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That video is great, it helped me a lot in learning what needed to be done.

I can't really remember. I just remember coming up on his ole antique shop in the middle of no where. I can't remember what road it was on, but I think it was east of the Bankhead National forest, so it would be closer to Cullman than Double Springs. Maybe along HWY 278?

There is an antique guy near Double Springs/Cullman who has a lot of smaller anvils (75-100lb), but like most people like him his prices are a good bit higher than they should be. However he told me he has too many and said he needs to get rid of some, so you may can haggle him down. The biggest problem is I can't remember his name or anything, but you may can find it via googling.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but the fire poker I posted a pic above was done fully on the horn and had no problems with the weld tearing. At least I don't ever remembering using the vice on that one. I wish I still had it to test the shearing strength of the weld, but I do know it was thrown around in several buckets against other steel for over a year.

Here is the poker I made from the method a year or two ago. I wish it was a closer picture.

Very interesting discussion. I may have to play with this now when I get a chance. I've got a picture of the poker I made years ago at the house(the actual poker was given as a gift) and I'll see if the same problem is evident on it as well.

Interesting, I've done it with round 3/8, but never tried square.

Always look around the yard for steel and tools before you mow. Small aspiring blacksmiths love to sneak out to the shop and freely pick up any old scraps or tools left on the anvil. Or be sure to put things out of reach before you close shop for the night

Had some kind of sparrow or wren next on top of my light fixture. Even though I tore down it's nest like five times it still continued coming back. Haven't seen it yet, but I imagine I will soon and the war will resume.

Oh I hate that. Expect a distraction and/or crisis to appear when a piece of steel is within moments of being at welding temp.

Finished forging and cleaning up a bowl adze, heat treating tomorrow. May forge an axe, depends on my other chores. Definitely feel like a wimp knocking the rust off due to the lack of forging.

I've never used springs, but try the big finish mower(I'm not talking about bushhog) blades that are under tractor decks. Do a quench test to see if they harden first though. I love using these because they weld nicely at a good soaked yellow heat.

I call myself a blacksmith now, but when I reach my goal of forging every tool I'll ever need(I intend to do this year) I'll call myself successful.

I wanted to go out and forge tonight , but didn't. The temp is a little chilly by Alabama standards in the lower 40's but I've worked much colder. My problem is due to living in a hole is air moisture and not thinking ahead and gather enough twigs in advance before a few inches of rain. Getting the will to start the fire on cold nights is the hard part. Christmas present for myself this year is an propane torch. Oh yea.

I remember one. At a meeting I showed a distant buddy of mine a hatchet head I had forged. He looked over it for a minute and asked if it was steel.

I can agree with that, in the same event with the kid who didn't know what a hoe was, another kid I'd say six or seven stood and told his young buddy what I was doing and that I was burning coal. I didn't say anything, but was quite proud of him. Getting off smithing a little, I work with a town Water & Sewer works and we had a lady tell us the other day that when we open a manhole near her place her drinking water gets muddy. I'll leave it at that, but we had a good laugh.

Oh that one is rich. I had one adult the other day ask how to use a drive hook so I had to demonstrate that.

I have been doing some demonstrating lately and i've heard some crazy responses. Sure I have heard the horse shoe comment or the can you make a sword comment, but here are two that got me. The first was from a boy around nine or so. He picked up a fire poker and asked what it was and I told him. Then he asked what was it for and despite being amazed I told him. He stared at me a second, put it back and said he had never heard of that. The second came another time when a girl around eight didn't know what a hoe or pitchfork was. Safe to say I was floored both times.

The first one is in my closet and is a bit embaressing as i didn't get it welded up as good as I would have liked. Ill get a pic up later. The second was far superior but it is no longer with me and dumb me only got one pic of it which ill have to find. The blades i used were about 1/4" thick and cut to 8" long. The axes were about 2lbs each.

In the two I've made, I made a hardy swage in the shape of half the eye and then sunk the two sides and welded them together. One had a file for both sides of the bit and the other was completely high carbon steel(tested tractor mower blade) for both sides. Getting the files in both sides and welding them was a bit of a pain and just using high carbon steel for each side was much easier. If you are like me, expect to have to try it several times before you get a good result. I lost count on my failures.

Looks a lot like the first one I made. It does feel good doesn't it. Looks good. I love to use mower blades too.

Southern Gospel on Rejoice 89.1 or WPIL 91.7 out of Heflin, or if late sometimes whatever sermon in on Truth Radio 91.3 out of Oxford.

My biggest problem is as Frosty mentioned not letting the steel soak enough. I seem to have the problem most when I take a few week break from smithy/welding. It is very easy to get jumpy when your steel gets to light yellow and yank it from the fire, only to have your weld fail because it is only at welding temp on the outside. I've definitely run into the error when welding something larger like a wrap and weld axe and at least on my end requires intense inward fighting to have patience.

My firepot has been glowing red to nearly orange with the very hot burning stoker coal I used, a little scale but no major problems. My pot is 1/4" steel.

Most of my neighbors are working on cars, running chainsaws and the like, ATV's, ect(like I do), I'd think the little pinging and smoke coming from behind my place is even noticeable.