Female complications, day 27

  Machines.

  The extra radiators in my bedroom are warm and work well, but they still have limited heating capability and I'm glad I insulated the house very well. I would have preferred a couple of Celsius higher indoor temperature, but 21 Celsius indoors in a large room without a lit fireplace is almost magical for the Elves, and pleasant enough for me too. Especially not having to leave the bed and get up in a freezing cold room and floor because the fire went out during the night. That is something everyone really appreciates.

  We're pretty sure Thrymheim is the most comfortable place here in the region during weather like this - maybe in the whole North - because Haera is convinced of that, and as the former queen, she is well travelled in the region and should know. The air in the room isn't dry, everything doesn't smell like smoke from a fire or have a fires noise, and a very low risk for a fire too. All the rooms are just warm and quiet, and the large windows makes it bright too. Haera really loves Thrymheim and its heating system, and looks forward to her own future mansion in the same style and incredible luxury. It's even far less work for the guards and maids, since there is just one fire to feed.

  My sambos loves Thrymheim, but 'Anna' amuses herself by blaming 'Elsa' for the long cold weather, until she realises that it makes us crawl a little closer under the covers, and instead she crawls over me and rewards 'Elsa', which 'Elsa' is just too happy to respond to. It's impossible to ignore their 69 next to me, especially when Iselin starts using one hand to get my manhood ready.

  The fact is that it is warm enough in the mansion for me and Jane, and magnificently warm and comfortable for the others, does not matter when we have a poor excuse for enjoying each other in bed. Not that we really need an excuse, but why let facts get in the way? The four poster beds curtains are excellent for keeping out the chill and making it even more cosy, because we are naked and not always under the covers.

  Iselin smiles as usual as she puts on her blinking diamond gold necklace and adjust her hair, followed by her stiletto shoes. Iselin is so sexy and seductive, and I like her smile when she sees me watching her and enjoying the view. Naked and seductively she slowly crawls towards me in bed with the necklace dangling and gives me a sensual kiss. I caress her butt before she slides off the bed and put on her bra, dress and belt with the keys and putting her knife in her pocket. The order makes it kind of telling what she likes and values most of her things. But she has promised to not wear high heels if she gets sore feet, blisters or pressure marks on her feet, and she will let her feet rest too. However, me massaging her feet does not help to reduce her desire to wear heels.

  Iselin helps Caecilia to put on her corset, followed by the dress and Caecilia makes sure her knife is in the right place before she does anything else, like putting on a necklace, fixing her hair, shoes etc. I have never seen Caecilia dressed without her knife since I gave it to her, and I know she sleeps with the knife hanging on the end of the bed next to her where she can see it. Even here in my bed, her knife is on the bedside table with their jewellery and Iselins knife too. The knife is Caecilias most valuable possession - in monetary value, of course - but it is its indication of status and that it means she is my woman, that Caecilia really values. A tiny bit of a fanatic warning too, because it was also with that knife that she marked herself to be mine.

  A woman in love might play with her ring - as Jane, who now often wears her platinum ruby ring on her finger or a leather strap around her neck, sometimes does - but we have all seen Caecilia tenderly and happily caress her dark R-shaped scab and future scar on her hand. Although I know why, it triggers a small fanatic/psycho warning, especially as Jane told me how she has several times seen Caecilia tenderly give the scar a little happy kiss when her hands were near her mouth. We have also seen that she occasionally lets her hand and fingers feel the knife and its grip on her belt. The others use the knife as a utility object and a tool, no longer really thinking about how exclusive and valuable the knife is, which is the point of a utility knife, but Caecilia always handles the knife with reverence. We'll see if that changes, because it's only been a couple of weeks.

  I'm not going to ask Caecilia if she has named her knife. If she has, I don't want to know, and if she hasn't, I don't want to give her the idea.

