, the stove ventilation system-- she sews what they call the stovepipe shield to the roof, then cuts away the canvas underneath. The shield is a fiberglass fabric rectangle with a silicone ring in the center, through which you insert the stove's exhaust pipe. After neatly finishing the edges... She attaches a canvas flap that zippers shut to close off the stovepipe shield and rolls up and ties to open it. She also sews a canvas weather flap that closes over the tent's front door-- extra protection in bad weather. She sews a row of d-rings to the edge of one flap... Then hooks to the corresponding door flap. They're both made of stainless steel, which never rusts, even with repeated exposure to moisture. These sturdy hooks and rings keep the flap securely closed in windy weather. The cutter, meanwhile, traces templates on heavy-duty fiberglass screen, then cuts the screens for the tent's triangular rear window and rectangular side window. The sewer stitches webbing to the window's perimeter. Webbing is a cotton seal which keeps out rain, snow, and wind. Meanwhile, a different sewer stitches the zipper to the door screen. She also sews 3-inch-wide seatbelt material inside the roof hem. Workers then apply pairs of grommets roughly a yard apart along this reinforced perimeter. Once you've pitched the tent, you secure it by looping ropes through these grommets and tying them to stakes in the ground. The tent floor is made of vinyl. Workers join the floor pieces using a radio-frequency welder. It emits radio waves that melt the material, fusing the overlapping edges into a seam. They construct the tent's internal frame out of heavy-duty galvanized steel tubing, then connect the pieces with stainless-steel couplers secured with eyebolts. As a quality-control check, they assemble the tent before shipping it out. After laying out the couplers, they insert the frame pieces to form the roof, fit the tent fabric over the roof framework, and insert the legs to prop up the structure. Then they pull down the walls, the same way you pull a shirt over a hanger. After tying back the flaps, they lay down the floor, which simply snaps into place. If you're two people, the entire setup takes about 10 minutes. Then it's just a matter of installing the wood- or coal-burning stove, cooking up a hearty meal, and getting a good night's sleep. Long-stemmed with an elaborately carved stone bowl, this is a native north-american pipe. Historically, it was reserved for special occasions such as the signing of peace treaties. That's why european settlers called it the peace pipe. Legend has it that the mystical buffalo calf woman gave native people the first sacred pipe. It is believed to have spiritual powers. The wisps of smoke from the stone bowl are seen as prayers rising to the creator. The pipemaker starts with wood like ash or sumac. These species are soft at the core, so they can be easily hollowed out with the red-hot tip of a thick coat hanger. He plunges the smoking hot wire into the soft core of the wood, and it quickly burns through it, creating a passageway through which tobacco smoke can be drawn. Now, with a planer, he shaves off the tree bark and shapes the outside of the wood to create a smooth, slim stem. He carves angled swirls into the wood with a rasp, a long tool studded with numerous sharp teeth. He whittles one end of the stem to transform it into a fitting for attaching the pipe bowl. He now confirms the diameter is right by inserting the fitting into a template. Next, sanding between the swirls smoothes away gouges left by the rasp. He files a notch into the stem just below the swirls. Then it's over to the beadwork artist. She wraps fringed leather around the notch and places a brightly colored accent piece on top. She strings glass beads around the leather-wrapped notch, working with a pattern and color scheme in mind. Centuries ago, natives obtained beads through trade with european settlers and threaded them onto pieces of animal sinew. Their needle was a thin piece of bone. The colors of the beads can really make a statement. A string of red might signify vibrancy and a long life, while a mix of colors could represent a spiritual burst of energy. The pipe stem is now complete and ready for the stone bowl. For that, they mine red clay rock called pipestone. Natives have used it for sacred pipes for centuries. Pipestone is soft, and this means it's easy to carve. It's also smooth and takes a high polish. He splashes water onto a chunk to make any flaws more apparent as he evaluates it for carving. His selection made, he now begins to trace, following a basic template of a pipe bowl. He saws through the stone along the penciled lines using a hacksaw. The rock is fairly easy to cut. It's essentially compressed clay. He rounds the angular edges using a rasp file. Now nicely contoured, the stone is really starting to look like a pipe bowl. With a series of finer tools, he flattens one end and then sculpts the shape of an eagle head onto it. He wields a rotary tool with a fine bit to carve eyes and feathers. Traditionally, natives use sharp flint or bone to engrave details. Power tools get the job done faster. He now drills into the stone to hollow out the shank and the actual tobacco bowl. For early natives, this job was very laborious. They gouged out the stone with an arrowhead attached to a stick. He rinses the eagle pipe bowl and then sands it while wet for a smoother finish than dry sanding. He aims a torch at it to heat the stone. Once hot, it readily absorbs beeswax as he rubs it into the pores. Beeswax gives the pipestone bowl a satin sheen. After a dip in cool water to solidify the wax, he scratches away some of it along the detail work, including the eyes and feathers. This adds definition and contrast, and after a bit of fine-tuning, the wooden pipe stem fits snuggly into the stone shank. He peers down the pipe to confirm that the stem is perfectly aligned with the bowl. The sacred pipe is now ready for any special occasion. They've used a combination of traditional techniques and modern power tools to produce this pipe, reconciling old and new in the quest for peace. Shredded wheat is a breakfast cereal made of 100% whole wheat, shredded into a straw-like consistency, cooked, and shape under to a rectangle. It was invented by an american entrepreneur in 1893 after he met a man who was eating boiled wheat with cream to alleviate digestive symptoms. They may look like tiny bales of hay, but they're actually a