Randy

Great piece, Sam. You have a good head for design. Now do you need a tripod/trivet to use it or just not put it down on the stove? Yea, "sourced" sounds like it grew legs and walked over to you as you drove by.

Pete calls them his puddle people. Makes them in many professions and hobbies. Also does other things.

It's so bright they call it sunny! Great, whimsical piece!

I forgot to add info about the fire. First it must be good and clean. Second it must be piled higher than you think you need. As you've seen you use a lot of fuel and you don't want gaps in it. Now heating the pieces, if they are about the same size it's easier as they will heat up at the same rate, but there may be hot and cool spots in your fire due to the type of grate you have, how the fuel is packed in or loose and basicly how even your air is coming through the fuel. So you may have to move the pieces in the fire in order for them to reach welding temperature at the same time. Now if the material are of different sizes, or materials, as in putting a steel face on a hammer, then you have to manipulate the pieces more. Start by putting the larger piece in first as it will take longer to heat. After it heats to an even orange or yellow depending on how thin the second piece is, then put in the second piece. If it starts to over heat then pull it slightly from the fires' center towards you. When the bigger piece is getting closer to welding temperature put the smaller piece close to the larger one, but don't let them touch. They'll stick together in the fire and if not positioned properly you'll have to yank and twist them a part and start over. Once they both are at welding temperature do the dance. (see post above) As far as the flux goes, do what ever you are comfortable with as far as the type that you use and when you put it on. I use straight Borax, others use Black Magic, EZ-Weld, Climax, Anti-Borax, etc, and no flux. When I give classes on forge welding I focus on the fire first. Control and maintenance of the fire is as important as hammering and maybe more important.

It wasn't a waste. You learned something. Doing it in charcoal makes it even harder. It doesn't support the pieces in the fire very well. Any time you have two pieces, either the drop the tongs weld or the jump weld you have to learn the dance before you attempt the weld. That means doing it cold first, several times. Start at the forge, swing pieces around, position them, drop tongs, pick up hammer, hit it, cha, cha, cha. Now again... Keep doing this until you know exactly what you're going to do. Make sure the hammer is in the same place and same position each time. If you have to drop the tongs so you can grab the hammer then drop the tongs on the floor. Don't lay them somewhere, you're loosing precious time which translates to precious heat. Now do it for real. Once they are just stuck together, gingerly put it back in the fire as one part, another welding heat and go to it. It's always easier once they are already together. It's then a protected surface weld and a good deep weld. Another problem is just getting them lined up right. If you're off when you first touch them they stick and if you're off you've got a problem. I do the dance and go from there, but if I can I use the stick welder just to tack the pieces together in a couple small tacks and then do the forge weld.

This was last weekend at a demo at Dan & Judy Boone's in Virginia. I'm the one on the right.

They're not dumb questions if you don't know the answer. Have fun!

I only have a 1/3 hp bench grinder w/ wire wheel. That way if something goes wrong, and it often has, the motor stalls out. Still have to wear safety glasses and a face shield due to the wires flying out. I don't want a bigger one for that reason. I worked in a company shop that didn't have guards on their angle grinder and I had a piece clamped in the vise, it caught and threw the grinder at me and tore a slash through my shirts and across my gut. Luckily only enough to tear the skin, not any deeper. Keep those guards on!

See them all on the top of my table behind the vise? Good for you!

That's slick! Looks like a heavy duty hole saw. Does it have a drill bit in the center for that hole, too?

In the back of "A Blacksmithing Primer" there are plans for a coal forge from 1/4" ot 3/8" steel plate. Due to the angles of the sides and the grate mine lasted for over 9 years in 1/4" plate. The sides didn't burn out at all, they just warped. I just made new sides of 3/8" and I expect to get many more years from it.

Here's my old (1954) Southbend 9 x 48. It had belonged to a doctor who obviously didn't use it much. I was really surprised when I saw the frosting was still on the ways! Then there were full boxes of collets still in their original tubes. This is the table that it came on, but I since have scrapped that and built a good one with storage underneath. Only other thing I had to do was make a new belt for it. It was a deal!

Looking good, Sam! I think I would punch that on the end of some tool steel, trim down the piece you punched that into and make that into your punch. Then you'd have it raising out of the piece you punch. Oooo...

True, work coming out of you shop should have all of the prep done, but at a show and the people want to buy what you just made...wire brush it with the hand brush and clear coat it. It will look black anyway and the people will be proud to have it. (This upper part should be under the "instant Finishes" not this thread.) To add to what Dan said, gotta watch your sandblasters, too. I require them to wear gloves. If they come out carrying my piece in bare hands I make them take it back and re-blast it. That's due to the oils and greases on their hands.

