David Kailey

There is no 4" issue for the gate, and it is being installed at a property to the NW of Spokane, Wa, that sits on the Little Spokane River. It is actually going to be a swing Gate. It weights in at only 550lbs The customer wants either silver vein or copper vein powder coating. Lol. It was several hours of hammering the tree into wooden swedges, due to the fact that it was all done cold and there was not much of a break from hammering, I did manage to get some very severe cramps in my hand and forearm which may have been the result of the look on my face. Frankly with the outside temperatures being 93-105 over the last 4 weeks and having so much forge work to do which kept the shop around 120 plus....... it was actually pretty comfortable because we did no forge work so it was only around a hundred in the shop that day. Thanks for checking out that work.

So i started with 700lbs of steel.....240 of it for the gate frame. I then forged for 38 hours while the outside temp was between 90 and 104, with my shop holding at a steady 125-130 degrees. I then welded for 18 hours..... The gate is raw right now and has 20 hours of work to clean it up and finish it up. May daughter and 2 friends who come and forge with me Nick, and Ethan helped out with several aspects of the process. This is 2" x 3/16" flat bar cut with a 3" angle on one end. I would put a small taper on the square end and then knock the point to the center. Then using crown dies to shape and texture the cattail leafs. Over 80 were forged at different lengths.. The center was a plasma cut tree, we cold hammered a it into a a rounder shape and then did a knock down weld texture. My daughter Madelynn did 90% of the texture herself and It looks fantastic. Next we forged curly Q's, delyo"s, cattails, dragonflies, butterflies, and some odds and ends. . Welded up the 1.5" x 3" frame and then cut fit and welded all the components together. I still have a lot of clean up and some structural welding to do. Here are some more pictures of the build.

Its just the price of doing business now, I have started to refer customers to a designer/engineer or tell them I need plans to work off. Its now my job to save them money it to provide them a bid for what they want take it or leave it.

Hace a lawyer draft your liability release and definitely make sure you get an insurance policy but it has to be specific for Education which means that you teach and demonstrate. One more line of defense is to set yourself up as an LLC and then lease all of your equipment to the LLC from you personally so that way if they sue your LLC they won't get your equipment and all your family belongings and stuff for can't be gone after

My dad had a No 1 kodiak brown bear trap when I was a kid, It was the biggest spring jaw trap i have ever seen, He did not weld it but he made a permanent clamp for the springs. It hung next to the front door with a sign that read. Tax collectors please press for immediate assistance .

Your welcome. lol. Forge on my friend!!!!

Thanks for the response Gote. I always appreciate it. It sounds like you have things dialed in and you and I have similar lines of thought as to how we arrange out tooling, I keep just my top 5-7 hardy tools and my wire brush on my stand, my hammers, tongs, punches ect. are on the wall near my anvil my forge, vise, anvil, power hammed, are all within 2 steps but i have lanes between them so I can work longer stock. It just makes me feel good to be efficient, it leads to me knowing I am good at what I do and that confidence lets me continue to push myself outside my comfort zone and that means I am continuing to grow as a smith...... who could ask for more then that!!!

CFI is hosting their summer hammer-in. June 24 and 25, 7:30 am to 5:30 pm open forges, demos, raffles, and group projects for more info contact David Kailey 509-413- 9727 [email protected]

CFI is hosting their summer hammer-in. It will be held on June 24/25 there will be open forging, demos, and group projects. IF interested or looking for more info Contact David Kailey 509-413-9727 [email protected]