  But it is cute to see Iselin and Caecilia helping each other get dressed, fixing their hair, adjusting Caecilia's corset and making themselves presentable, and how they sexily play and flirt with each other in the meantime. I guess there is real love between them, and I hope it continues for the rest of their lives, because it might help them when I'm no longer here. A slightly depressing thought, and I hope it's at least two decades until then. I also hope that I'm still healthy and with enough energy twenty years from now to wake up after a night and morning like this with them, and that we're all happy then too.

  Iselin is visiting her parents, so I take the lead screw rods and stuff I've been turning and go to the machine shop, accompanied by Caecilia, Alith and Hillevi, to see how the various jobs are going, including the security door etc to Iselin's secret passage.

  The first real machine that Olafr is making for the machine shop is almost finished, and he has done most of it himself and I have only described details. Olafr likes the challenge of trying to do most things himself, and seems to want to prove that he can make advanced machines. I have mostly had to make parts for bearings and some other round parts like shafts etc on my lathe. It's just a matter of time until Olafr feels comfortable and trust himself to do lathe work too. What has taken time is also that Olafr has been very careful so everything is straight, even and stable, but that is something I really value.

  The machine is a hydro powered line shaft driven multi-axis vertical milling machine, built in steel and iron. The milling head is adjustable in Z-axis, i.e. in height, but the workpiece holder itself can move in X-Y direction and rotate around the Z-axis, with a future rotational Y-axis workpiece holder. With the right shaped cutting wheel on a long rod in that Y-axis holder that is exactly rotated between longitudal cuts, a very long toothed cog will be made, that can then be cut into different width but identical diameter and toothed cogs. It takes time and is fussy to align each thing to be machined and even more so to hand make, but that time is pretty unimportant and precision of the produced is much more important, and we want the machine to be really good. And the machine will eventually make more parts for itself.

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  The basic machine is already working, and Olafr wants my input on the add-on he is building so the machine shop lathe will be able to make long accurate machine lead screws, with even accurate pitch all the way. The two I've made will, with the right gears, be able to give accurate fixed pitch measured in millimetres to make heavier coarser lead screws and also give equivalent internal threading in larger holes. The new parts, together with heavy steel rods and other parts, will become sturdy vices and more parts for the multi-axis vertical milling machine, and increase its usefulness.

  In addition to tooling for hammers and presses, a milling machine will be able to produce complex parts, and especially make parts for other machines, such as a gear cutter, a planing machine, and motors. Everything done with a good degree of accuracy, flatness, and in balance, that can be repeated, time after time, which is important. There will also be other machines for making and processing sheet metal such as a larger more powerful rolling and bending machine or press brake. I need metalworking machines and operators.

  A welder would be very nice, but there are so many problems. The power source will be very primitive and without active control, but that should have been the norm for most of welding history. The shielding gas in MIG or TIG is a big problem, because pure carbon dioxide is not optimal but is probably the best I can create as shielding gas, as I 'only' need to create a process to produce carbon dioxide and fill bottles with it. Electrodes or welding wire is another problem. The T in TIG stands for tungsten which I can just forget, but something else like a carbon rod might be used as an acceptable electrode. However, filler material and the welding wire are a problem in both TIG and MIG. The coating for a stick welding rod is another problem, but perhaps doable, and a stick welder is probably the best I can do. It is a technology from the early 1900s, and OK electrodes and ESAB is a world-renowned Swedish company. Exactly how those electrodes were manufactured is not something I know, but will have to try my way. At least I know what the purpose is and how it is suppose to look and work. I will not make nice good welds before I solve something that isolates the welding point from the surrounding air.

  At the same time, it's worth trying to do something like where one or two carbon rods create a powerful electric arc and melt or perhaps cut metal, and see if that is useful. Also, try building one or two power sources so I can experiment with the power source, regulation and coatings for different types of welding. Battery operation will really limit use. I really don't want to start experimenting with hydrogen etc instead of acetylene in an oxy-fuel torch, but it could be very useful if I manage to create something that works. Keeping those gases under pressure is its own concern. A spot weld can actually be done right now. It's just current through two electrodes clamped together. I just haven't built things that really needed spot welding yet. Because basically, welding is just a practical way of joining metal for a structure, just like forging, riveting, bolting and soldering, so I've designed so that the need isn't there or is minimal. But if I make an okayish spot welder, I can start designing stuff that use it.

