ThomasPowers

I've seen punched channel in Wrought Iron fences---*real* wrought iron fences so that nowdays goes back 100 years or more... If I had to have the hollow I'd punch two channels and then weld them together... Thomas

When collecting roadkill be sure to be safe, saving a couple of dollars isn't worh spending thousands on car/people repairs. I haven't had any close encounters; but I would rather walk a ways than panic stop with someone already on my bumper! Note: always carry gloves in your vehicle and cardboard or a tarp to keep the trunk clean from messy finds. I keep a red flag in the glovebox just in case i find something long... Thomas

My main anvil stand is a baulk of timber I found floating in a creek during a flood---3 large timbers bolted together for about a 2'x14"x6' chunk. I have 400# and 500# anvil on it plus a swage block and a lot of loose tooling. I checked last night and the 500# anvil is mounted with 4 fence staples pounded in to the wood next to the anvil so it doesn't scoot around when we use the big sledge... Thomas

Hillbillysmith---you won't notice the weight difference between steel and real wrought iron, it's not that much. However they have made Ti prybars...spark test it! Thomas

I had to do some forge brazing in my gas forge last weekend. I found a steel tray that would fit and then filled it with small pieces of industrial coke so i could position the parts accurately and any excess flux was caught by the tray. Thomas

If the file is pretty small there might not be enough heat in it to keep the temp high when placed in the annealing medium. Heat up a "helper" piece of metal to the same temp and put *both* of them in at the same time. Thomas

Fly press can be a lot faster than some hydraulic presses; prewarming your tooling is always a help IMHO when welding. Thomas

Also note that the pritchel could have been added later---it looks pretty clean compared to the wear on the rest of the piece. Thomas

Sounds like Dodgy advice to me... Thomas

What type of bamboo? There are hundreds of varieties out there. Some would work great, some would be awful. You might try to get some samples of bamboo flooring to work with, it will be a type that is hard and durable and already treated for use. Thomas

"If you could chose only one book on Knife making what book would you recommend" I'd recommend you decide what type of knifemaking you want to do and then ask about *that*! I consider the good Dr's bladesmithing books to be very important references and the best out there for bladesmithing; *BUT* if all you are interested in is stock removal multibladed folding knives it is not the book for you. Sort of like asking the same about car repair and not telling us you are not interested in anything but model T's or diesels... Thomas

Ellen; why not use your flypress for welding? Thomas

Well I'm more of the side that crawled out of the hills, My father got a scholarship to college after he graduated HS (and married!) Ended up working for NASA and AT&T and retired a bigwhig. His father ran an implement business and farmed some on the side---with a 6th grade education IIRC. My other grandfathers: one farmed cotton in OK and died young when the tractor over turned and the next one farmed minnows! 160 acres of ponds and a vertical monopoly bait business in AR. We sold off our share in the cotton land to the cousin that's still farming it---told my mother when she asked if we should keep it that all it was good for was cotton and if I ever said I wanted to be a cotton farmer she should take a cast iron skillet and whop me up on the side of the head with it. (they *pay* me to sit in an air conditioned office here!) My great grandfather was the smith in cedarville AR (NW corner along AR59) and had 900+ acres when he died; most were sold off but I still have a share of what's left---scrub oak, stoney land and enough mosquitos that Toshiro Mufune on speed couldn't deal with them all. The branch still in Cedarville is a tad notorious in the region. 1045; hmm may need to juice that up a bit; but will probably go OK with L6 though I would like a bit more C... Thomas

Another method of getting "identical" scrolls is to forge the scroll to your satisfaction in *heavy stock* and the heat it and push it out so the middle sticks up and let cool and use it as a form. Mount it in a vise and you can then take a hot piece with the end already forged and then just grab the end and the form with a pair of tongs or vise grips and wrap the hot piece along the form. You will still need to "compress" it back to a flat plain but you will have "identical" scrolls Thomas

Jim; I know that I don't need to tell you this but for other folk reading---don't forget to relieve the ends of the fullers so you don't leave abrupt "steps" as you go down the piece. (Think of the fuller "face" as a rocker not flat and square) Hmm might be interesting to try it out with a tapered step block that you pull out as you work the piece (simple handle that you grab with the tongs?) so you deal with the distal taper of the blade but can't go too far... Not as fun as eyeballing but if you do a lot of something may be worth while. Thomas

