robert hanford

If you are a beginner, Randy McDaniel's book or Lorelei Sim's book are excellent. Randy's book has information on forging a dragon head which was very exciting for me, and got me to keep going beyond the wall hook phase. Get them both on Amazon.com.

I tried it today. It seems to work well. I'm wondering if the iron powder behaves like a solder and sticks the pieces together.

Well, this is the Internet I am sure that the recommended teachers are excellent! Do any of us really have the information or the omniscient judgment to be able to proclaim who is he best?i What's good for one person may be not as good for another. What is difficult for one person might be the ideal for another. I'm just saying your criterion, although useful, is kind of simplistic. sorry for the late hour, if I don't make sense.p

It's great to see that project come alive! It only gets better! I think you have been hooked!

I have something like that. It brings me great pleasure. It is not big, but it serves the purpose of having a nice little enclosed forge and actually we wired it with electricity recently.

This will literally be my first TV show in years! I'm actually going to be purchasing a TV soon and can't wait for your program!

Personally, the above advice is wonderful, I might add that I have had more success using slightly thicker stock. The thin stock loses heat very fast.

Awed. And wish it were mine(but of course I am happy you have it.) And thank you for your instructional videos. They are excellent.

Nice!

Great job! Much better than my first pair of tongs. I am sure you will get a lot of pleasure out of using them. Isn't it amazing when they actually work?

LarryH. The work is beautiful and clean. Bravo --to you and your student. Although I have a full-time job in another discipline I will be taking a course in blacksmithing soon, and hopefully it will open up some new possibilities for me.

Hi I am a hobbyist, but I make bottle openers a lot like that one, except on the wide end of the spike I make a Dragonhead and draw out the tip of the spike to make a tail which is then curled back to make a little resting place for the thumb. Speaking to the topic, it is interesting how similar the disciple/student aspect is to what I do for my living, yet also how different.

Nice!

Well, it must've been quite a party.

You have a good point! From my perspective, the tools I use to make a living are many times more expensive than a power hammer for instance. Blacksmithing is expensive, yes, but there are other professions with a much larger outlay. So I say, don't be cheap if you are going to go into it professionally, but if you are a hobbyist, thriftiness is part of the pleasure. Just my unconsidered 2cents

I am an amateur, however I started out with a brake drum and extremely quickly decided to save up my change for a real fire pot. You can use anything for a blower, and easily exchange blowers when you decide to upgrade, but a good firepot makes a huge difference. In my opinion, spending some money on a good fire pot is really worth your while, as you might waste your time, and also wind up spending a whole a lot of money trying to make secondhand materials work for you. Although for all I know you might be much more of a do-it-yourself guy than I am, and actually have a lot of fun with fabricating something for yourself. Good luck! Robert

Beautiful. I look forward to being able to do something like this myself, preferably this summer! Robert

Thank you for sharing your experience. You have obviously learned something from it, but putting it out there also helps us to be more safety conscious.

I just wish I could figure out how to access Brian's photos. this technique sounds very useful. maybe I will be able to access them on my PC, my mobile device sometimes is not appropriate for this website.

Oh no, don't start talking about Stradivarius- what was his Secret really?

Most amusing! Thank you for posting.

I like the poem. But what was that – near the beginning – object being put into the bonfire – a RR spike!? Noooooooooooooooooooooo!!!aaaeeeeeeeee!!!