MattBower

It's on his profile page. Surrey, UK. So no, our coins probably aren't a good option for Vic. I suspect a copper/pewter billet won't take kindly to twisting. It'll probably delaminate. There's one way to find out for sure. I've seen copper/brass mokume that looked nice, although it wasn't especially high contrast. That's not a terribly expensive alternative. Scrap brass isn't too hard to come by. I don't know how well such a billet would take to being manipulated, cold or hot.

Yes. This is what I was trying to tell you. If your steel seems to be cooling down too fast, it's because you're not getting it hot enough before you start forging, because you're not very efficient at forging (which could be attributable to tools, technique, or both), or a combination of the two. Different steel -- of the same size -- will not solve the problem.

All true. He simply asked if it'd be possible to form a laminate this way. I think it probably would. But you're absolutely right that it couldn't be cold worked like normal mokume. You could expose layers of soft soldered "mokume" by 3D sculpting of the billet -- but you wouldn't be able to work it back down to 2D, as with regular mokume. This could likely be done -- outside -- on a camp stove in a stainless steel sauce pan. Real pewter should melt below 500 F. Note that I have run into "pewter" mugs that were not pewter. I'm not sure what they were made of -- possibly an Al alloy.

Hickory and white ash are good, so is Osage (a.k.a. hedge, bois d'arc or bodark). You can find these woods yourself in the wild or at a lumber yard, or buy commercially made handles online. The user handles (as opposed to pretty, more fragile stuff like figured maple) are pretty cheap. Dunlap Woodcrafts has good handles. If you're going to make your own, a draw knife is a very handy tool. Since you're a blacksmith, you can make your own. As for attaching the head to the handle, tomahawk eyes typically are tapered slightly, from larger at the top to smaller at the bottom. You taper the handle so it'll drop into the eye, but can't drop all the way through. That prevents it from flying off the end of the handle during use. Friction keeps it from sliding down the handle, though it may occasionally do that anyway. Just slide it back on.

Sounds plausible. Oppi Untracht describes soldered mokume, which is similar to what you propose. You'd need to get your copper up to a soldering temp, though. I don't think you'd need much of a gap. Probably better to dip the copper stack into the molten pewter and let it sit until it comes up to temp.

Do you weld in that? (I'm wondering if you have any trouble with flux getting into the burner -- not that a little flux would really do much harm in a blown burner that size.)

The underwhelming reaction here is confirming what I suspected. :)

I guess that make sense. Simpler, too. Is that just a piece of rigidized ceramic wool, Grant?

Bueller? Bueller? :)

I'm curious how many folks here use a commercially made burner flare like the one sold by Larry Zoeller, or the flares that come with the T-Rex burners. If you have such a flare, have you ever replaced it? Do you plan to replace it eventually? Would you be willing to pay a little more for a flare that might last much longer? If you don't use commercial flares, why not? What alternative do you use? (Sheet metal, piece of pipe, refractory flare cast into the forge, something else)? Do you just go without? If you make your own flares, how often do you make them, and how much time and effort do you put into it? I'm asking because I've long wondered whether it'd be worthwhile for someone to make high alumina ceramic flares. I'm thinking about what it'd take to do that, and whether it'd be worthwhile.

Good advice from Phil. I'm also glad to hear it's worked out well for you.

Probably some CO, also! SiC ought to work. I'd just be afraid of melting the dang thing.

Hmm. With a sharp file on annealed steel I'd just about take that bet. But for $20, have fun!

Wow. I knew graphite was a good susceptor, but that was almost scary. Looks like it'd take a lot of careful attention to make crucible steel that way.

I did make something. It was so crude. Wood for the fan disc (didn't manage to get the shaft hole perpendicular, so it wobbled as it spun) and sides of the housing, closed off with a heavy duty trash bag and lots of duct tape. Sheet aluminum blades attached with wood screws. Cheap, sintered bronze bearings. Belt drive with MDF discs for the sheave and pulley. Pathetic gear ratio. Badly balanced.

The only "upgrade" I would do with respect to that blower is to figure out a way to give it a smaller footprint. I much prefer hand cranked blowers for solid fuel forges, and there's nothing wrong with that one. When I said you might not need to gear it up so far, I meant you might be able to eliminate a sprocket and save yourself some torque and friction. What's your total gear ratio on that? How many seconds to make one revolution of the handle at a good blast? (On the blowers I typically use, with coal, 1 revolution per second would be really cranking. Two is probably more of an average. And yeah, it takes a little work.)

It doesn't need to be a "real" anvil. There is no magic in London (or other common) pattern anvils. They're (the good ones, that is) just heavy, solid pieces of hard steel that incorporate a few design features that have proven useful to smiths over the years. Mainly what you need is mass under the hammer. The rail is too flexible, which causes it to absorb much of the energy of your blows. You would gain a lot of efficiency by taking that piece of rail, mounting it upright, and working on the exposed end.

Grant, to your knowledge has anyone ever adapted one of your induction forges for casting? Stick a crucible inside the coil, add your charge, and away you go . . . maybe?

I just saw your anvil on the other thread. It's better than nothing, certainly, but it's robbing your blows of a lot of their energy. That's at least a part of why you can't get as much work done in a heat as you'd like.

I love the convenience of the Internet, but there really are some situations in which there's no substitute for getting out and pounding a little pavement. :)

Someone in St. Louis builds buildings, and whoever that is buys their steel from somewhere. They make nothing but hot air in the DC area, where I live, and there are still several structural steel sellers (which often call themselves iron works) within ten miles of my house. Find them. It's much cheaper than paying for shipping on steel. I buy tool steel online. Never mild steel.

That's some frankenblower! I would think it'd produce way more air than you need for a fire that size. If it seems like too much work right now, you might be able to get away with simplifying it a little and not gearing it up quite so far.

All plain carbon steels "hold heat" pretty much the same in similar cross-sections. You may not be getting the steel hot enough to begin with, you may be wasting a lot of energy (e.g., with an improvised anvil, which, depending on the design, can absorb a lot of energy that should go into the work), and as a new guy you probably aren't very efficient at moving steel. It takes practice. For the types of work you describe, a variety 1018 or A36 mild steel bars from 1/4" through 3/4", both square and round (you'll likely need more 1/4", 3/8" and 1/2" than 3/4") would probably serve well. I don't recommend rebar, as it is very unpredictable material. Mild steel is not very expensive, although I understand that when you're on a tight budget everything seems expensive. Edit: I see while I was fiddling around, Mac beat me to it. I personally wouldn't worry about the 1/16" increments. Easy enough to make 5/16 out of 3/8, and so on. :)

On that note I'll add that everyone I know who has used one of those 1" belt sanders for knives (blades, that is, not for shaping handles -- they're OK for that) has hated it. Stock removal with those is verry slow.

On the subject of worn out files, I have heard great feedback about these guys:http://www.boggstool.com/. I can't quite exact prices, but I'm told it's much less than the cost of a good quality new file. I have a variety of files from needle files to 14"+ mill files, in a wide variety of shapes, almost all bought used for a buck or two each, most by good makers -- Nicholson, Simonds, Grobet, etc. For a rundown on file types, tooth coarseness and use, see here: http://www.evenfallstudios.com/woodworks_library/nicholson_guide_to_filing_2006.pdf