Sandpile---you never let on that you had met my kinfolk when you were up in the hills! (My college roomate's mother came from a family that made shine and would tell tales about it on visits---I *never* asked what some of my cousins were involved in; that's *their* business; but I wouldn't be surprised if you had met a couple in your current occupation...) Me I'm from the "good" side of the family even if my Father was the first to ever have graduated from highschool...we fought tooth and nail to get off the old worn out hill farms and stood in complete bewilderment when the back to the land folk wanted to go back to them...I still have a share in some land in Cedarville AR though. I was hoping that Ellen would see that I came from a poor hill folk background and take pity on me; but knowing you're an old cowpolk would realize that you wouldn't even wake up for coffee mornings till you had been thrown and then drug through a mile or two of prickily pear Back to business: Anybody know what they use for the backside of bi metallic bandsaw blades? I've been given a bunch of worn out ones to play with. Tip for cutting bandsaw blades for billets: cut from the back--the front edge is hardened and will mess up your snips but the back is pretty soft and then you let the front edge break off rather than shear. I have a set of bulldog hand snips for "Stainless and Alloy Steels" that I mount in a vise and c clamp a stop on the bench and cut a bunch of billit pieces all at the same time. For the big re-saw blades I use a beverly shear. I have some 1' wide bandsaw blade from a mill that I need to billetize sometime but have not had the right tool yet... Thomas

Well you could mount it flush in a steel table top and then just stack firebrick to make the firepot you need for the job at hand but it might be handy to make an approximation of a firepot for that tuyere---just look at commercial ones and do a weld up that will bolt to your base. For a masonry Forge you would shape a depression in the table for your tuyere to mate with. Thomas

Well will you be needing to move it? For my demo/travelling anvils I have stuck a piece of 2x6 under the anvil and traced the curve on the side and cut them out and mounted them to the stand so the anvil drops in nice and snug but can be lifted of for transport. My shop anvil doesn't move much, it's a fisher and quiet an at 500# it pretty much just sits there with a couple of small nails so it doesn't drift under heavy hammering. For a nice noisy anvil a strap that you can cinch down helps---the one I have seen use a short piece of angle iron lagged to the side of the stand on each side with a hole drilled through it for a bolt and then the strap is bent around the anvil and then given a right angle bend on the ends with a matching hole for the bolt. Make a set for either end of the anvil and it holds well and quiets it down. A variation is to just use angle iron about 2" longer than the anvil is wide and drill a hole for a lag bolt in the 1" "slop" on each end. fit angle over the feet and lag down. Thomas

Sandpile, I've been a father to 4 kids and they are all doing me proud---even the ones I was not *the* father of. Makes me feel more important than any politician or celebrity out there. What I'm afraid of is that the first time we meet up with Ellen is that she'll take one look at us and then try to worm us... Ellen, have you tried the stainless tray filled with the cheapest clay based kitty litter they make to save your forge floor? IIRC His Purple Passionatistess suggested it quite some time ago on a forum no longer around... Thomas

Jim, I'm sure *everyone* in the class is just dieing to get to the "edge steeling on composite european style cored blade construction" part... As to billet sizes; I've been rather restricted as with no power to the shop my 30# champion is just sitting there laughing at me; but I could always do a road trip and borrow a couple of hours of hammer time from a smith some where. The helmet billets were made from 1.25" wide sawmill bandsaw resaw blades and wide strapping. Pay no attention to Ellen; she has livestock---a clear indication that the heat's gotten to her! Thomas

I had one that would "tic" on one fan blade. I adjusted the fan blade. I had another with slop side to side, there was a bearing adjustment on the other side I could move in but then it ran so it was always rubbing. The real fix would be to move the fan spider on the shaft to compensate but it had been in place a *LONG* time and was fragile cast and so what I did was to make a shim gasket for the cover from some scrap leather so it has a bit more room inside and doesn't rub anymore---it's worked ok as my main forge blower for 25 years now so I hope it was an "ok" way to go. I don't notice a decrease in effiency though I know they must have been some. Thomas

I have some bars I welded up for my helmet project sitting around waiting to be twisted and welded together---doing the chevron pattern thing. They could be "sacrificed" though they are pretty long and not too big in diameter. (5/8+ ?) Thomas

Loose as it spins on the drive shaft or loose as in the drive shaft has slop in it side to side? Thomas

Sigh, had a "friend" call me up over lunch saying he had something he thought could be made into a blacksmith's triphammer. Sure enough it was a small punch press as I expected. He did offer to sell me something I had expressed interest on at the tech auction but had not bid on as I didn't need it and it was lumped into a group with a couple of things he did need---wanted about as much as the whole lot went for IIRC and as that was about 5 times what I paid for similiar stuff previously I was not too enthused. Thomas

I used to live in a "bad" part of town in Columbus OH and having the shop cleared out was an on-going fear till It got full up of scrounged stuff and then fear of being sued when someone broke in and hurt themselves trying to relieve me of my junk. The basic rule was that all tools that would fit in a 5 gallon bucket lived in the basement and only when used would they go out to the shop. I had a break in a couple of times---had to fix the doors but nothing stolen. I particularly liked the one where they pulled open the doors to where I had several thousand pounds of wrought iron plate stored, plate that had been throughly mangled by a demolition contractor to be sort of like a large scale rusty slaw shredder---I checked for blood but I guess they were smarter than you would have thought... Thomas