LDW

You are right. Tell your family I said hi, hope all is well.

Brian David and I had a blast this afternoon putting a square drift through a round hole. I tried to get as many pics as I could and David took some as well, he will post his soon. As long as the heat is right and you have a nice drift that can be hit with a striking hammer it is amazing how well this process works. I could imagine that this could be a nightmare if you tried to do it without enough heat and if you were trying to drive the drift with a 2 or 3 pound hammer. It went smooth as glass doing it with Brian. Heres the pics, https://picasaweb.google.com/LDWynn/SquarePegRoundHole?authuser=0&feat=directlink

I did a good bit of striking today so I did not get many pics, Sue and Elise took a few. They were a lot of fun. https://picasaweb.google.com/LDWynn/SueAndEliseDay3?authuser=0&feat=directlink

I like that pic to Dave. I just wish I knew how to put one on the post like that.

We have been have been working away. Heres some more pics. https://picasaweb.google.com/LDWynn/SueEliseDay2?authuser=0&feat=directlink

Hey Roger, this is not in the place of Brians demo, this is an additional demo that will be done by the 3 young smiths. One of the three will be at the controls.

Brian and I will be working with Sue and Elise for a few days. They came here from Texas. Sue did some striking today, she was swinging both the 12 pound and 10 pound hammers. She worked with a jack-hammer bit and made a hardy tool. She made punches first thing. Elise wanted to work on technique, so we did some two sided tapers, and made some key finders. They are both great listeners, and are a lot of fun to work with. We are going to get an early start in the morning and I will post more pics as I get them. https://picasaweb.google.com/LDWynn/SueAndEliseAtBrians?authuser=0&feat=directlink

Here are some pics of the meeting with the MS Forge Council in May. Brian did the demo with the flux and a several of people tried it. https://picasaweb.google.com/LDWynn/MSForgeCouncilMay2012?authuser=0&feat=directlink

That is great Tubbe, looks like your punch is a on a good 90 degree angle to the handle. Keep your pics coming as well.

Thanks Jodi, its a lot of fun when you have people that show an interest in learning. If you have any trouble remembering any of the steps feel free to give one of us a call. Hopefully the pics will help also. Here is a link to the pics I took, and some Jodi took as well while we were there. https://picasaweb.google.com/LDWynn/ClassInSouthCarolina?authuser=0&feat=directlink

Heres the pics of the new hammers. Brian and I worked all day playing with hammers today. https://picasaweb.google.com/LDWynn/BirthdayHammer?authuser=0&feat=directlink

Hey let's sing happy birthday to Brian I will start it off, Happy birthday

Hey Bentiron the name of this thread is "The Trouble with Vulcans" I have only been blacksmithing for about 14 years, ya'll taught me a lot. I knew mine was softer than most, but it has held up well, even with me striking on it. I reworked the horn because it was so flat on top. If or when it fails I will get something different. I learn everyday, and appreciate everyones input. Hey Thomas, it was the anvil at the other forge in the shop. When you were at the treadle hammer it was on your right.

Thomas I saw the link, but the first post refers to vulcans as if all of them are the same. Which they may be, but I would buy a nice edged vulcan without any drawbacks. As I stated in the beginning of my first post, I may be lucky, but I like mine.

Here is a better pic

I guess I am just lucky. I have a vulcan anvil that I really appreciate. It has nice edges and allows me to do the forgings I desire. Here is a picture of Tsur and Brian making a three D horse head from square stock on it at the ABANA conference last time. https://picasaweb.google.com/106506050631612810521/ABANA2010#5479813854610599298 I know it has a fairly soft surface but if you hit hot metal there is no problem. I have a better picture of the anvil I will post. Brian and I routinely strike on this anvil, and there have been a lot of students use it as well.

Thanks everyone ya,ll are great. I have enjoyed learning from Brian for the last couple years and still learn something everyday. Roger we really appreciate your support. Everyone else too. Anyone can do the forging Brian shares with us. You have to attempt it to believe it. Once you understand the process you have the rest of your life to practice it.

Sounds like three different sizes of nails to me.

I went to Brians this morning and took some pics. Thomas Dean arrived there yesterday and he had made a hot cut, a hammer, and punches. I only got to visit a moment yesterday but Brian said he was striking well enough that he was able to make a bigger hammer as his first hammer. This morning they made some tools. I took pictures of him making two different hot cuts from 1" round 5160. He even had Thomas doing some directing while Brian was striking. I got some good pics. It was a pleasure meeting Thomas and his wife. They are some fine people. Here are the pics. https://picasaweb.go...feat=directlink

Brian was hardening a hammer and I always try and get a picture of the hammer half way in the water when he quenches it. It never works out either I am too early or late or out of focus. I think I finally got the picture. You can see the faces are at heat and the cheeks are not of color resulting in a differential hardening. I was hoping to see the steam acting as an insulator but it does not happen at this point. I think its cool though. https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/wI-GhkqosOOMZLZIVVGPytMTjNZETYmyPJy0liipFm0?feat=directlink