  Since the supply of every metal is quite limited in this world, Olafr and the others doesn't really understand how big and important all the metalworking will be, but Olafr wants to see what we can do. Advanced machines that work metal is a whole new world for him. The nail and bolt making tools-machines and the steamboat have lit a fire in Olafr and he really wants to experience the machines I have described. To use machines like that.

  Yeah, there's a pretty good chance I have to build a good spot welder over the next week or two because he really wants to see and use one. And it would be handy to have an electric wood burning tool in the carpentry shop too. Bodil likes using the wood burner I've made.

  The craftsmen already appreciate the pencils, and dedicated machines will be made to get a good production as quickly as practical. Also, I want thinner pencil leads for pencils, carpenter's pencils, and different hardnesses of pencils. Jane of course wants to be able to use them for art, which means slightly different requirements than I or the craftsmen have. We'll see how fine pencil leads we can make, but have already managed to make 1 mm, which is good enough for a basic pencil, and I've already made prototypes. Round wooden pencil body sectioned at one end into four fingers that are clamped together via a metal ring nut around a 1 mm pencil lead was easy to make and very cheap. It's something that can be spread for a low cost. Just not very good or optimal for a thin pencil lead, so I've made a similar metal pen with a narrower and sleeker metal casing, where the locking is conical metal jaws and screw locking much like a simpler rotor tool uses. Maybe in the future we will produce more modern mechanical pens, because I've disassembled and cleaned enough of them to be able to recreate something like that. But the parts are tiny and needs to be precise. We are in the process of trying out 'erasers' and trying resin mixed with various stuff.

  Those of us who have used modern pencils have high hopes for future pencils and fountain pens, but I'm so happy for what we have already produced. Quills suck!

  Before I head down to the mechanical lab, I order several tool sets for simple electrical and repair work. And a steel pipe, about 2.5 m long, diameter about 40-45 mm and wall thickness of about 3-4 mm. Straight and without sharp edges on the outside, and will weigh about 8 kg. The inside has no requirement for accuracy, and the outside does not have to be precise in roundness either, but the surface must be good, and the joint durable and probably heat shrunk. It's the striptease pole that Jane suggested I should make. I'm also ordering floor and ceiling mounts, with simpler bearings so the pole can rotate, and a pin at the bottom that locks the rotation. Olafr has no idea what it's supposed to be, but he doesn't really ask any more about my projects purpose. If I think he needs to know, I'll tell him, and Olafr sees the pole as a good exercise for our marvellous vertical lathe. Olafr only has questions about the manufacturing and quality etc. The pole will require a lot of steel, but that is now relatively easy to make, especially when Olafr and volunteers does the work. I advise Olafr that he can make 2 pole segments that are permanently joined, because the length of the pipe is a problem, and the vertical lathe can only make 1.8 metres which is just over half the total length.

  Even though the mechanical lab is just a semi-open building with high ceilings and available water power, it feels good to just stand here and think about the possibilities. What will be tested here in the future. Beside a water powered air compressor, the first machine to be built here is the hydrodynamic test facility. It sounds fancy but is just a fairly simple but large oval shaped water channel to be able to test water resistance on different hull shapes, since building a ship model basin will take a few years, and might not be on these islands. The water is driven around at different speeds on one long side, and on the other long side I can test the resistance with a tension spring or gravity device etc. The water channel will be able to be filled to a depth of about 30 cm, and to see below the surface, the water channel will have some glass windows. By testing different shapes, lengths, widths and loads I can gather a lot of data to make future boat designs more efficient, fast etc, and will also be able to test water resistance of different bridge pillar designs and so on, and how it affects the water level on each side. A powered wave machine will also be installed just to get more use out of the water channel to check how the height and length of waves affect different hulls, and how the hull moves through the water. Asta and the ships crew are really looking forward to the completion of the hydrodynamic facility, and are already making models. It will also be useful for the Academy to demonstrate the benefits of experimentation and data collection.