Bentiron1946

I had a visit from an old friend of mine who wanted the name of the dog eye doctor. It appears that his shop dog had gone blind at the age of seven. I looked at the poor thing and he has cataracts that should be on seventeen year old dog. This fellow builds mostly fences and gates plus some sculpture these days. His dog is one of them faithful types that don't lay to far away from him when he works. His regular vet told him it was most likely from the arc and there wasn't anything to be done about it but he wants a second opinion. So what do you do for your dog's eye safety? His hearing safety? To keep form setting his fur on fire? I got to thinking about that after he left the house. When I am grinding I always just hope that the mutts have enough sense to look the other way but maybe they aren't that smart. One of mine is always under foot and that is an inconvenience plus a safety hazard for me and her. Let me know what you do with your shop dog/dogs when you are working.:confused:

At one time I wore soft contact lenses in the shop until the day I raise my face shield and the fellow across the shop started his grinder. The shower of shards sort of nailed my lenses to my eyeball, what pain, and the eye doctor in the emergency room suggested that if I was going to be doing metal work I invest in a pair of safety glasses with safety side shields. So I no longer wear contacts and I do have prescription safety glasses with side shields. I still have to get x-rays of my eyes when I get MRI's taken though because I work with steel. Brass, bronze, silver and gold are OK though. It just ferrous metals that are a problem for MRI's.

Frosty, You make it sound so simple. Thanks. Does the wood need to be well cured or can it be green?

WOW! A pneumatic operated helve hammer. What fun that must be. I never thought that when I posted that link to that short hammer that there were that many short, small hammers out there. Thanks!:D

I stopped at a blacksmith shop in Oklahoma in the late 70's and the ole boy there was using an old worn out pipe thread cutting machine to twist his rod. Nice slow motor and did a nice job on various sizes of steel. With the big chuck he had on there. He did both hot and cold twisting. Hot for tight twists and cold for window bars.

This sure is an evil post. I ain't got no money, my back is killing me and we sure as shooting don't got anything anyways near this good out here. The pictures of the tailgate sale look better then anything we got out here. Just plain depressing I tell you, plain depressing. So many tools so little time:D

I was just looking at the short Chinese hammer and thought of this one for you guys into homebuilts. It is a Zoller Forge style hammer, which is a modified Kinyon, and this guy has two of them at least but it is the "bench top" model that may interest you the most. Air Hammer Page P.S. Scroll down aways to see it.;)

That sure is a cute little hammer. It looks a bit short though. Are you a midget? I guess to get it at a comfortable working height you will have to put a reinforced concret base under it and lower that foot pedal some. Looks like you are going to have a lot of fun in the near future.:D

The boy done good for sure.:D

Now the two of you can forge together.:D

We have a lot of different species of rattlesnake out here but so far I have not had a serious situation. I bought a snake tong several years ago to remove from the property. I hate to kill them considering the amount of rodents they eat but the thought of them striking the old (me) or the young bothers me. This year so far my neighbor has had two Mohave, three Western Diamond and one Black Tail rattlers and he lets none survive. I do worry about the dogs condensing the cost of anti-venom, to save a dog it costs around $1,200 so if one of mine gets bit it is goodbye.:(

Just a tad far for me to make it but I bet the temperature will nice and cool compared to here.:)

I already thought that farriers were smiths. Well we won't hold the fact that you like horses against you. I guess that after your back and knees go you need to do a little diversification in the hammer skill department. Welcome IFI:D

Smooth! That thing works well to say the least. Nice sized compressor too.:D

This is the place to be. The BluePrints are a great resource for new ideas and there is always 'search' if you can't find it in BP or just ask and you will get an answer very quick. Welcome to the clan!:D

Well Roxy don't seem to care much for anything but sleeping, eating and pooping. Nice quiet dog. Don't show much interest in rabbits but is interested in lizards. I don't need another dog taking hammers and chewing the handles off, got one of them already.:(

It appears that I have a congenital problem with my lower back. The five lower vertebrae are malformed and can't hold the disk in place. Doesn't appear to be much they can do until I loose around one-hundred-fifty pounds. Then there is the possible hairline fracture of the hip. They also can't fix that until I loose weight.

It hasn't got a thing to do with smithing but she sure is sweet. Some idiot gave me a 18 month old Basset hound female. They thought she bayed a bit much for the townhouse but compared to my other dogs she's very quiet.:D

My prayers are with the surgeon as he is the one doing the cutting. You just have to take it:rolleyes:

I buy my fire clay at Phoenix Brick as they have a wide selectiion fire bricks too. I think that I paid less then $15 for my last bag.

Very nice looking gate for the wall but that would never pass the Phoenix, AZ city code for pool fences or gates. Fences must be a minimum of 5' tall, non climbable with bars spaced no more then 4" apart so a child's head can not fit between them. Gates must have self closers on them and a keyed lock, of course they have no appreciation for beauty either.

Now that you have the floor down you can build rammed earth walls. Same idea as the floor only use the cement/soil mix in a wood form and ram it down hard, then move the form up and do it again. Dirt cheap as they say:D

Hi Frank! Welcome IFI, I like the Blueprint section too. That is what brought me here at first too.

Someone was looking for a home built arc welder. Well I ran across this version while looking for something else. Homebuilt arc welder

I have used the soil, if you want to call it that, right out of my yard. We have very little organic material in our soil out here but do have granite particles. I usually buy fire clay at the masonry supply dealer in 25# bags though instead. Sounds like you just had a real fun experience especially with the hair jell.