EtownAndrew

This looks good. I had been keeping my eye out at scrap yards for something to use for a chimney. I'll grab some empty paint cans at work.

I got into blacksmithing through making knives. I had heard that a knife could be forged and so I gave it a try. I don't make knives very often now but have moved on and forge other things.

I agree with your thought that the handle seems too fat. In fact I also think that the blade is too fat for this size knife. If you make a second one you might want to reduce the thickness by 1/3 or 1/2.

I have never tried a horizontal sheath in the back for a knife. Can you sit in a chair or drive a car with that knife and sheath in place? Can you post a picture of your favorite horizontal sheath? An inside waist band sheath for this knife is an interesting option.

Today I finished a small belt sheath knife. The other belt sheath knives that I have are too big and awkward to wear during normal daily activities like shopping, driving, and sitting. So my motivation was to see if I could make a knife/sheath combination that is comfortable. At SOFA I had seen a lady wearing a similar belt knife that tucked under the belt and looked relatively comfortable. I am thinking that I'll end up making a new sheath that places the knife outside the belt. The knife is made from an old industrial band saw blade that is 1/16" thick. The handle slabs are walnut with 10 gauge copper wire pins. The open pin is 1/4" copper pipe that I reduced to 3/16" I.D.

That part was easy. I forged down the end with a hammer on my anvil. I just kept rotating the pipe around as I hit it with most of the hits being at the end so it would be tapered more. Stop whenever you want. I then took the pipe with a tapered end to my band saw and cut off the desired length for the socket. I could have also forged a pre-cut piece of pipe. Forging it while attached to the longer piece of pipe provided a convenient handle so I didn't have to fuss with tongs. Also I didn't have to guess how much to start with as a cut piece. I had forged the socket end down till it matched the 3/8" metal shaft that I then inserted and arc welded all around. I then forged the weld down smooth. I could also have forged welded the shaft to the socket but it was easier to arc weld it. I could also have ground the weld smooth but my forge was still hot and so I forged it down. The end of the wood shaft was hand carved with a knife to match the taper with frequent tests to see where to cut next. I repeatedly inserted the shaft into the socket and then pulled it out to see where it was dirty and cut more at that spot until it fit. The hole for the pin was drilled through both the socket and fit handle all at once. I probably used a 10 gauge copper wire as a pin. 10 Gauge copper wire has become my favorite pin because it is readily available and peens easily with a small hammer.

Attached is a picture of my twist tongs. This sort of tong is so simple that the picture really tells you most of what you need to make them. They are the first pair of tongs that I make and I use them frequently. Since then I have made about 4 more tongs. You take two bars of 1/4" x 3/4" x 20" long steel. (Other similar steel sizes will work.) I don't know if it is better to put in the pivot first or twist it first. I think you could do it either way. Drill a 1/4" hole for a pivot through both bars and insert a 1/4" round bar into the pivot and hammer on both sides to mushroom the bar. Heat up the grip end, place grip end in a vise and twist 90 degrees using a crescent wrench. Adjust grip end by placing a piece of 1/8" sheet into it and hammering the grip end down to hold it. Done. This type of tong is good for holding sheet metal and up to 1/4" thick bars.

You will like that forge a lot better. It will be very flexible since you can heat up all sorts of odd shaped things. Even if you should ever make a propane forge you will still want this sort of coal forge since it is not limited to the small interior dimensions of a propane forge.

That will be a fun class for you and the boys.

I suspect that you will want to work out a stock rest to help hold up long steel pieces as they are sitting in the fire heating up on one end. At some point you will want to heat up the middle of a long bar and will be wanting a hole in the far side of the forge so the bar can hang out both sides. I suspect the chimney is too small for a forge. It looks to be a 6" chimney opening. If is bigger past the opening you can enlarge the opening it to get the maximum draw out of it. 10" to 12" chimney diameter is normal for a forge chimney. I have heard of people using a blower to help the draw of a small chimney so it might be made to work. Your first pair of tongs looks better than my first pair. Years of enjoyment await you. Forge away!

