dablacksmith

nice work! i like that you went to the trouble of forge welding the hinge barrels ... time on something like this for a friend dosent count... and your comment about stagnating is a good one ...

no will not work... welder isnt setup right for that use...

use a vice partly opened as a temporary punch plate ... will give you a better cut it will still bulge a bit tho and you will have to clean it up a bit...

i get those various weapons from fantasy a lot... gotten to the point where if they start talking that direction i ask um for a historical reference to build off of .. most of um cant seem to differentiate between "history" and "fantasy" .. had a person ask for the arrow heads from a movie that had cgi arrowheads that looked like scorpions... I do custom but about half of the inquireies are not for items i can make or are willing to make ( i dont cast items and try to stay away from fab jobs) its a ongoing teaching experience to explain what i do (is that a real fire ?) and what i can make (can you make this only just plain) and where the cost in a product is (is it cheaper without the twist?) . when you show them what is involved it helps ... most people still think it should be cheaper but that is changing ... When i explain that my shop rate is the same as my motorcycle mechanics shop rate the price complaints go down...strange items ive made ... a brand that was a pair of lips.... i made a mini horseshoe for a stick horse and nailed it on( only horse ive ever shoed) .....

looks like a reasonable deal to me...

ive switched to all coke.... no more black snot! (or at least not as bad) also lasts a lot longer ...

might add Daryl Nelson for his animal heads,,, but for me it would be Peter Ross.. taken a few classes with him and hard to find anyone better!

ya antique stores can sometimes have good deals ... picked up a post vice that had the post cut off short and threaded for a nut for 10 bucks one time in a antique shop . was in with the junk ...

depends on the rasp... some are case hardened and wont harden...

steel yard if your going to do any quanity ... to start ck your local hardware store they usually have a bin with various sized steel pieces its expensive compared to steel yard prices but it allows you to buy small amounts ... now if your looking to make knives then spring steel usually works good (there are a lot of things that use springs).a lot of people start with scrap ... i still use it but not often if you want a consistent product its hard to achieve with scrap unless you have a constant supply of the same scrap...i personally wouldnt mess around with rebar much... not a consistent product so a piece might be great one time and junk the next....not worth the hassle for the savings ... as a buisness i have found steel price does not affect product price much... most product i make the price of the steel is 10% of product at most...hope this helps

if its just a thermostat you can use a digital one ive seen um on ebay for around 40.00

students are something i have had and that is a whole different kettle of fish... i have been looking into teaching again my current shop is to small to have anyone else in but the local arts center (comm college) has a blacksmith shop for teaching...as far as getting into blacksmithing what angle? there are many different aspects (knifemaking,sculpture,gates and railing, historical reinactment ect...) i saw the other post you posted and ime of the opinion that horseshoeing is not really part of blacksmithing anymore if it ever was... most shoers ive met dont spend much time working metal its more dealing with the horse ...

i generally rivet cold...... or at least start rivets cold then heat to finish....

time spent isnt money?????

ya i hafta agree ... and there is a group of people that think you should give it all to them... training costs also and no i dont need /want a aprentice! ive tried that route and really dont need someone wasteing my time and ruining my tools so they can make a few projects and then leave...blacksmith tools are cheap tho compared to other tools (ask a professional mechanic how much he has got invested in tools )and they last quite a wile ...But if you want to blacksmith and do it for 50 bucks ....dont ask someone else to scronge stuff up for you! i always let people know the price range i am willing to spend on a item ime looking for and i try to find out the price range first! that way when a deal comes along i will know it and can act quickly...

it looks like its gona be in that range but only to know is weigh it! if you won the bid it looks like you got a good deal at least it would be in my area! ive looked at anvils on your ebay tho and almost all of um are good deals... could make a bit of money if i could get um to the states at a reasonable shipping cost...

ya need to go to work for mythbusters!!!!! ive seen muzzleloaders loaded possably for over a hundred years and the powder was still viable ...(it was a flintlock converted to caplock and had sat in the owners house for 50+years untouched he got it from his grandfather) ... i always check!

man i wish.....too far away ...

oho i can build the stake ... just wondered if there was documented hearty holders ... was thinking of maybe a seperate stump with holder for a horn stake and various other hearty tools to fit into .. probably rig up a something even if its not quite period...got to be better than anything ive seen at ren fares...

not sure yet... when it actually gets here ile decide... it looks like there is enuf face that is flat enuf but wont know till its in my hands...gona hafta make a stake anvil for a horn ... no harty hole so have to do sumthin for a replacement ... any ideas?

well ive been looking for a old anvil to grace the blacksmiths booth at the renaissance fare ... found this 5th foot anvil on ebay and had to have it! its not perfect but its not that bad and the price was reasonable... its also seen many years... it will be a honor to hammer on this as who knows how many generations of blacksmiths have....

there is a reason you normalize steel ... and the temperatures you reach forge welding are one of them ... normalizing is done to refine the grain structure .... forge welding is done at tempratures much higher than normally reccomended for high carbon steel forging.. that is why you dont skip the normalizing steps...

well.... its not the easy path that is for sure .....i would suggest looking at it like becoming a artist because that is what we are .... also almost all blacksmiths are buisness owners ... i suggest learning as much about running a small buisness as you can .... also drafting will be useful (computer or by hand ). the jobs you do are partly determined by your skill and equipment ... the hard part is getting enuf skills to make a living while keeping things going...having a nest egg to start would help ... also you might get a regular job for a bit on top of the blacksmithin ... welding and metal fabrication skills are a definite plus...some dont define between blacksmithing a fab work...bolth would like a large shop... the thing to remember is the bigger the shop the bigger the overhead but also the bigger jobs that you can do....also if you get real big or numerious jobs you may end up with enployees...at some point as the shop gets bigger and you end up a manager...met a few that have gone that route ...so keep in mind what your goals are for your buisness .Are you wanting to make gates and railings or smaller stuff.... are you making one of a kind art or limited production hardware ... lots to learn ... its dooable and your limitation is you! to get a feel i would make a few items and take um to a small art show (or flea market) set up a booth and try your hand at selling... its a easy and fairly cheap way to test the water..as far as how much you can make it is like any small buisness and that always depend on the owner! .good luck!

well... ive had several shops over the years ... started with a 6x10 shed and have had as large as a 30x40 pole building with 12 ft to the trusses !it kinda is a evolveing thing... but it dont matter how big it gets your always looking for a bigger one! i currently am injoying my shop at the museum... partly because people come by and talk and partly the view... biggest thing ive found for your feet is staying away from a concrete floor where your forging ... pavers arnt bad cause they change the angles (and there fore pressure points) your feet rest against.if you make bigger stuff a good tall ceiling is nice .. other than that its what ya can afford and the bigger the better!