terr

My day job is gearbox engineering and I look at gears as works of art.  One of my goals in life is to acquire an old mill gear (about 20' diameter or greater) and use it to build an entrance to my property - basically drive through a giant gear to get to my house.  If I had two 10' gears, they'd probably flank my gate.  

I hope you find something awesome to do with those!

I made this one a few weeks ago.  It was forged from .75x.50 mild steel stock.  The finish is beeswax applied at high temp them buffed with leather.  It will be a Xmas gift.

NickOHH, 

Looks great.  What was your process for getting the big hole opened up on 3/8" stock?  Slit and drift then move to the horn?  I haven't tried to open up a hole like this on smaller size material yet.

I put a beeswax coating on a bottle opener I made recently and decided to try something a little different.  I heated it to a dull gray (past all of the pretty tempering colors) and rubbed the wax on very lightly.  What I liked about this was it turned a nice black color due to the wax burning.  After it cooled, I then buffed it for a little while with some leather.  I have to say I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.  Controlling the amount is key for sure.  

Jaz,

I'm a recent ME grad (2009) and I would definitely recommend utilizing any resources the school has to try this all yourself. Including hardness testing and finding methods of polishing for examination under the microscope. This is all done outside of class hours but that's what it takes to learn and is how I learned so much when I was in school. Good luck.

I appreciate the offer, Thomas! I've been through two of Kelly's classes so far. I'll probably be taking one more in the winter semester. I've been to one NTBA meeting through the class and am hoping to get there more often.

New guy here! I'm in the DFW area. I got a wild hair to take a blacksmithing class at a community college last year and have been a weekend warrior ever since. I'm slowly getting my own workspace together and have been lurking here as a non-member for a while. I'm looking forward to seeing more of the awesome work many of you produce for inspiration. Cheers!