Willis

For small projects, I use modeling clay. If you start your clay in the same shape as the stock you will be using, and then form it. You can see an almost step by step process.

Power hammer! I want one of these.

Great idea. I like this

I enjoy making these, but folks around here just wont buy them. Apparently it appears to be too much of a weapon. 

I bill them as 'swamp sticks'. We have a lot of national forest and protected wetlands around here and anything from snakes to alligators can come out of nowhere on some of these hiking trails trails. The first one I sold was to a little old lady who had trouble with her neighbors rot weiler as she walked the neighborhood.

I live in north Florida. We have sinkholes here that swallow houses.

My middle grandson will wear a black armband on this day from this day forward.

Cleaned up a musket to sell to my friend Steve O from Dothan Al. He not only showed up with the money but also with 200 lbs of coal. He says he paid $12.00 a hundred lbs from Enfinger Steel on Ross Creek in Dothan. Now thats a friend.

I deal with PTSD and Bi-polar disorder. My forge has more than once saved my sanity AND my marriage.

Its what we call productive therapy.

Check out any site for Polish Weapons from the Medieval period. These walking stick hawks were used by the Polish nobles of that period to beat the peasants with should they fail to pay their taxes. In fact the church outlawed the ax style head because the peasants were often killed. Instead they suggested a hammer type head so you could still punish the peasants rather than kill them. The nobles dont get paid,the church dont get paid.

This is of course only one of many stories you can find for the evolution of this type of 'walking stick'

You can always ask 'Me Bevis' to show you his forge after the show. When he replies 'my name isnt Bevis' you reply 'Oh, sorry, you must be the other one".

A friend of mine was doing a demo and making crucificxion style nails as used in the Roman era, an old lady told him he was wrong as they didnt have the tecnology to do that back then. His reply was 'well, ma'am I reckon they just DUCK TAPED Christ to that cross'.

Really nice job. I'm all over the copper guard. I use a lot of it. Copper plumbing caps make great butt caps.

Good job. I'm still trying.

I stabilize dried corncobs. I soak them in a 50-50 mix of polyurethene varnish and acetone for about 4 days, stick them on a nail with the head cut off and air dry for about a week. I have used them for tool handles, and knife handles. they can be turned on a small lathe. I even had a friend turn one on a pen lathe and present me with a unique writing instrument.

If you use a cheap hand vacume pump from Harbour Freight then I'm sure the process can be sped up or bettered in some way.

I use a large mouth glass  gallon jar with a small hole poked in the lid for the soaking process.

I get my dried corn from Wal Mart. They sell dried corn, about a dozen to a bag, in the garden shop listed as squirrel food. Just shell the corn off the cob and voila. Dried corn cobs.

I assume you can use the same process for wood, but with a longer soak time.

I've offered to teach a beginners class in blacksmithing to our church youth class. We are small but close. So far I have two girls intrested. :) My friend and I will also do demos for local churches with only three requirements. 1) we get to sell our wares 2) they have to feed us 3) we tithe 10% of our total profit for the day to the church that we demo for, any denomenation.

This opens up a whole new market for us and word gets around.

Our ministrie is also a 1/2 way house for recovering substance abusers and recovering alcoholics. I offer them classes also and so far have three students from the fifteen in that group.

I'm still at the 5 gal. bucket stage.

I have a squirrel nesting in an old cast iron tea kettle thats hanging from my shop rafters.

My two favorites.

I was using a 7" angle grinder and wasnt paying attention to where the sparks were going. I set myself on fire when the sparks lit up my T-shirt.

I went to polish up a knife handle yesterday. Turned on the buffer  and as soon as I touched the handle to the wheel it jerked from my hand and sliced the tip of my left index finger pretty bad.

I have also ground off about a half pound of skin from my knuckles over the years, ran a quarter inch drill bit thru the webbing between my left thumb and index finger.

People who work in emergency rooms call folks like us job security. I do take some comfirt in the knowledge that I help keep some people in a job.

Just yesterday our friends got married. He had the ring displayed on a 6" high cross with two entwined hearts. The hearts were made from trampoline springs and the cross was made from masonary nails. The upright from a 4" nail with the cross piece made from two 2" nails spot welded. The base was dogwood. Supposdly the wood that christ's cross was made from. Since the wedding theme was black and white. The cross was painted black and the hearts were painted white. I have no picts since the 'object D art'  is now on its way to a secret location with the honey-mooning couple. It was my wedding gift to them. Supposedly the groom got the idea from some pict on pintrest and ask me to make it or something similar.

Forged wedding gifts are indeed popular. Everything from a set of kitchen knives to the display stand for the cake or ring as the case may be. 

I keep my coal in a small broken down chest freezer aganist an outside wall of the shop about 20 feet from my forge. The seals are still intact so the freezer is still air and water tight.

I use the rivet method. Mostly for looks. My wife cooked three meals a day over an open fire for five days week before last at an 1814 event. She used a spoon, strainer and ladel that I made last year. No problems.

I've used osage orange, pecan and oak. I much prefer the osage orange because it's so dense and I like the color + whatever shavings/dust I have leftover from making the handle, I collect and my wife uses as a natural dye for yellow.

I really like this. Being from Florida, oyster knives are big around here also.

Keep it up. None of my fork tines ever come out even. Thats why I bought a bench grinder.

I've only been smihing about seven years. Many thanks to my then gilfriend-now my wife- who loaned me the money to take a Blacksmih beginers class at JC Campbell. It is a my stress relief and I love it.
I do have long hair and we do live in the Florida woods with five chickens, four pigs and numerous 'critters' and I'm old enough to draw social security next year.
I was on that bus a long time before I found my niche.

I like mine at my shoulder level about 56 inches.