Wolf's Den Armoury

I'm kind of like John Larson on this. I treat my customers the way *I* would expect to be treated if I was the customer. I also try to remember the axiom of "A happy customer will tell 5 of his/her friends. An Unhappy one will tell everyone else." Most of my business is by word of mouth. I really don't mind the word spreading slowly, as long as the customers stay happy with my products. David

Why not just make it *into* a rattle? Would make nice baby gifts. David

Just wondering. Smithing outside (well, not right not. Tuyere *FELL OFF* my forge, so I'm done until I can repair the firepan), and occasionally the temps in the Fall can get a bit chilly. My wife seems to think that the cold weather, specifically how it relates to my anvil's temperature will adversely affect my forging successes and failures. Is this true? Or are we both just showing a bit of ignorance of blacksmithing? Thanks, David

I'd love to go to a hammer in or even just another smith's shop that was close by. Anyone here from up-state Vermont? I'm 3 miles from Lake Champlain and 22 miles from the Canadian border. I feel pretty darned isolated up here. David

Over the last few months that I've been a member here (and blacksmithing), I've read several references to metal hardness that are, quite frankly confusing to me. Specifically, in referring to the use of springs or files for knife making, flint strikers or tools What's confusing to me is this... While these are good very hard metals, once you've brought the metal up to a very bright heat, doesn't this hardness go away until a proper quench/heat treat happens? Or is there something I'm missing in the metalurgy class I forgot to go to? Thanks, David

not a problem. My wife tends to refer to me as "a veritable warehouse of worthless information" :p That, and I have an almost perverse obsession with history and facts. lol D.

C-Clamps...I must have 15 or 20 of them in various sizes. I don't even know where half of them came from. I also have tons and tons of pliers, but those are from my work as a maillesmith.

Well, I finally made what I think is my first truly usable piece. A cheese slicer, made of 3/8 round stock (mild steel), squared, flattened, drawn and twisted. Wire is 0.035" diameter 5356 Aluminum. Wire-brush finished. The handle didn't quite turn out as I had originally planned. was working in near dark (5:00 pm December 4th in Northern New England) and night-blinded a bit by my forge, so all things considered, I guess it turned out ok. [---DIAL-UP WARNING! NON-RESIZED PIC---] http://www.wolfsdenarmoury.com/images/blacksmithing/who%20cut%20the%20cheese.jpg Comments? Suggestions? Cheesecake? David

Actually, Jimbob, the cross on the flag of Scotland is known as the St. Andrew's Cross. Andrew is said to have been martyred by crucifixion at Patras (Patrae) in Achaea. Though early texts, such as the Acts of Andrew known to Gregory of Tours, describe Andrew bound, not nailed, to a Latin cross of the kind on which Christ was crucified, a tradition grew up that Andrew had been crucified on a cross of the form called Crux decussata (X-shaped cross) and commonly known as "Saint Andrew's Cross"; this was performed at his own request, as he deemed himself unworthy to be crucified on the same type of cross on which Christ was crucified. About the middle of the tenth century, Andrew became the patron saint of Scotland. Several legends state that the relics of Andrew were brought under supernatural guidance from Constantinople to the place where the modern town of St Andrews stands today Hope this clears things up. David

Well, given the size I ended up with, I wouldn't be able to pull it apart by hand anyway. Thanks for the advice Phil. I'll give those ideas a try tomorrow (pre-bird coma). I always thought the metal needed to be struck. Nice to know that a simple push might work. Would that work witha jump weld (1-1/4" square tubing onto 4" x 8" plate for a portable hardy hole)?

I was screwing around the other day and decided to give a try at forge welding a "folded onto itself" billet. Folded it in half four times, and I *think* I got it to forge welding heat, brought it out of the fire (coal forge), put in on the anvil, and (as advised a few times in several places) tapped the billet lightly with the hammer. Question is (and yes, this might be a *really* stupid question).... How do I *know* this piece is actually welded? there seems to be an area between the folds where there is a "filled section", but its recessed about 1/16" from the edge, leaving the individual folds obviously visible. So basically, I really don't know for certain if this is a successful forge weld or not. :confused: Thanks for the help, David

'bout all I can think of I'm thankful for is that I have a forge and sufficient tools to learn this craft and beat the heck out of steel to work out my frustrations, this forum and the people here to help me learn.

Just wondering... Has anyone here ever made one? I know they're fairly easy to find if you know where to look, be it flea markets, ebay, or what have you. But it might make for an interesting project. (much more advanced than *I* am personally ready for ) David

You didn't mention what kind of forge you have. If it's a solid fuel forge, you might already have the solution right in front of you. This might be a little simplistic, but maybe set up a reflector of some sort (maybe high polished stainless sheet?) at an angle over your forge? If positioned right, it would reflect the heat from the forge out into the rest of the shop. You're already burning fuel to heat the steel, why not use the escaping heat?

Can I assume that *this* is the style you're referring to? This is from somewhere between 1740-1790. From what I can tell, dablacksmith is correct. I might add telescoping or removable handles to give the ability to move it safely.