Kelly, as far as Daniels striking in the video, the most important thing about punching a hole is hitting into the center of the material. As you can see in the video the billet is not moving when Daniel is striking that means his hands are not too high or too low. Power is not the issue in punching a hole. He is also striking with a 12 pound hammer that probably has a 2 lb handle in it. Looks can be deceiving because there is a lot of force going into that punch. I like you comparison to splitting wood, that can only help with striking. Chris, your too kind, I thought I was going to cry. Like Brian always says "its all about the metal" and being around such enthusiastic young people is indeed an inspiration to us all. Its actually the inspiration of the people that we are around that encourages the motivation you spoke of. Its also parents like yourself that are willing to allow your children to follow their heart that encourages Brian and I. Daniel has a good head on his shoulders and understands what the metal is doing. He will pass us all up soon enough. Thanks for all the kind words.

Daniel is back taking a class with Brian Brazeal. I spent most of the day making a swage block stand, but got to take a few pics and got my wife to take some of us. It was very unusual for Brian to forge such a large piece of metal but Daniel is an inspiration. I looked in the shop and they were forging a stem on a piece of 2" round 1045. This is massive to forge with a sledge hammer so drastically. Brian then formed a shoulder in the 1 1/2" square hole in the swage block. We all upset the piece to form a flatter. I got to swing that 30 pound hammer Brian has in rotation with him and Daniel. It was great, and you could really see the metal move with each blow. I will get some more pics of the progress tomorrow, The video is Brian and Daniel punching a hole in a large top tool billet that is going to be a large ball fuller. https://picasaweb.go...feat=directlink http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wN7zzp11t0&context=C4a95303ADvjVQa1PpcFO0_MN4ohiK7OV_Fi986XrcsFFcKQaGlYg=

This may not pertain to knives directly but the following are some notes I took at a Bruce Baker workshop on selling crafts.I think it does help get a perspective on how to establish your low end pricing whether you stick to it or not. Just posting this because I had it on hand. Establish your pricing by pricing your work wholesale. Use this to get your retail price. To keep your material prices down you should not pay taxes on items you purchase for your craft, also try to purchase these items in quantities that allow a discount. Mark your materials up. These materials tie up money just as if you issued a loan from a bank. A bank would charge interest on a loan. Your money will be tied up on supplies until they have all been used and the customer has paid their bill. 20% mark up on most items. Establish your labor cost. Bruce lives in VT and uses 60 dollars per hour as his labor cost. Add your yearly overhead. This was left kind of vague. This part was not in my notes but am adding now, As craftsmen we can judge by the past what the approximate yearly expenses are incurred other than labor and supplies. you can then assume what the quantity of items you sell in a year and divide that quantity into the dollar number of overhead to determine how much to add to each item. Bigger companies have to have a forecasting sells department to decide what items will have the most sells and distribute the percentages of overhead equally to each area. sorry for making this complicated. Add an additional 20% to allow for reps and quantity discounts. After establishing the wholesale price double it to get the retail price.

Hey Greg looks like you got the idea, but there will be no need for the coke or coal dust. The punches work efficiently without sticking. When we punch a hole through a round blank sometimes the punch will stick right before the slug pops out, but a shocking blow straight down usually frees it. As Brian said when drifting a punched hole, the drift will cool the hole therefore when the steel turns black around the drift you can hold the top of the drift and hit the bottom of the drift on the anvil and it will pop right out. Makes you look like you know what your doing. This will allow the heat to wick back in and you can flip the steel over and drift from the other side resulting in a beautiful clean drifted hole. The one thing I did not see mentioned is to use a matching hole to your drift to set the metal on to keep from hollowing out the surface being drifted. This also backs the slotted hole better to keep from pulling as much metal through. Here is a picture of fieryfurnace on the last hit of the drift. In the next picture he flips the metal to drive the drift from the other side. You can see Brians "dial a hole" underneath the metal. https://picasaweb.google.com/106506050631612810521/DavesLastDayAtBrians#5721927395590079554

There is a local company here that sells cable. THe cable I get from them comes from Bridon. Here is a link to there site. http://www.bridon.com/site/products/crane/bluestrand6x36.php The cable I like to get is a blue strand series is all I know. He called the company while I was there and was able to get out of them that it was comparable to 1082 steel. For some reason they do not like to disclose much info from what I have heard since then. Since it is being forge welded, the quicker you can make the welds the less carbon you lose. I know you would know that but someone else might not. After talking wih Shawn Mcintyre I will never skip normalizing three times again to reduce the grain structure prior to hardening either. The guy had also mentioned that Bridon and one other company are the only companies left that make cable in the US. Both these companies make a high carbon cable, but he said the imported cable was not as good. I am only repeating what I heard from as reliable a source as I can get. Hope this is any help.