DSW mentioning the pot reminds me. I suggest that you do not weld the pot to the table after you cut out a hole for it. It will expand and contract with the heat and you will have welds pop if is solidly connect. The pot flange should just rest on the table top. (I welded mine and realized the mistake later.)

Looking good so far.

Looks like your having fun.

I have a Brick Pile forge like Frosty describes. At one point I had two 3/4" burners hooked together and running off one tank. Since then I have separated them to run on individual tanks. This provides several advantages. The main advantage is that it makes the burners more portable. I transfer them between a forge and melting furnace. I also use them for occasional spot heating. Most of the time I only use one burner for the forge and furnace. I can easily block off the back half of the forge to heat small items with 1 burner. In fact I use the 2nd burner so infrequently that it is now coiled up on a shelf and not installed in it's place on the forge.

It sounds like you should be able to forge weld. If you are having trouble with the burners how do you get it to work normally. Do you use a different set of burners? I think that the puffing sound normally comes from not having the pressure turned up enough. But that may not be what is happening in your case. Can you post a couple pictures of the burners and propane forge. That may show something that the description misses.

I don't think anyone has already said this so I'll add a tip. You want to finish the top of the nail so that when you drive it into wood your hammer is hitting the peak of the nail head centered over the nail below. Otherwise it will quickly start bending over. With a domed head on your nail header you can make final angled hammer strikes on each side of the nail. This creates a high point over the center of the nail and also looks decorative. This assumes that the nail head is centered over the nail below. If the nail head ended up off center your finishing strikes should be directed toward salvaging the nail and leave a high point over the top center of the nail.

Looks good. I've modified a harbor freight hammer too.

Looking good!

It doesn't look worth the trouble. He demonstrated splitting little easy straight grained logs that split with only half hearted effort using a hand swung maul.

You may have already found it but the link below is one person's building of a brick forge. http://www.iforgeiron.com/page/index.html/_/blueprints/100-series/bp0553-building-a-brick-forge-r1094 I agree with the others. Brick forges are hard to move or modify and a lot more expensive than a simple metal table with 4 legs and a pot in the middle. They do look nice. Appearance is the only advantage. I have a nearby blacksmith friend who made a brick forge that works fine as far as I can see but he now would like to improve it. However, that does mean taking hammers and breaking it all apart to start over.

Nice.

It took about 4 seconds to heat up this 1/4" x 3/4" headed rivet.

A few weeks ago I was surfing the net and stumbled across the idea of making a spot welder from a microwave oven transformer. The idea sounded fun and so I proceeded to make one. It successfully put a good weld between two 16 ga sheet metal pieces together this evening. I had to hold it on for about 10 seconds for this weld so I think it is probably about the limit for what can be welded. I separately plug in each transformer and so I expect that for lighter gauge metals I will do some combination of holding the push butting down for less time and unplugging one of the transformers. The transformers did not have the exact same windings and so I varied how many wraps I put on them to get the output voltages close together. One transformer had 2 wraps and the other had 3. The final output voltage was 2.32 volts. I also had to switch input spade terminals at one point since the voltages were out of phase and were canceling each other. The nice thing about microwave transformers is that they have "shunts" that limit the current flow and so keep you from blowing your breaker since a spot welder creates what is effectively a "dead short" during normal operation. Not counting a few things I had on hand my total expense was $30. I got the transformers at the scrap yard. People had sold the scrap yard a couple broken microwaves and so I opened up the cases and took out the transformers. They cost me $5 all together. Most of my expense was in the 3/8" round copper bar for the electrode tip and heavy copper wire. This now give me 5 different ways of welding to choose from when working on a project at home. Each has advantages and disadvantages. So depending upon the situation I choose the best one. Forge Welding Stick Arc Welding TIG Arc Welding Acetylene/Oxygen gas welding Electric Resistance Spot welding This web site was where I saw two transformers being used. http://home-workshop.com/MOTWelder.htm

I bet you would get lots of looks at them but I can see that someone would hesitate to buy one. However, I bet my brother in law would love to add one to his collection of walking sticks.