ThomasPowers

If you have a need for 3/4" thick stock.

Bell, gas forge shell, dishing form; all that is left is the squeal and the cutting swarf!

What did the company that makes it suggest when you asked them?

Glad nothing worse was hit! I remember having to climb a tree that was dying near our house and take it down in about 60cm lengths using a bowsaw to make sure it wouldn't hit the house the next big storm we had.

I still have a piece of air dried oak to make a crossbow stock out of; been drying for over 200 years now, yes 200 years. (Barn torn down by a developer in NJ) Maybe when I retire... IIRC The modern Blacksmith predated Foxfire 5 by half a decade. Coming from the hills myself, Ozarks, I've liked the Foxfire series and understand that their methods are often based on what they had rather than what might be best. (Shoot a lot of my work is still based on that!)

One issue with RTB is that the books often are not written with respect to what we are doing. (And how we are doing it.) I once saw Daryl Meier's copy of a well known handbook on heat treating steel and there were a very large number of inserted pages with how heat treating blades differed in practice from the "industrial" suggestions. A big one is that most heat treat info is based on a cross section of 1" You know any blades 1" thick? This is why you often can slide one quenchant less aggressive (water to oil, oil to air, etc---depending on alloy). Also the slide can throw you off when you find that something has hardened on you unexpectedly! (O-1, in thin crossections, hardening in air has a history of surprising folks.)

While TLWEC had a bit of smithing info in it my first dedicated to smithing book was "The Modern Blacksmith" published in 1974 and I think I found a copy remaindered in the late 1970's and it's still a favorite of mine even over "The Edge of the Anvil".

Now it's a Friday; I was just contemplating the carving of a flower from a 2x4 with a knife... As a kid we spent a lot of vacations in Florida as my Father worked on the Apollo Project. I used to use my boy scout pocket knife and carve swords from palm frond center ribs. Of course Mel Fisher was finding the 1715 treasure fleet back then too. IIRC, the first documentation I remember about knifemaking was how to make a knife from an old file in the Last Whole Earth Catalog.

I don't know your weather conditions, (save lower altitude and much damper than mine), but will you be heating it in the winter? I have a small old coal stove that came from a schoolhouse that I could use.

However I have found that trying to work after dark by the light of the forge is NOT a good idea. My smithy has a couple of fiberglass panels for skylights mounted away from the forge for daytime and I hope to put in some led shop lights for after dark. Perhaps you could forge some "authentic looking" lights and use led bulbs in them. I have some old lard cans that would make great "shades" for outhouse lights...

DON'T GO THERE! (Getting power to my shop has just about reached the 1 year mark with a substantial payment made on it last June!) You at least luck out with 220 being standard. Will you be using LED lighting?

I'm wondering if the WP is an owners stamp and more recent as the pitting doesn't extend into it. "Too bad it's not WTP" said William Thomas Powers covetously...

Probably a lot like the Chance Brothers: Slim, Fat and Nota!

After I get power to the shop I'm planning to put a "gazinta" into the shop driveway so I can drop in a sq post with a large post vise mounted to it for when I need to swing a long bar and be able to pull it up and store it in the shop for when I don't. Perhaps you could build a little wooden "house" to go over the outside vise when not in use?

Thursday October 21: No sign of work by the SEC; we're down to the "wire" if they are going to get anything done "the week of October 18". I was thinking of taking Thanksgiving week off and finish up things; but it needs to be done *after* the final inspection... I try not to burn my bridges before I get across them. Remember this as a rural area; this isn't a large faceless corporation! I go to church with some of the SEC, meet them in the grocery store; pick over what they have scrapped at the junkyard, etc. (Since my smithy is based on several Utility poles, fittings from utility poles are handy!)