51/55

An auger is a boring tool used in a variety of woodworking trades, such as carpentry, wheelwrighting and ship-building, to bore long deep holes. Shell augers have been used since Roman times and remained in common use until the development of the spiral auger. Part of the auger bores the bottom of the hole as the tool goes round and another part holds the shavings and discharges them when the tool is pulled out. The donor got this auger from a master carpenter in Winchcombe, Gloucestershire.

1 auger: wood, metal

Citation in publication [H. J. Massingham, 'Country Relics' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1939)] –' Its natural fellows are three shell-augers in three different sizes given to me by [the donor], for boring timber, especially in the beams and rafters of barn interiors, long before the centre-bit and the spiral-bit for use in the modern brace replaced them. The shell auger is without a point, so that a preliminary hole had to be cut in the wood by gouge and mallet. Nevertheless, the obsolete shell-auger had this advantage over its smarter successor, the screw-pointed auger: it kept true to line, whatever the slant in the grain of the wood; whereas the screw-points will insist, in Mr Rose's words ("The Village Carpenter"), "In following the direction of the grain, to the utter ruin of a central hold through any piece of wood." (p.65) [see also 51/176], MERL list / description [Massingham Collection, October 1989] – 'ACC. NO.: 51/55 // NAME: SHELL AUGER // NEG NO.: 35/134 // STORAGE: ', MERL 'Catalogue index' card – ‘Auger (shell) // DATE ACQUIRED: January, 1951 // GROUP: Crafts - wood // NEGATIVE: 35/134 // PERIOD: Unknown // PLACE OF ORIGIN: The H.J. Massingham Collection // NUMBER: 51/55 // DESCRIPTION: In all branches of the crafts of woodworking, the auger has for centuries been one of the most important tools. Wheelwrights used it to bore the axle holes for the wooden wheels of wagons, the carpenter used it to start mortise holes and to peg furniture together, while the ship-builder used it to make holes in the planks that formed the hull of a new ship, so that these planks could be sheathed together by wooden pegs. Shell augers similar to this one are known to have been used by Roman carpenters, and they remained in common use until they were superseded by the spiral auger, the first of which was invented by Phineas Cooke in 1770. // The shell auger, or 'down cutting' or 'nose' auger, has a metal spoon the bottom of which has been deeply notched. One of the spoon projections thus produced has been bent upwards to clear the shavings while boring, while the other, the so called 'nose' is sharpened along its rounded edge. This nose effectively bores out the bottom of the hole as the tool goes round. Meanwhile, the other non-cutting spoon bottom holds the shavings and when the tool is pulled out, discharged them. // While early augers possessed no upturned spoon bottoms, all the shavings could not be discharged effectively. Both sides of the spoon were sharpened and thus it could be turned both ways, clockwise and anti-clockwise. In this type of auger however, it is the revolving nose that acts as a downward cutting edge, and since the sharpened nose is on but one side, both sides of the spoon need not be sharpened and the auger can only be turned in one direction when boring, a direction that is invariably clockwise. The only purpose of the half cylinder shaped spoon is to clean out and smooth the hole, and steady the instrument, so that the sides need not be sharpened at all as in the older augers. Since the auger very often does not 'bite' the wood, it must be started by a preliminary notch or dent. // This auger was obtained by Mr. Massingham from a Mr. Greening of Winchcombe, Glos., a master carpenter. It consists of (a) a round wooden handle 19.5 inches in length which is at right angles to the metal section of the auger. (b) Piercing the centre of the handle is the auger itself, its top projection bent over the upper surface of the handle. (c) A square metal piece inches long widens, and flattens into the cutting spoon itself, which is 1.5 inches wide. (d) the notched tip, one projection of which is sharpened and acts as a cutting edge, completes the half cylindrical shape of the spoon. // The type of bore hole made by this shell auger will be a cylinder with a diameter of inches. ’ , MERL Catalogue Form (temporary) – '[...] Dimensions: Length 46.0cm. Length of handle 19.0cm. Length of bit 17.0cm. Diameter of bit 4.0cm. // Inscription: J. Howard. On iron shaft. Stamped. [...] Notes (continued overleaf) An iron shaft with square section. The ‘bit’ is semicircular in section. It has a hand shaped wooden ‘T’ handle. Cataloguer JM Betts of MERL date 20.11.75'

Wood, Metal