bigfish

bill- sounds like a pretty good deal and nice forge too! curly -yah troy only like two hours south,i do hope to go thomas- thats cool ya get 2 see your family as well thanks for the info guys every little bit helps -scott

phil- thanks for the link thomas- nm? quite a road trip.i hope to see you there! and thanks all for following up with the lowly apprentice :rolleyes:

150 $ is alot closer to my budget quad state? don't know it. half hour north of dayton is even closer yet more info please thomas thanks -scott

yah i thought it was a little high but from my limited experience it looks like its in great shape (gears in blower)not just the paint plus the extras coal,hood,hammer definitely wouldn't go any higher tho moot point anyway no money=no more toys but i guess i should ask what do you guys think its worth?

http://cgi.ebay.com/Champion-Blacksmith-Forge-and-Blower-Extras_W0QQitemZ330407464065QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item4cedd1cc81 just cruisin ebay wanted to give you guys the link on this wish i could afford it dayton only a couple hours from here ahhhhh someday :rolleyes:

finally got some more work in on my first spring steel knife fired the forge up this weekend and annealed it-sorta don't have a good substance to properly anneal @this time so i heated to cherry red and let air cool 3x it softened it up suprisingly well let her soak in vinegar 2 days and a little grindin lots of filing and this is what i've got. go easy guys this is my FIRST spring knife :rolleyes:

very nice! and better yet i'm sure the wife will be pleased :)

would love to go 2 bad i live a continent away :(

glad i can finally be of some assistance to someone here instead of being the one who asks questions all the time as far as the proper use of files i believe nakedanvil has a thread on here somewhere about it but i'll be darned if i can find it but the best i can recall you should have the handle in your left hand and only pull toward you hence the term "draw filing"going back and forth can damage your file and the piece you are working on by holding shavings in the file you should knock the shavings out frequently and there was also a reference to using soapstone on your files to keep the shavings from sticking to them.As far as the bevels go i will freely admit i am no expert but filing seems to give me the most uniform edge. hope this helps some :)

well finally got to do a little forgin this weekend managed to get one knife roughed in out of my leaf spring i started with a piece about one inch xthree and a half inches long xabout 1/2 inch thick the blade is about 5"x1 1/2 @widest point with the tang being about another 5 inches. tang is about 3/16thick x 3/4 wide with the spine tapering pretty even to the point. the other two blades are from my last round of forgin' both are spike knives so i guess letter openers but either way i'm pretty happy with the outcome. on the antler handled one i split the bone on my scrollsaw and used a dremel to hollow out the impression for the tang.the handguard is a piece of an old plow bottom cutoff w/a cutoff wheel then hammered flat also used a hot chisel to punch slit in for the tang. the wood handled one i used same scrollsaw to cut fingergrooves in some old native oak planks that came out of my grampas' barn and a lot of filing/sanding I used loctite 5 minute epoxy and brass pins 3/32 thick [barely peened]to attach scales

hey thanks guys its always good to hear some + input i have been using oil to quench everything so far should i be using brine on my spikes?

just finished a blade i have been working on for a while. I am very pleased with it made from a HC r/r spike it measures 11 1/2 inches long, blade 6 1/2, handle 5.Deer antler handle brass pins and polished to an almost mirror finish. I tried to stay away from the grinder and did most of the work w/a file and sand paper but the buffer w/a little emory compound went a long way. When tempering the edge got an almost perfect straw yellow and this blade actually holds a pretty good edge unlike a lot of my spike knives but recently aquired some leaf springs out of a big rig and we did some banging on some this weekend. Oh boy what a difference! we used twice as much coal and got half the work done not sure the carbon content but i'm told its pretty high.Can't wait to get a little further on them. Any and all comments appreciated. THANKS GUYS scott

thanks guys i hadn't thought of the hardy hole, gd idea :rolleyes:

50$ in the condition you describe does seem a bit high to me but then again i'm known to be pretty tight for 20 though prob. ok i'm sure you could fix the spring but i'm no expert. i have seen them go on auctions pretty cheap

but i don't know if i would call myself a blacksmith yet maybe just a guy who heats things up and beats the heck out of em' or blacksmith has a nice ring to it [pun intended]

i like that

ok thanks all working a smaller piece @ or just above waist high makes a lot of sense please excuse the occasional dumb question as this is all pretty new to me it looks like we have decided on around 36-38 inches total at this point not planning to work anything to large but i'm sure that will change too :] but as to putting a wood base would this be for a vibration damper? if so i have some native oak 2x6 planks i think would work also thinking about 10-1 or 15-1 anvil/hammer ratio since my anvil will be around 400# i guess that would work out to be 7-9"4x4 hammer also trying to figure out the search feature to look up some questions but still trying to figure it out i would like to thank you all for taking the time to help out a lowly amateur such as myself :D

i think about belt height would be pretty close but once again i'm the newbie the anvil i found is 7" diameter solid stock but we had talked about using say 5"tube filled w/sand or something capped w/a block of solid steel don't know if thats a good idea either hopefully someone w/the knowhow chimes in keep me informed of your anvil build too please the more ideas the better thanks scott

thanks for the input bryan but my thoughts on the ergonomics of it are this try holding your arms straight out for a length of time or down or @ an angle seems like they would get tired faster straight out [i know this from a certain midddle school teacher whose fav. punishment was holding a stack of books in each hand outstretched] lol just trying to think of all the angles b4 i have my anvil cut thanks all

ok i'll try these pics again well i guess i could only get one up, anyways got some new buffing compound- very happy!

also found a piece of 4x4 stock thought would make a nice hammer we were thinking about 18" long that should give me about an 80# hammer most of what i've read says between 50-120 pounds so it seems about right I LOVE THIS PLACE thanx a-lot guys

thanks j i and my buddy are both around 5'9" so we were thinking around 32" w/2"dies plus the 1"base=35"overall trying to upload some dad gummed pics of some blades i'm working on but it won't let me says i've used 4.27MB of 4.88MBglobal upload quota do i need to delete other pics? if so how? CONFUSED

thanks curly i thought it might be a little low we were thinking between 30 36 inches

hello all, ok so two friends and i are starting on a treadlehammer build so far we have scrounged up a piece of steel plate 1"x24"x52" and a 1hp motor i found a piece of 7"diameter round stock @ the junkyard so my question is i read somewhere that a good working height on a anvil is approximately the from the ground to your knuckles when making a fist w/arms straight down which is about where our anvil on a stump is so does the same rule genarally apply to a powerhammer? any input would be greatly appreciated

thanks for the correction now i need to start shoeboxin some dough so the wife don't know :} lol maybe next week ill be able to get it question though the largest stock we'll probably ever draw out will be 2" and i don't even see that happening often if ever so how many pound hammer would be appropriate? all suggestions much appreciated thanx guys