blafen

what is wuhu iron? could you post the link? never heard of forge drilling myself?

aluminum melts at a very low temp you should be able to forge a ladle (deep spoon like thing) to melt and pour the aluminum, use a tow hitch ball to forge the ladle. wait do you mean to make aluminum moulds to pour other metals into or moulds into which you would pour molten aluminum?

sort of off topic but i once had a piece of orange hot steel i was cutting fly off the anvil bounce off a wall bounce off that wall hit my anvil and then bounce into an open gas can my dad left in my shop luckily it had no gas in it but i stood there marvelling at how it bounced and bounced finally to go right into the inch and a half opening on the can.

Well my first forge was made from on old tire rim that i lined with regular red clay, and used a large T shaped tuyere, i burned charcoal in it and regularly got it up to forging temperatures, I also cut two notches one on either side of it so i could pass logner stock through the forge, but it was still very limiting and could have been designed to hold heat better, but for a first forge with items you probably have at your house already its a great deal. oh yeah and for a blower i used a regular shop vac hooked up to a dimmer switch so i could adjust the speed.

i've had a piece of damascus unweld on the polishing wheel which raised a little steel flap which caught on the wheel and drove the chunk of steel through my 3/4 inch plywood bench top.

I was shocked when my shop teacher who i thought was extremely knowledgablebegan setting aside scrap pieces for us to practice welding an he had all kinds of galvanized bits, and i explained to him the negative effects of the galvanization burning off and he got the textbook which listed nothing at all about the effects of burning off galvy. luckily he allowed me to use his computer and i took him to this site and showed him the thread about how Paw paw died from burning galvanization off of steel. if i have to use a piec of galvy i will throw it into some muriatic acid for a while, and then use the steel, because most of the tie you cant grind every bit off. but i am appy to say there is a sing above each welding station in our shop at school that says not to weld any galvanized metal. ( i got em to give it me )

beautiful nice flow to the overall piece and looks like it can cut like nobodies busines.

no way my shop is tiny, i have roughly 2 feet by 8 feet of free space and everything else is ttols anvils drill press and grinder table workbenches forges etc. etc. kiln clay spinning wheel thingy (my grandmas) all stuffed in between my house and water tank.

beutiful blade and good pattern there, it came out very good for a vineager etch i can only get that kind of bold pattern with muriatic acid or other harsh dangerous etchants. sure wish my forge was working.

this is his first post, hes got a generic username ad ibasically hocking some product, yeah this scream commercial.

wow, that is lame.

i get my 20 mule team borax at wal-mart, they were actually sold out on it once.

i would remove a segment of the bulldozer to use as an improvised anvil, then burn the 2x12 into charcoal to forge the spring steel into a bar and attach that to the 2x4 mild steel. i would then connect both ends of the slightly curved steel bar with some chord and forge and file me some arrow heads from the hot cuts. saw a notch to recieve the string on the mild steel bar and viola you got yerelfs a crossbow.

i have a large machete and a monster bowie knife out of 5160 leaf springs from a truck, both work well and hold a pretty good edge. the vasco wear i hear is very hard to work with and if you are a new to blacksmithing i would suggest something simple like the 10xx series of steels, or maybe o1 and 5160 are easy to work with.

wow thats just rude lol.

brand: vulcan size:200 pounds year:2006 i think condition: good price $500, steep i know but i live in hawaii and this was cheaper than shipping, on most anvils.

i believe the liqiuid probably has other ingredients that would ruin a weld, and it would spatter when poured onto a red hot surface. i use the white powdery borax and it works just fine.

i used 5/8 round mild steel, to make my tongs and they have held up to quite alot of abuse, as i generally reforge to fit the size stock im working. 3/8 might work if you harden and temper it, and also drill small a pilot hole and open it up to keep alot of steel around the hinge pin.

i use a 1-1/4 by 1-1/4 inch steel bar, and clamp it in my vise and i then use a c clamp to attach the blade to the steel bar. it makes it much easier to file the sides and edge bevels of the knife.

hey man at least you dont live in a stat where the cost of shipping an anvil is equal or more than the price of an anvil. i got a 200 pound vulcan for 500 dollars and im not complaining.

my dad was drilling and had this happen to him, he waited till the next day to get it removed and they used a wire brush (hopefully nylon bristles not steel ) to remove the rust. but an interesting side note is that if you enter an MRI with that chunk of steel in there it will be violently ripped from your eye and that it wont always go out but it may go back through your eye towards the back of your skull(or so says the doc) which sounds reasonable eough considering the magnets involved

this is the story my shop teacher told us about rings and jewelry etc. in the shop and i really didnt believe him, until now.

a very good trick i use (i think i got it from this site) is to hang a bucket of water in front of the grinder and as soon as it gets too hot just dunk it.

what kind of problems did you encounter, i am a fairly new smith been doing this for a few years, and i tried to weld a blade right off the bat, i weled up hacksaw blades and mild steel in my charcoal forge to check the temp i twisted some bailing wire together and would heat it in my forge and try to weld that. i actually welded the blade succesfully( so i thought) until it totally came apart on me during the filing my next blade was a marginal success as most of the welds took and but it had several cracks and coldshuts and i had to remove so much material that it isn really viable as a knife anymore. but just go slow and keep at it. clean the metal thoroughly and make sure you flux well and check the welds after each pass and before you fold, nothing ruins your day like a blade you've been working on for almost a week falls apart in your hands :(

i have tested this on a piece of flat iron stock, by coating the blade in parrafin, and cutting my name out, then i built a little retaining dam around the waxed area to hold the acid, i used plumbers putty for that which didnt work good (it reacted with the acid, not violently but still not good)