ThomasPowers

Are you planning to leave it in "as cased" condition? any clean up of the blade afterwards will substantially remove the case hardening. The big question is "why" go through all the work to make a low grade blade and then spend more time trying to "fix" it?

"if your only tool is a match---all problems look flammable!"

I like to source sharpening stones at fleamarkets as many lovely *old* stones can be found at give away prices. Much nicer than the cheap chinese stones sold today. Knowing the old techniques for cleaning and flattening old stones helps too. (as was living in Arkansas where novaculite was mined...)

My grandfather used to do those at fleamarkets---never had to heat them though. Used a wooden or nylon hammer as I recall. Then used to flatten out the spoon bowls and make wind chimes from them and the fork remnants

Hey I've been smithing for about 33 years now and I'm still learning; I figure the day I stop learning y'all should just drop me in a hole and start kicking dirt over me... As I've mentioned; my great grand father was the smith in a small rural Arkansas hill town. There are things he could do offhand that I will probably never learn to do. OTOH there are things I do on a regular basis that he never learned and I know a lot more about the science and history of the craft than he ever needed to know for his career. Hmm perhaps it's a bit like cooking; when do you call yourself a cook?

Perhaps you are hanging up on the difference between a blacksmith, a good blacksmith and a great blacksmith. Do you manipulate steel/iron's form using heat to make it soft but not molten? If so you are a blacksmith.

The fryer regulator I got off a turkey fryer and used for my forge went to 20psi and has worked for over 10 years so far...can't say about more recent ones---got it cheap at a fleamarket where the dealer hadn't noticed it was dangling off the back of the trailer and had worn off the brass propane fitting end...scrounged another one of those from a junked gas grill that had a large bore fitting too and was in business for US$3 total

But Frosty it gives it that "Post Apocalypse Play-Ground" look! Can't wait for the cutting tests.

Yup I heard a story about a smith that would just dump the anvil in the bed---until the day he "accidentally" got a custom anvil armrest!

If it's hitting the truck's horn *you* are in deep kimchee!

Blacksmith truism: You need N+1 propane tanks when you own N

So now what are you going to make???

mega-rhino-plasty indeed! Though in humans they generally reduce the sice of the nose... I'm sure it could use some time in the sun after the repair and I would like to volunteer my shop in very sunny NM, USA!

I've seen it done with those before; but for me it's always been cheaper just to buy vises that have a good screw/screwbox; *or* pick up piece parts vises---local antiques place had such for US$24 that had a good screw/screwbox. (of course they originally priced it at $90 and after pointing out I was buying *good* vises for less than that we came down to $24---but my buy point was $20; so it's still there or was sold on in the meantime.)

mine huffs when the jet is not perfectly aligned concentric with the pipe

Actually sounds pretty good; especially the tempered the whole blade blue before colourizing it and the weight is quite spot on!

Actually I was referring to a method to accurately determine alloy content where you clean a surface and make a spark off it and then evaluate the frequencies giving the elements it contains---fancy piece of equipment. see wiki---http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_emission_spectroscopy You are thinking of the spark testing for carbon content---doesn't usually tell you what other elements are present!

Unless you work a lot with sheet metal it's not usually worth being overly concerned with getting a perfect line up---especially side to side. Grinding to match may change the distance where the face of the jaws are parallel. Also some vises have steeled jaws and grinding may thin the steel face out. Usually if they don't align well it's a sign that someone put a piece way out at one edge and then torqued down on the handle twisting the shaft of the jaw. One thing to do to prevent this is to make a set of spacers to match standard stock sizes that you can put on the far side of the vise when needing to work a piece at the very edge of the jaws. That way they can't twist the shaft of the jaw as there is a "stop" on both sides of the screw's pressure point.

For medieval knives one topology dealt with how they were steeled: butt, lapped, insert and overlay.

"The real expression is "That'd be cheap at twice the price," but my father would purposely say it the other way to see if anybody caught on. He could be perverse." The apple doesn't fall far from the horse...

Without knowing the manufacturer and date it was manufactured and part number--- NOBODY knows exactly what it is. Without testing. "Junkyard rules" apply. Remember *NOTHING* prevents a manufacturer from changing which alloy they use 3 times a day---unless their documentation specifies a specific alloy for that specific blade. Spark spectroscopy is one method of finding out the details on an unknown alloy.

Immediately use the news to push for rebuilding and accepting donations of materials and TOOLS! The Shop shall rise again! (and this time split off those noisy dusty woodworkers to their own shed!)

Well traditionally when you wore the steel bit out you took it back to the smith and had them weld another on---what's the worry? Think of it like tires on your car---they wear out you put new ones on...

May be a variation of L6

I should have specified that 1/2" was too thick for the copper to be formed. For the die it would probably depend on what type of die.