TomN

Thanks. Good to know.
I have some spring steel, but its in the form of a coils spring from a car. Probably not the best thing to try and make a hardy tool from.

Nice salesmanship John. I am now very tempted by that!
Might have to talk to the wife again.

Thanks for the details. I will give this a go, when I get a chance.

What is kroil?
Forgive my ignorance!

I was fortunate enough to come into the possession of a few pairs of rusted old tongs recently.
I need to free them up and remove the rust, so they become usable.

Any tips?

What steel was the stock?
I need to make myself one of these!

I'd love to have a go at these, but have got to make some tools for it first.

I have a question about the faggot weld.
Presuming you get the metal nice and clean and flat against the other piece, what other criteria do you need to get the weld to stick?

What sort of temperature does it need to get up to, to weld?

I'd love to be able to do one of these at a show coming up soon! May be a little ambitious though.

I went for spotted dog.
For the simple reason that it sounds more 'friendly'. I know that probably sounds rediculous, but the others sound a bit serious.

Trying to think up a name for my litle workshop at the moment as well.

I shall be at Thame on the 8th John. Look forward to seeing you there.

Going to be practising my little demostrations and will try them out on the wife.
Also going to try and make up a load of things that I could sell.

Think I will keep it simple for the demo's. Maybe a leaf key ring and a hook. And maybe a bbq drink caddy thing!

I'm practically salivating at the patern welded, bearded axe near the middle!

I suppose you could always put collars around the welds to hide them Beth.

My left forearm, near my wrist has been aching for days and a bit swollen. Not when I twist my wrist it 'creaks' like two bits of leather rubbing together. So I think I have tendonitis. Iritating!

Got to let that heal and then get myself set up to get some practice in before the Thame show. Going to that Beth?

We did indeed John.
It was nice to meet some more like minded people and have a good chat whilst forging. I was getting on very well with the chap next to me, the farmer from Launceston. We were helping each other with bits when needed as well.

Looking forward to finishing off my hanging basket bracket.
Thanks again John.

We started off by making two punches, a round one and a square one.
Following that we went on to make a hanging basket bracket.

Techniques were punching holes in the backing plate, and splitting the top out to shape a fleur de lys sort of shape.
We then made the 'arm' by upsetting the bar and then making a tenon. I'm sure John has put up some pretty detailed explanations of the process, with pictures!
Then we attached the arm to the backing plate. John showed us how to make a scroll for underneath, with a leaf on it. Then he shaped it to fit the underside of the bracket. Then he showed us how to make a collar to fit it all together. Very concise techniques, explained in detail but simply enough so all could understand.

Very usefull indeed! Its given me the knowledge to be able to make a load of items now. Just need to practice now!

Just had a call from Giles. Looks like I may be going to the Thame show to help him and promote the Guild.

Went on the joining methods course last weekend.
Very useful and more knowledge gained. Hopefully I will get a bit more time now to work on my forge.

John very kindly let me have some old tongs from the workshop as well, which is a massive help. They need some TLC, but I will get them up and going!

Indeed he does. He took some photo's as well, so hopefully he will get them up in a while.
I forgot to take my camera which was very foolish of me.

Hope all is well with you Beth.

Shame you didn't make it Beth. Was a very useful course. As always John delivers knowledge well.

I agree, that dates would be very helpful. I am away for 2 weeks in June, but mostly free on the weekends after that.

John made me aware of this on the joining methods course last weekend.
I could make a few of the shows in and around Oxfordshire.

I have very minimal experience and very few tools, but I will be practising soon, now that we are getting rid of the snow.

There may not be a lot I can make, but i'd be happy to fetch and carry.
Will certainly help me make a few contacts I suppose and see how people make their money smithing. Plus I am all for helping keep the craft alive, if I can help.

I would be interested if the money was right. (sadly can't work for free)
Certainly wouldn't cause any problems if I could help it.

Will watch this thread with interest!

I finsihed off my letter opener with the angle grinder and the missus wrapped it up.
It became a present for my Dad and he really liked it and he could even tell that it was a letter opener, so it must have been roughly the right shape.
I will be the first to admit that the letter opener was a little ugly, but it was functional. So i'm hoping the next one will look a fair bit nicer, as well as doing the job it needs to.

I've just been let know that my new blower has turned up. Its a bouncey castle inflater, so should be putting out a lot more air and will help me get a deeper fire. This will make my life a lot easier for heating the middle of bars!
I have to thank JohnB here for giving me the advice on this and even sending me an ebay link. Hopefully I will get to try it out at hte weekend.

I've also booked my next course as well, on joining methods, in February.

Thanks a lot for the links John. The bouncey caslte blower looks great.

Cheers Beth.

Getting this will help me get working on some festive projects.

Big blower it is then!
I will get sourcing over the holiday period.

Thanks for all the advice guys and the pictures John.

Sorry about the lack of details, but I was on my lunch break at work, so had to write it quickly and hope people would understand what I was talking about.

There are a few images in my workshop setup thread. In the first post!



As you can see the fire pot is quite deep and tapers in. There are no slots to slide stock into the fire.
I've been using coke as the fuel and getting a really nice fire going with it. The only blower i've got so far is a cheap hairdrier, but its working ok. Will look to upgrade after xmas!
I'd say the fire pot is about 4 inches deep. I get a few inches of nice glowing coke in the bottom, but really need it a bit higher to get the stock in there heating.
I wouldn't be able to fit a brick in there, so would have to cut one up into sections if I went that route.

Hope this information is helpful......

Hi all.
I've not long been forging at home, but i've made a start. I have a solid fuel forge, with a deep ish fire pot. I can get a nice fire going and have made a few things, but I get a bit stumped when trying to heat a bar at any distance away from the end.

Is there a good method to build up the fire, so it reaches up out of the top of the firepot (ie - increase the depth of burning coke)?

If I could do this, then I could heat the middle of bars and it would make my life a lot simpler.

Cheers.

The gates looking nice Beth. A very interesting idea to incorporate the pitchfork in there. I like it!
Its wonderfully symetrical as well.
As for Wespoint, i'm planning on going down there for next February for the joining methods course. Hopefully taking the wife along and making a long weekend of it. I think theres some forge welding in that course, if only briefly!

I finished off my letter opener. In the end I improved the twist to make the end sit square with the profile of the 'blade' and then shaped the 'blade' to near a leaf shape. I then used an angle grinder to finer shape the rest of it.
It came out a little ugly, but its functional and has been used to open a few letters!
It will be a gift for my Dad, so I made sure its not sharp on the edges, and the end is rounded. He will have to take it back on the plane to America, so I didn't want him to get in trouble at customs!

I'm hoping to make a few more bits over the Christmas holidays. I'm going to make a poker for my friend who lives over the road and possibly another one for a guy I work with as well.

I will try and keep adding photo's on here as I go.

stewart - The anvil came from a school apparently. I had a choice of 2. This one, or another one which was larger, but came with a stand. This anvil had nicer edges to it though, so went for it!

Beth - Look forward to seeing some of your photo's.
I've got to find some way of rigging up a 'roof' for my workshop area. Can't rely on the rain to stay away in England can we!
I have so many tools i'd like to make. Its almost hard to know where to start, because I can think of so many. Some flat headed tongs would be a great help though, so their first. Got to order some rivets now as well.