Frosty Is a bit more on track. I may have picked the wrong item, soap box, tool....ect. I have been told that my work is better because........tools, equipment, bla bla. Or I can't because I don't have...... One of the things I notice is no matter what means the smith has the "doers" smithy , stands differ from the "I can'ters". I was taught that if your not there for your tools, your tools won't be there for you. Looking professional..... my view on that is different I have seen smithy's, with 250K and couldn't look more unprofessional, and the opposite is true. Expensive or low value equipment does not define a blacksmith, but yes his smithy dose. I can look at a smiths smithy and have a good idea if they are a doer or an I can'ter, It causes, me to think man.... I'd be an I can'ter also if I tried to do even simple forgings I this smithy. I so badly want people to embrace and love smithing as much as I do. I hate seeing people struggling, give up, make more of the work then it really is. But so many times it is because they literally set themselves up for failure, because their smithy is so woefully inefficient they will never feel like they are getting a good return on the effort they put forth, the return is not enough to continue. And they settle for it, they are willing to keep trudging alone as if with only one leg wnae they have 2. I am a professional blacksmith, not a master smith, but I get that return on my time and energy, I can give the customer a piece of myself, one like no other and for a price that is comparable to one made by a heartless machine. Yah I get customers that pay more and I get rewarded for what I do. But I have to be a doer, I have to provide a product, met perceived expectation for a price point that works. Had a customer wanted 5 corbels, willing to pay $20 each, efficiency and forming and emotional connection between the customer and what I can provide enabled me to get $25 each and create a hand forge item that is all their own it took me no more then $16 in material and 1.5 hours. Because my hammer, my anvil, my stand, my smithy is nice and clean. Complex yes..... a bit of rambling absolutely, possibly lost in my words...... well maybe. But give yourself every opportunity to succeed, give yourself the chance to feel the return on that investment of time and energy, give yourself the ability to compete on an open market until you are able to find those customers that are willing to show their appreciation and pay you an honest wage for your work. We have traveled a long way, just like my smithy from 5 years ago to now. Every step I improved, I gained and I kept it nice and clean. Thank you all for your thoughts and engaging in this conversation. Keep it going. Yah I ask for the height they want the anvil top to be at and how tall their anvils is,

When I started Smithing I had a hole in the ground with a pipe and my wife's hair dryer, my anvil was a hung of RR track with bent nails holding it down. The reason I have the luxury of choices is because of where i live and the fact that I worked my butt off selling forged item at $3-7 each until I made enough to but my anvil........I now have 50k in equipment all paid for in cash from the work I did smithing. you can get all bent out of shape and show all the videos you want but did you notice that mans smithy......? maybe not much to look at but it is clean, everything has a place, its efficient and its the best he has for what luxuries he has available to him. I hate it when a guy has 10k, 20k,50k, 100k in equipment and has a crappy looking stand held together with duct tape, bailing wire, and 5 min epoxy. my point is use what you have and make your smithy the best it can be, keep upgrading it, keep making it better, more efficient, safer,,,,,,,ect. Dont settle, dont just be ok with you wobbly stand, your stump that is split apart and you keep wrapping bailing twine and tape around it. I made over $2500.00 with that ground forge and rr anvil. I have seen so many smiths complain about how long it takes, how they don't have as good of stuff as i have, my work is higher quality/better/easier..... because of the equipment i have. That's not the case at all, i was the african smith forging on my knees but i kept reinvesting my money into better stuff. People just need to commit. I sacrificed a ton to become a blacksmith, sold my boat, guns, dirt bike, other toys, I simplified my life down, lowered my cost of living my wife and daught supported these things..... last year I suffered a theft of over 35k in work, tools, materials...... insurance jerked me around and finally denied my claim...... but I took what i had made it the best it could be and went back to work. Remove the stumbling blocks, remove the time wasting in-efficient stuff, cut out the things that kill your production and or hinder you psychologically. And get to work, commit and met that commitment half way. nice job! it clean, well built your anvil is good and secure thats a beast of a stand, pretty killer.

Offer him $0.25lb that is 3x current scrap prices. Remember, you see value in this steel but it is useless to him and scrap price is only $160 a ton or $.08 a pound anything above that is bonus to him.

Yah I think the shank of the hardy needs to be a bit taller so the shoulders sit above the top of the anvil. I made a cut off just like that and I got stuck like that also, I forge another one and it had taller shoulders its snug but just a tap and it pops out.