FredlyFX

When I was in the Marines, stationed at Camp Pendelton, one of my buds was driving his dads 60's vintage VW bus through the base one night and hit a large deer. The whole front of the bus was smashed in. The deer was on the side of the road thrashing about, so this guy from inner city LA grabbed his K-Bar out of his web gear in the back and figured he would cut its throat to put it down. He got out of the van and went walking towards it. Well that ol deer wasn't having any of it, and he jumped up and charged him horns down. My friend said he nearly soiled himself running for his life back to that van.

My uncle & cousin went hunting in northern Nevada years ago driving their little Mercury Bobcat. They spent the weekend hiking through some mountains and never saw a deer. On the way home they hit one square on. It rolled onto the hood, smashed the front windshield, crushed the roof as it went over, then broke the rear window as it came down the back. They had broken all its legs, so they got out and finished it off and dressed it out. They rode the rest of the way home crouched over looking through the small gap between the roof and dash board. The car ended up being a total loss. Pretty expensive deer.

Very nice looking spike knife.

Very nice setup. Looks like lots of possabilities. You could add a side draft hood onto your forge box and it would probably keep things pretty cleaned out.

When I was in college I recall a class about technology and the first day we watched a movie where they took it all back to the very beginning of society. According to them the one tool that allowed humans to move away from being the hunter gatherers was the plow. Once the first primitive wood plow was invented it made it possible for the first time that not everyone in the entire village or family had to spend all day every day trying to gather enough food to survive. Some could focus on other things, and one of the first things they did was try to figure out how to build a better plow and better digging instruments. It was this that led to using copper instead of wood for the plow and the rest is history. It was a never ending series of trying to make life better or easier that has brought us to this point.

Great video. Sure makes it look easy. I think my DG will be getting something soon with this process.

It looks like you have a couple of problems going on. The problem with your spring is that it is in backwards. Take a look at these pics and you will see how it should be. There are more pictures of how I did this on my web site on the projects page down near the bottom. As for the jaws, it really looks like both jaws have been bent back. I can't even imagin how much force that would have taken, but judging from the bent handle, someone put a big cheater on there and then proceeded to ruin the vice using it as a press most likely. I think I would try to grind both sides to where they meet vertically rather than trying to heat it up. If you try to reassemble the vice while part of it is red hot the only thing you will ackomplish is burning yourself and losing all your heat before you are ready for it in my opinion. good luck FredlyFX http://fredlyfx.com

Congrats on the nice score. That should be a nice hammer once cleaned up and functioning.

Nice work so far Duck. I did a similar project a couple years ago. I have attached a pic of how I did mine.

Sounds like a great time. Are there any pictures of the top 3 entrys anywhere? I would love to see what they came up with.

The first one is actually the first spike knife I ever made. I gave it to my wife for our first wedding anniversary. She loved it, and then orderd that I give her another knife each year. I will post pics up soon of this years when I finish it. All the sanding on that was done with a 3x18 belt sander and a 1/4 sheet pad sander. I took it to about 220, then went to a polishing wheel on my bench grinder. Many hours on that guy. The others are just a few that I had some pics of.

Nice looking knife Bill.

So bbb, I'm curious, how much time should we waste on him when he starts coming back asking questions about how to forge his cast iron into sword steel? If none of us had said a thing to him we would have seen who knows how many questions on the forum later as he tried to implement his impossible plans. I totally understand your position, and normally I would agree, but in this case he was so far off the track that it seems to me we do him a disservice if we allow him to continue without at least trying to help. Although some of it was done pretty tounge in cheek, he was given links to some really great resources. If he actually takes the time to read them and learn, instead of going by stuff he has seen in movies, then he may actually be able to forge something useful one day. If he digs his heels in and refuses to learn then he will be plauged by years of frustration. River-Gazer, making swords is pretty much the top of the blacksmithing trade. It is like being a mechanic on formula one race cars. You don't start off on race cars, you work up to it. You don't show up at the track and say, "I want to be a race car mechanic cuz I been watching it on ESPN, and I think I got it down." You work for years perfecting your skills. This is the same thing. Hammer control, metalurgy, fire control and numerous other things all come into play. None of these are touched on in any significant way in any movie. Personally, I love the Highlander movies and series. I own all of them, but now that I have been smithing for a few years I know just how out of touch all the sword making stuff is in those movies. Still entertaining, but not accurate. I hope you consider the advice you have been given here and really take the time to learn this trade. It is a wonderful skill, and if you work hard at it, then some day you will be able to make a sword that you can be proud of, and will not be a danger to you and others. Good luck with it.

Very nice score. I love those kinds of deals.

Another thing to factor in, or at least give some minor consideration to, is wether you are trying to make a living at it, or is it just a hobby. Personally, my smithing is just a hobby. I have a good job I am very happy at which pays the bills. My ultimate goal is that some day my smithing will break even. However, I found that when I first started and I priced stuff way too low that I was actually hurting the professional smiths in the area. If I price stuff way too low it reduces the percieved value of hand made blacksmithed items. For example, if someone buys a fireplace set from me for $50 but a professional smith needs to get $500 for the same set to pay for his time etc, then I have dragged down the local market. That personas friends and neighbors will be looking to pay a similar price for that set in the future. (btw, that's an example only, I would never charge that little for something like that) I have now taken to pricing my stuff at a more reasonable rate. It's still probably lower than the pro will charge because I don't feel my quality is where it could be, but at least now I am not dragging down the market. The other thing is that even if I don't think about other smiths in the area, I am also dragging down my own future market. Once you start selling an item at a certain price, then it is tougher to raise it by a large amount later. Charge a fair price and give them a faire product that is the best I can make. It may not be perfect, but it is the best I can make, so I feel ok with the transaction. That's how I look at things now.

Wow, that looks great One Rod. I like it a lot. How tall is that? It's hard to tell from photos.

That's just what I was thinking when I said I could get in too much trouble with that car. It would certainly make LA traffic much funner.

I built mine without a lathe. On this type of equipment build you modify designs to match the materials and equipment you have available. Check out that MSN group I mentioned above. You will see almost 100 different 2x72 grinders and every one of them works. Some are nice & fancy like Rich's, and others are very obviously back yard scrap welded together. There are even a couple that used no welding I believe. They are all bolted together. Think outside the box. None of this is set in stone. You just need to turn 2 wheels. Everything above that is just more icing on the cake.

I was thinking hole punch for a moment, but with the way that nub is rounded it wouldn't punch a hole, it would just make a large dimple I think.

I would find a larger one. I used a 3HP Compressor motor from Harbor Freight. It will probably only last a year or two, but by then I will be able to afford a real motor. This one was less than $80. I am pretty sure you will be able to find a drive wheel on ebay or at Surplus Center. They are out there, you just have to keep an eye out. You may also want to take a look at a group on MSN called home or shop built grinders. There are a lot of pictures of various home made grinders there. You will find some good ideas and some good sources of parts.

I have no idea what it is, but it sure looks like it has had some hard use judging by the 3 different welds on the handles.