larrynjr

Very sweet score Valentin!

I'm not sure on how to give it an antique finish, acid bath / vinegar maybe? As for charging, I would certainly charge something, cost of materials plus a reasonable hourly rate. If there are other items you normally make that would be of an equivelent size / shape and you have a "normal" or know how long it takes to make that item I'd charge the shop rate for that. When I worked computer / network support for other businesses and took longer to fix something then I thought it should take, I'd charge the number of hours it should have taken. Or if I had to do research to fix it and it was a general software issue (could or might happen at any type of business, not particular to theirs or their specialty software) I would charge a fair rate. If you plan to never make another sword you might charge more for specialty work but if you think you'll do more swords in the future. Charge a reasonable amount that covers costs and normal forging time.

Congratulations on getting some hammer time! My neck / shoulder / arm is getting much better but I don't know when I'll be able to do my first forging of the year. Hopefully within a month's time. post pix of your accidental welds! even as a mistake they sound kind of cool.

Welcome the IFI Bobby!

A very fine looking blade, Great work Valentin!

My regular hammer is the 2 lb. cross peen on the right, I haven't tried the one I modified yet. I'll probably do some more trimming before I try it anyhow, it still feels too heavy to use regularly.

I was over to the bus garage today and saw these sitting all alone and lonely so I asked what was going to be done with them and was told, thrown in the DUMPSTER! I asked for them and was gladly given them. They will also start saving lawnmower blades for me. I'll use one for mounting my post vise and not sure yet for the other. They are at least 100 lbs. each.

Hard to say quality wise, it looks similar to one that was posted recently. I think that you'd pay at least as much getting it shipped to Hawaii as it weighs, if not more.

At this point it still feels heavier then I'd want to swing for any length of time. I think I'll have to cut some of the face off to drop any more weight. I might be able to grind some more from the slope of the peen too. It is definitely front heavy, it is rounded at the eye and if you balance it there then let go of the handle it immediately rolls to the face side of the hammer.

Pault17, that looks really great. I'm concerned with cutting a chunk off the face itself to reduce weight. Will I need to reharden the new face? I will probably spring for a postal scale or something along those lines at some point but I'm not overly worried about it at this point.

Thanks everyone for your comments, the only only scale I have is a bathroom scale and it doesn't seem to be very acurate at that weight so I still don't know how much I have actually removed. I'd like to get it down to at least 3lbs. but I need to come up with a better way to get the exact weight!

This has not been my regular hammer, my regular hammer is a 2lb. This is one that I occasionally use for upsetting. The grooves were to to help lighten the face side so it's not too unevenly weighted. It's still front heavy and heavier I think then I'll want to use regularly, but I like the way it came out.

Not being able to actually do any hammering I decided to modify my 4lb. hand sledge into a slightly smaller cross peen hammer, using my 2 week old angle grinder. Don't be fooled by the image, I was slightly more zoomed in on the modified hammer.

That's a good question. I've always assumed that mild steel would be the way to go. Hate to waste good tool steel on such an unassuming item but I could be very wrong.

the one's that I saw, just their own posts were editing to either rant against the site or just remove the info they had posted.

Welcome to the site! While I haven't gotten into knives and swords yet, I'm sure your input into that area will be welcome. This is a fine place for questions and answers.

I'm no kind of mechanical engineer to have an answer but I know others here are. Possibly a similar question has already made it the rounds and they are waiting for you to find it in the archives or they haven't had time to fomulate an answer.

I thought it was former members posts but I didn't know that they were the one's changing their own old posts. That just seems wrong. Is there any way to block editing a post after say a week but not lock down the thread itself? Often I will edit a post once or twice immediately after posting to correct spellings and such but after a week, even one full hour it seems like the post should stay as it. Thanks for the FYI Glenn!

I've been reading back through the archive of posts and have been find one or more members posts that appear to have been deleted and now only show ................. I'm wondering what happen with that member and why his posts were removed? hopefully I'm not stepping on any toes or digging up bad history.

Welcome, where are you living now that you'll be moving to Australia? I hope you enjoy your journey into the wonderful world of blacksmithing!

Most of what I want would come in under that dollar amount. 1. MIG Welder 2. Steel for my Treadle Hammer 3. Hofi Hammer 4. Oxy-acetyline regulator 5. Chop saw 6. Band Saw 7. #0 fly press Though if we were filing jointly, I might want to give my wife at least half............. I get to claim my kids this year, so as long as my ex doesn't mess around and try to claim them also. I should get considerably more than $600 back.

Did you use the Alwin Wagener demo as your template flower? Great job! I can't wait till; (a. my neck gets better so I can hammer) (b. I can build my treadle so I can hammer) so that I can try that out also.