Will Bruner the techniques were developed by a group of knappers in Idaho. Most are actually Vietnam era veterans, Tom is just one of best of many. If you don't have a water fed grinder the other tricks help.

Rob Smith Tom was nice enough many years ago to demo different knapping techniques. This was in Eastern Idaho, unfortunately I have since moved to Colorado and speak rarely with Tom. So your inquiry will for now go unanswered.

That is a good question, when you say square slab do you mean right angle edge or actual square slab found in some stain glass window projects?

Flintknapping is the art of shaping stone, whereas pressure flaking is one technique of the art.

***** Thank you!

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I cannot speak for Tom, but there could be several reasons for flakes not traveling far. Think of it in terms of adding pressure on your preform with your pressure flaker just before tipping the preform down and a flake release. If your preform platform is ground with a bad angle, your copper is too hard (slipping), or supporting weakly the preform may prevent enough pressure build up before flake removal.

If everything otherwise addressed is good and you are still getting short flakes, the most likely causes are bad angle and lack of in pressure. The flatter you hold the rock, the shorter the flakes. To successfully pop a flake off, most of your pressure needs to be pressing inwards and then just shift the tool to start the fracture. Remember to keep pushing in as the flake starts otherwise it will stop short.

Hoagy Carmichael Tom uses a water fed grinder to shape his blanks.

Billy Doty I wish I could recall the brand, been a few years. Tom used a water fed grinder with two diamond grit grinding wheels, coarse and fine.

I am just drawing a blank trying to google search for one and such. I have a glass grinder from hobby lobby but would like to find something a little better and more efficient. This little thing is made for stained glass and cant handle the load to be honest.

Billy Doty it was pretty heavy duty, large enough motor to grind metal.

Probably a cabbing machine could probably even use a flat lap for grinding blanks like these

I don't know the brand of the grinder, but it was a dual 8" wheel with a 1/2 or 1/3 hp motor mounted overhead to the shroud. Ran 100 and 80 grit flat faced diamond wheels.

I will knap with anyone who wants to learn and share knowledge.

Hehe there’s no such thing as cheating in flint knapping. Unless you’re using methods like this and claiming you went all abo. They are humans, making blades with the tools available to them, just like everyone else who has ever knapped. If I was interested in pretty flake patterns I’d use whatever worked best. I don’t even really like the idea of slabs but you can’t deny the efficiency. I’ve got a quartz slab right now which is why I find myself here. But it’s still not ‘cheating’ it just won’t feel nearly as satisfying as it would to start from a spall