tasty and nutritious breakfast or snack. Shredded wheat was the first mass-produced, ready-to-eat cereal, invented at a time when people typically ate a cooked breakfast. It all begins with whole grain wheat. The raw kernels are hard as rock, so to soften them up, the factory cooks them simultaneously in water and with steam for about 30 minutes. As the wheat exits the cooker, its moisture content is about 50%. Excess water drains away through holes in the conveyer belt. The wheat then travels through a dryer. Inside, nozzles blast the soggy kernels with hot air. By the time the wheat exits about 10 minutes later, the cooked kernels are dried. They drop onto a conveyer belt which transports them to the operation that puts the shredded in shredded wheat. The wheat goes into several fill tubes. Each fill tube drops kernels in between two rollers that apply pressure, shredding the kernels into delicate strands. The strands drop onto the conveyer belt below, forming a fairly even layer. Each pair of shredding rollers deposits another layer of strands on top of the previous one, until there's a specific number of stacked layers. The company won't reveal how many, nor will it let any camera photograph the next machine-- a especially designed cutter that divides the sheet of layered wheat strands into rectangular biscuits. The sheet of shredded wheat biscuits now travels through a tunnel oven for approximately 10 minutes. The specifics of what goes on inside this oven are top secret. All the company will reveal is that there are two cycles, baking and toasting. As you can see in this before-and-after comparison, the bake cycle makes the biscuits crisp, and the toast cycle lightly browns them. The next machine compresses the sheets with a belt, which breaks apart the individual biscuits. Shredded wheat comes in two varieties-- plain and frosted. At this point, the plain ones would be ready to proceed to packaging. However, this batch is designated for frosting, so the conveyer moves them along to the coating station. To make the frosting, they blend and heat sugar, water, and other ingredients. Overhead nozzles spray it onto the passing biscuits. The frosting takes about a minute to dry and set. Here's what the shredded wheat biscuits look like before they're frosted and after. On the packaging line, an automated machine forms a bag out of a continuous sheet of plastic film, fills it with a weighed-out portion of shredded wheat, then seals the bag and cuts it free. The next station inserts the bag into a cardboard cereal box, printing the "best before" date on the top flap. The box not only shows consumers a photo of the contents, it also lists the cereal's nutritional benefits-- that it's high in fiber, low in fat and sodium, and contains zero cholesterol and trans fat. Cannons are back on the battlefield, as history buffs re-enact scenes from the american civil war. The fighting isn't real, but these replica cannons aren't fake. They can do everything the originals could do. The attention to detail adds authenticity to re-enactments. On the front lines of any civil war re-enactment, you'll find the big guns, the cannons, built to various scales with all the original details, these replicas have real firepower. For safety reasons, they don't load actual cannonballs into the muzzles, just black powder. It's traditionally been used to propel cannonballs, but on its own, it still makes firing a cannon a real blast. Production starts with wooden molding boxes that have a cannon shape inside. There's a top half and a bottom one. Together, they're known as the pattern. They'll fill each box with lake sand that's been laced with bonding chemicals. The sand is soft and warm at this point. They pack it down and level it off. As the sand cools, the bonding agents cause the sand to solidify. This sand mold will be used for casting the actual cannon. While they complete the other half, they brush an alcohol-based wash into all the crevices of the sand mold. But they don't just leave it to dry. Instead, they ignite it. The fire burns off the alcohol, leaving a protective skin on the mold, one that will prevent seepage of the casting material into the sand. A worker then applies glue to the border of the cannon mold. The other half of the mold has by now taken shape, and they apply the same alcohol-based treatment to it. Using a crane, the team carefully aligns the two sand molds. The glue cures, and the mold is ready to receive the casting material-- iron. They pour flaming, molten iron into a large ladle. Then, suited up for protection, they transfer the fiery liquid to the sand mold and pour it inside. The iron cools in the mold for about six hours. The flames die down, and the liquid metal solidifies. Then it's into the shot-blast chamber, so named because there's steel shot inside. Once the door is closed, the tiny pellets bombard the sand mold and break it up. A vacuum sucks the sand and steel shot out of the chamber, leaving the solid cast iron cannon. A worker slices off unwanted gating, which was formed as the iron flowed into the mold. One section served as a reservoir to compensate for shrinkage as the iron solidified. He removes that, too. He then grinds the casting seam until smooth. At the finishing factory, a lubricating mix of water and oil flows from a drill bit as it bores into the center of the solid cannon casting. The operator switches bits twice for a gradual widening of the cavity, taking it to precise dimensions. Here's a look down the cannon's newly bored muzzle. With the nose of the muzzle now protected by plastic, he pours an epoxy adhesive into the barrel. He then inserts a steel liner. The liner is a modification to the original design-- a modern safeguard that will enable the cannon to better withstand the pressure of ignition. The cannon turns on a lathe, and this action drives the steel liner completely down the barrel. It also spreads the epoxy evenly for a good seal. A carbide bit moves down the spinning cannon, to taper the exterior. He grinds the area between the trunnions, which are cylindrical protrusions used for mounting the cannon to the carriage. He stamps the maker's mark into the metal and then sprays solvent-based primer onto the entire cannon... Followed by three coats of flat, black paint. From start to finish, it's taken about eight days to produce this full-scale replica of a revolutionary war cannon. It's now ready for a little historical re-enacting. It's sure to be a hit with the troops.