edge9001

I have a guy giving me close to 30-5 gallon buckets of coal. free. this guy bought a house and in the basement, coal. he has no use for it, so it is listed on craigslist for free. also myt anvil a railroad car coupling knuckle found by the side of the road free. what have been some other good "finds" or give-a-ways you guysa have run across?

i light my forge with my propane torch, the ones that use the camp stove propane bottles. of course i burn charcoal in my forge. i clean then fill my forge with charcoal, then start the airflow just slightly, and then put the torch to it. it is going in about 2-3 minutes.

well I figured since I was gonna be seeing Mark Aspery soon, I'd better get some practice time in, been really busy with a biiiig party for Mem day, 120 people showed, sooooo I decided to go try a new bottle opener out, now as you all know, when you don't do somethin for a while, it seems to have faded from your memory exactly how to do it right. In any event, this was the one that reminded me of all the wrong ways to do it, but I didn't have the heart to pitch it in the pile out back, I tested it last night on a Dos Equis, and it works, so even though it's a screw up, welll you know, time and sweat and all that, but you can see where I'm going with this design!!

It was a wood lathe chisel a half round profile 1-1 1/2 inch wide. similar to the third from the left in the picture.

I was really looking for a longer blade than that, but by the time I get around to messing with this blade again, I probably will forge a tang with what is left.

it's still agrivating though. This blade was almost finished, I wasn't going to polish it. I was just going to mount it to the oak handle with some epoxy for a hidden tang with a copper guard and leave it black.

Today I attempted to make a knife from steel other than mild HD flat bar. I used an old lathe tool to make this blade. I hardened it and then...this happened. Before tempering it(big mistake) i tried to make a copper handguard for my knife. anyone ever hear of copper breaking steel. now you have. I did it. I know before everyone yells at me for not tempering it. My ADD got the better of me and I got on a side track and tried to do something else first. Now I need to decide should i try to forgeweld it back together, or throw it to the scrap pile. as i have never welded before i will probably scrap it for now and learn to weld later.

Try a bathroom fan, I have one of them on my brakedrum forge. I'm not sure if it will meet your needs, but with a charcoal fed brake drum forge it seems to work for me. I am new to this and I've been beating on the hot stuff for about a monthnow, but like i said, it seems to work for me. you can get a bathroom fan startting around $15 they are quiet come prewired for power and ready to go, I got mine hooker up in about 2 minutes. here is a picture of the fan used available from HD for about $15 not to mention quiet, nearly silent

sorry about the confusion about the temps. I'm not sure if my forge can get to welding temps, and I'm not really sure about heat treating, it is hit or miss. I was a bit tired while i typed that. So I need to go to a few meetings somewhere and I need to read a few more books.

I have made a pretty good, but ugly tomahawk from a ballpeen hammer, and it seems to be pretty hard, my file wouldn't cut into it, it skated off the surface with out as much as a scratch. I used a propane torch to temper it (i think).I got the cutting edge to a straw brown color by heating the body of the blade section neat the handle eye. I put the torch flame on the middle of the blade section right up next to the eye, when the cutting edge turned straw colored I quenched it in water. If i can get a camera working I'll post some pictures of it.

Now if I can get some good steel instead of just the "plain" steel bar offered at the homedepot. I'm going to try my hand at makeing a few blades.

I've been on the look out for a local group the closest ive found so far is abana, but it's too far away for more than a once or twice a year trip. I live in the nw corner of Ga. near me i have 3 atlanta, knoxville, TN and alabama, all over an hours drive for me. still looking though. as for my "anvil" yes lots of useful curves. Before i found these (i found 2 of them) all i ha was a piece of cast something or another, this little thing is just a 4 inch round by 3 inch cast iron puck. it was terrible even for the 3 days i tried to use it. ot enough mass under the hammer and no rebound at all, not to mention it moved with every swing.

I can't find an anvil, nor can I afford to buy one if i did. I had thought of using the tried method of using a piece of railroad track as an anvil. while trying to find one i found what looks like a railroad car coupling. It so far seems to work wonderfully. It is made from what seems to be steel, this thing has a nice ring when I hit it. I've made a few knives on it, nothing worth posting pictures of just some ugly "shop use" blades, barely more than and edge ground on a piece of steel. I'm trying to learn how to work steel and so far seems to be pretty straight forward process. I hope to make some nive blades someday. I'm not sure if my forge gets to welding temps or not, so heat heat treating is hit or miss so far. I really need to buy a few books, up to now allmy learning has been from this forum and youtube.

Mine is just a 55gal drum lid with 1/2" pipe for legs no mess no fuss construction.