Arftist, I really hate to be a jerk, but how would a thread about several different hardy tools help someone with no hardy hole? If I *had* a hardy hole, I probably would have come up with these already (or read the threads on hardy tools) Thanks for the thought though.

Well, I took the advice that I *could* use (it was all good advice, but some didn't apply to my situation) I *think* I did ok. the stem/vines seemed to turn out a bit better, although I'm still not *quite* happy with how they came out. Probably just need to be a bit more patient (you would think that after 15 years of weaving thousands of tiny rings into clothing, I would *have* enough patience. lol) The viening on the leaves aren't as good as they could be, I think because I don't have any way to hold the piece on the anvil while I get the chisel in place before striking. Working on figuring out a hold down tool that wouldn't require a hardy hole. Tried using a C-Clamp, but can't get it to hold tight enough :confused: comments? Suggestions? Thanks, David

Don't have a fuller or a rounding hammer (not even a hardy hole on my anvil). Coal forge, Anvil, cross peen hammer and a couple of ball peens. Just starting out in blacksmithing. still building tool inventory. I think I'll try Mr. Larkin's idea of "use a rounded corner of the anvil or my cross peen, to PUSH the metal in the long direction" tomorrow. I'll let you know how it goes. Thanks for the advice all. David

Well, I'm fairly certain it's mild steel. I'm also assuming that I'm using the right definition of the phrase "drawing out". Longer and thinner. Is this done in other ways as well? (no power hammer here, by the way) David

OK, so I've searched the forums (probably missed something somewhere though ) and I can't seem to find anything on leaves and vines... I'm not have a problem with the leaves so much...getting those down pretty good I think. The vine/stem on the other hand... I usually start the leaf/vine combination with either 3/8" or 1/2" diamter round stock (scrap yard find, so no clue what steel it is). I taper the end about 1" to 2" from the end, then fuller on the edge of the anvil to make the "neck" or beginning of the stem. Cut it off about 3 or 4 inches long (from the base of the leaf) then start drawing it out. Frustrating part is, I can't seem to get the stem to reduce in diameter very far. Don't know if I'm just being impatient, need to work on hammer control, tong control, or what. Getting the piece plenty hot (very bright yellow. hard to look at sometimes), so I know that's not it. Any ideas?

well, the green smoke was expected. I thought the way it just kinda hovered over the coal looked pretty cool and a bit on the ethereal side. What I *didn't* expect was the black smoke, not only the presence of it, but the sheer amount. It reminds me of oil or rubber burning. Is this a normal smoke with bituminous coal? There seems to be quite a lot of it. My wife seems to think that this Spring (when we completely re-do the smithy), I might be getting to build a side-draft forge (so she can turn the current forge into a flower pot. lol) David

That's a dead link (404 error). Is it still an active site? David ===== Heat it up, hit it with a hammer. Repeat if necessary. Dragon Droppings Forge

OK, so I've been blacksmithing for a couple of months now, using Anchracite because it was the only coal I could get ahold of locally. My results with the anthracite has been acceptable thus far, but my coal source finally got in a shipment of bituminous, so I thought I'd give it a try. Made my usual mushroom cap of newspaper and surrounded that with a log cabin of dry wood and lit the fire. I simply could not believe how much of the infamous green smoke there was!!! That stuff stinks! I'm just glad none of my immediate neighbors were home! I also noticed that there was quite a bit of what appeared to be a black smoke that I can really only describe as "oily". Is this normal? What can I do to reduce or get rid of it? The coal itself seems to stick together in a kind of gooey mess, and seemed to have the texture and consistency of styrofoam. Is *this* normal? The heat from this coal was incredible, much hotter it seems than the anthracite. I also did not have to keep my hair dryer blower running continuously (which, I assume is why hand cranked blowers and bellows work so well with bituminous coal). My projects for today were: 2 simple coat/key/hat hooks a colonial pipe lighter (cuz I smoke a pipe. might as well use the fire that's right there instead of my lighter. lol) Also made a 1" wide chisel out of some 1/2" round coil spring just because I was reading some posts last night on heat treating and tempering and wanted to see if I could do it. Hammer-shaped the straightened out piece of spring, water quenched, hit it with the grinder to make it nice and shiney, then held it in a hole in the fire and watched closely. It was just plain cool! Out of nowhere, the steel suddenly started to change color! I couldn't remember what color it should be for a chisel, so I quenched it when it got just past blue. I'll post a picture in the "Tools" section later. Any advice someone might have for working with Bituminous Coal? It's kind of wierd, but I like it. David

You can buy a titanium/niobium electrical anodizer from The Ring Lord (an online chainmaille supplies "store") The Ring Lord fairly reasonable price too for what it is. Only $185 David

Any ideas how to hook up a grounded 110v power cord to the motor so I can run one on 110V? I have a Maytag DE110 blower and motor assembly that I'd like to use as my blower motor. D.