Dan, try this with the saw: http://cdn0.grizzly....als/g9742_m.pdf It shows you how to set the angle. Once it's set properly you're good to go with no more fussing. Thanks, Dan. Those legs on the base were 2" round solid. It took the Nazel 1B, my 60 ton press and my poor back to shape and bend them. That's the second one I did. The first one had a sea shell in the center. Below is a shot of the base to the store fixture assembled. Would make a nice table, too.

How about : if you throw copper in a forge you will never be able to forge weld in it. I've had to dis-spell that many times over the years, but I still hear it.

Beth, she's the artist. Check this out: http://bathsheba.com/artist/

Looks like I missed that part. :wacko: Well, now Dave does a good job of showing you the technique without the horn. Practice, practice, practice...

That's it, Vanex Breakthrough paint. That's what I used on the entranceway except for the kisses. I heard someone else bought them out, but there are a lot of companies today that have a water base paint for metal. Funny, when I first got info from Vanex they had a picture of an iron gate and a quote from Tom Joyce on how he liked it. Of course it was his gate. We also used it on a gate restoration in the historic district of Philadelphia and it still looks great after many years. I've used both the pool chlorine and the low ph powders with equal results. Cheap and good results with both.

This has to rate up there pretty high: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-D6-w1g3_30 Not even welding on the anvil, just swinging in the air! Just jump up on it and hammer some more! Wow! There's also one of forge welding a huge anchor where they're adding pieces to the pile and swinging away. Incredible! Oh, it's about 5 minutes into the chain making video posted earlier.

God be with you all!

When I used to do outdoor shows I tried waxes and even burned on linseed oil, but just the sun and outdoor heat would melt it slightly. Not good to hand a sticky piece of work to someone. So I started just hand brushing the part and spray painting it with these quick dry clear finishes that are available. Dries in ten minutes and it would take more time than that to wax and buff. I used that method for over ten years with no problem. Makes a nice finish, too, if you get the semi-gloss.

Well, it's been over a year now so guess I can comment about my new bandsaw. I had an old horizontal bandsaw that had a 93" blade. Looked something like this, but like I said it was old. Throughout the years I've had a lot of jobs that required mitred cutting. To change the angle on this type of saw you have to move the angle of the metal in the saw. To do this you have to reach underneath the vise, where you can't see, find the bolt and then loosen the nut on top. Then bang the clamp that holds the metal and measure the angle to what you want. To measure the angle you have to use your own tooling as they couldn't even mark anything to give you a clue where you are. Then you tighten the bolt back up, must be a better way than this, and do a test cut. Of course it's off so you reach underneath, grab the bolt, same routine and another test cut. Do this until you're close and then start your cut. Whew! I'm tired just describing it. Sound familiar? Plus due to the shape of the material you may have to move everything to the other side to make the matching angle. I had a job coming in that I knew was going to require a number of miter cuts at exactly 45 degrees, The side and top pieces required them on a cabinet base for a store fixture. So I started asking around for a better solultion. Rich Waugh clued me in to the Grizzly 5" x 6" Metal-Cutting Bandsaw w/ Swivel Head. http://www.grizzly.c...ivel-Head/G9742 A year ago with freight and sales tax as it's a local company, it was $600. Now it's gone up around $50. Still half of the nearest "professional" saws that are similar in design. This is a smart saw. The head moves instead of the metal. Plus there is an angle scale built into the top right where you can see it. Once you set the zero angle every cut is right at where you set the blade. Also it cuts up to 60 degrees. Plus I'm surprised that for a 64" blade it cuts so much faster than my old saw. Due to its' design the footprint is about half of my old saw so it easily fits at the end of my steel rack against the wall. Now I have more floor space, and we all know how valuable that is. Only complaint I have is the so called automatic shutoff switch. As the blade comes down it hits the switch, well that doesn't work. They need something better there. It is a dry saw, but I've cut up to 2-1/2" round with it with no problem. With this new set up the saw paid for itself on the first job. I highly recommend it!. Here's the first job I used it on:

Bathsheba has been doing 3D printing for many years now and I am always astonished with what she comes up with. First off because she "sees" it in her brain first, figures out the math to create the convoluted intertwined piece and then draws it on autocad. Then the 3D printer brings it to life. Amazing stuff! http://www.bathsheba.com/sculpt/ Biggest change I've seen in 3D printing is the number of materials that they can print in. Oh,, I should also mention that on her "download" page she has sculptures that you can download, cut out the pieces and create your own metal sculpture.

Now, that's a well made axe and video! Thanks for sharing it with us!