matt87

Smoke is not an energy.

Well I guess this sums it up Thermite welding - Wikipedia

I understand completely :)

My girlfriend wants me to make (assemble, my bladesmithing woudl truly suck) her a sheathknife. She's picked out the parts, now I have to put it together. Lucky old me eh? :D

I agree. The government making available a decent rifle and/or pistol to each eligible citizen once they reach a suitable age for little or no money makes a lot of sense... though I wouldn't neccesarily want to force people into it.

I use charcoal exclusively, but then I am a rank n00b with a history obsession, forging in the tiny back yard to my rented house... There are many features I like about charcoal: it's renewable, it's the more traditional fuel (in terms of number of millenia it has been used vs. other fuels ), it has virtually no smoke, no complex or possibly dangerous gas fittings and valves, you can make your own fuel, and it doubles as one xxxx of a barbecue! I also hear it's virtually self-fluxing, but then I haven't attempted forge welding yet...

Dan, are you willing to reveal the location? MY parents live to the NW of London..

For now, I just put a jumper on under my overshirt. After a fwe minutes of pumping the bellows or swinging a hammer, I'm not too sure it is winter...

An outhouse paper holder? Could be as simple as a spike to drive into the wall.

When I have more space, I have a few of them projects slined up... power hacksaw and model lathe for instance. Great site!

Loaded chamber + safety is one thing, but I'm sure you wouldn't put your hand over the muzzle of a loaded gun if you knew the trigger sear were worn out of spec...

+1 Frosty! For most of the 3,000 years of iron usage, general-purpose anvils were often hornless. Japanese swordsmith anvils still are. Plenty of very good work can be done on a hornless anvil. Heck, look at the work Viking smiths were able to make on sub 5lb lumps of wrought iron! :D

Careers exist... just not many. Where are you exactly? What aspect of blacksmithing?

You sure it had a horn? Is there a scar? It may perhaps have never had one...

A skill which is very useful: 1) Scroll to top of page 2) Click 'search' (third from the right) 3) Enter search criteria (e.g. blacksmith NJ) 4) Hit [return] 5) Find it

I find this very useful, you might do so too MatWeb - The Online Materials Information Resource

/me votes this becomes a sticky

Saw this today while trawling fleabay. Looks to me like a little post vice which someone hacked into a crude little table vice thing. Find Miniture Blacksmiths Vice.(end time 11-Nov-07 22:04:07 GMT) I was wondering if it would be possible/easy to turn this into something closer to what it was originally. I don't have arc welding capabilities but I would take it to a garage near me and have them do the work.

I did a bit of research on maille-making a couple years ago. See if your library has a copy of Ffoulkes' "The Armourer's Craft". Think it's from 1912, and is somewhat like the armourer's Bealer. Teh conclusion I came to is this: - Butted is fine for some situations. Still takes a long time though. Not authentic though; if you can seperate the rings with a pair of needlenose pliers then what chance will there be with a fulll sword swing, even a non-live edge? - Welding already has been mentioned. You might be able to spot-weld rings, as already mentioned, but forge welding would be a) more authentic more difficult. - Rivetting/bradding is the way that most maille was constructed 'back in the day.' Still lots of effort. Ffoulkes says that some rings were solid and speculates that they may have been stamped/punched from sheet iron, but IIRC most these days think they are forge welded wire. Ffoulkes could not, apparently, see the point in solid rings mixed with welded/punched, since a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. However, I think that it was a matter of time saving; you can heat a wire ring to welding heat fairly quickly without the problems associated with heating lots of rings just to weld one, and it was a lot of fiddly work to rivet or brad a ring. With, say, Euro 4-to-1 pattern you would only have to rivet/brad 1 ring for every 5; you make up a bucket of welded rings and link 'em with brads! Another big problem is finding plain mild steel or iron wire. Mind you, drawing wire down by hand would be good practise As far as jigs, look up coiling mandrels on maill-making sites. Save you a lot of time!

No blacksmiths that I know of in my family, though my mum's mum's dad was a scrap metal dealer. My dad is self employed and part of what he does involves building bespoke furniture. His dad was a tradional French Polisher (a cabinet maker who uses French polish, he weren't French! ). His dad before him was the same too. When my grandad died, most of his tools wre piled into the garden shed. Some were chucked. A few were given to my dad. Most are still in my nan's shed though I think; noone wanted to do much with them when he died because of the emotion involved. One day I'd love to work with some of his tools, some of which were his father's.

I believe pottery supply companies carry haematite and such.

Now now Ian don't lose your temper over it! After all, you are a man of mettle...

Update on Ironbridge WI: I happened upon this (well actually my girlfriend did ) while searching for something else. Turns out it's pure iron rather than wrought. Pure Iron - The Core Element

Steel... mild, medium or high?

What type? Single-action? Great (double-action)? Chinese box? There are a few articles on building great bellows on the net, but IIRC they are mainly 3 foot by 5 foot. Think there is a blueprint or two also. Sugest you use heavy canvas or similar rather than leather; that stuff gets expensive!