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I Forge Iron

will52100

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Everything posted by will52100

  1. Thanks, got it heat treated and everything came out OK. Good info, thanks for sharing.
  2. Thank, good idea's, love the horse shoes, never thought of that.
  3. Here's a couple of pics of my smithy as it stands now. There's a partial wall around the west side of the smithy to block light and make it easier to see hot metal colors. It's just 2x4 and tin with 4x4 post for the roof. Sorry for the mess, shop needs a cleaning. Every once in a while I'll clean and organize, then start a new project and back to chaos.
  4. Good ideas, thanks. I should mention the wall strength is not really an issue. My smithy is basically a 12' wide drop shed off my main shop. Walls are 2"x4" stud with 1/2" OSB inside and out with metal roofing (tin) on the smithy side. Don't want to hang a 500 lb anvil off the wall, but pretty strong and for anything heavy I'd add bracing. John, that's a heck of a set of tool racks, gives me some ideas.
  5. Looking for ideas for tool storage, from tongs to guillotine fullers, ect. Basically my smithy is a 12' x 24', with a power hammer and hydraulic press, two gas forges and soon to be a coal forge, and one anvil. Space is tight, so I need to come up with a way to store stuff I don't use much, but can get it down easy. Trying to figure out a way to store hardy tools on the wall rite now, thinking of some type of shelving using square tubing. Thanks
  6. Thanks, can't believe there's not more info on tempering temps and hardness ranges out there. I guess if it ever really bothers me enough I can forged some small pieces out and heat treat them and have them tested. Or eventually get a hardness tester myself.
  7. Thanks, I appreciate it. Past my bed time as well, but if I'm reading it rite 400 degF would translate to about 52-53 rockwell C.
  8. Thanks, but I'm not looking at it as impossible, just hoping somebody has an idea of what hardness to expect at what temper temperature. Like say, 52 RC at 400 deg. F, ect. I've done tools like you described and they work well, but I like to know more about the steel I'm working with and I'm coming up empty on google and metallurgy sites. Like I said, it's not a big deal, but more for my curiosity. Thanks
  9. LOL, the same could be said for knives, except maybe for the hitting hot metal! I have no doubt I could simply harden in water and heat the drift and run temper colors to a bronze or straw and have an excellent hammer. But I'd like to know, more for my own curiosity's sake, what the actual hardness is. If it really bugged me I'd send it off to some one who has a hardness tester, temper charts would give me an idea though. Even with knives, a RC reading is just one point in quality control, not an end all be all as hardness tells nothing of grain refinement or if the steel was damaged from overheating.
  10. Sounds like it's most likely a simple high carbon steel, probably 1070 to 1095, posibly W1. Or it could be anything really. It's a good idea when heat treating knives to do at least 2 temper cycles. Long complicated story, but basically after the blade cools down from the first temper you wind up with more martensite forming and since it formed post temper it's untempered and potentially brittle. A good rule of thumb is 3 two hour temper cycles. Also longer time at temp means you can temper slightly lower temp and still have the same flexibility with slightly better edge holding. Being mystery steel you'll have to sneak up on the proper temper. Best way is the brass rod test, sharpen and flex the edge, if it chips raise your temper 25 deg.F. and temper again until it stops chipping. If it stays flexed or bent, you went to soft and will have to re harden. I have played with a lot of mystery steel and have learned a lot from it, but have had a lot of failures while learning also. This is one reason I highly recommend new makers to use known steel, cuts down on frustration.
  11. Thanks, I was figuring on 400-500 for first temper, but still would like to know what RC that would be. I understand differential tempering, and plan on softening the eye. But I would like to shoot for about 50 to 52 RC on the faces.
  12. Anybody got a chart or where I can find a chart for specific rockwell hardness for tempering temps of 1045? I've searched here and google with no luck. It's for a 1045 forging hammer I just finished but haven't heat treated yet. Yes, I know I could get close and good enough with tempering colors, but I've got a heat treat oven and will be using it. Wish I had a hardness tester though, would make figuring on a recipe a lot easier. Can't believe I couldn't find charts on the internet, I can find info on just about any other steel out there. Thanks
  13. LOL, I hear you on the color, I've been tempted to spray paint my luggage some off the wall color to be able to spot it easily at terminals. Plating it shouldn't take long, and to be fair for most work it really isn't needed, I just like to over build. I did get my vise fixed using acme threaded rod and nuts, will try and take some pics later, so no need to re-invent the wheel with forge brazing. Though I know there's got to be a way to do it, if they did it 300 years ago we should be able to figure out a way today. But then I've got about 5 million projects I want to do!
  14. Just getting into the blacksmithing aspects, but been forging knives for over 10 years. Just for blade work I've got 4 hammers that I use, all in the 1 1/2 lbs to 4 lbs range. I've got a 5th that I don't use much anymore since getting a power hammer and press, it's a short handled 10 pound sledge. I'm currently making a blacksmith/rounding hammer and the target weight for it is 3 1/2 pounds.
  15. I've tried fluxless welding in my gas forges with good results. I find what works best for me is that I grind the pieces clean and stack and weld the ends and rod on one end. Then a dip in diesel fuel and into the forge. After welding and drawing out I'll cut on the chop saw and surface grind, then repeat. That's for 1084 and 15&20. When I'm playing with "frontier" Damascus, IE, everything including the kitchen sink, I use flux, partially due to less cleaning and flatting, partially due to using ball and roller bearings in the mix, think pieces of files, ball bearings, rake teeth, part of an old wrench, pieces of saw blade, ect. When I was first learning to forge weld Damascus I had issues every now and again, but haven't had any real issues in the last 10 years with the exception of a feather patter blade I did not long ago. It wasn't from inclusions, the high nickel steel didn't like to weld to itself. My thoughts on flux is that it lets you weld less than perfectly clean steel together, helps melt rust back into iron and squeeze impurities out.
  16. Don't have much scrap myself. Especially scrap wrought iron, that gets saved and welded up into a bigger billet.
  17. Cool first start, and a lot better than I started with making knives. You acquire tools and equipment and skills as time goes by. My first anvil was a harbour freight Anvil Shaped Object, cast iron. Then on to a block of mild steel, then a cast steel Russian that's pretty soft. Finally got a good one just recently. Just out of curiosity, have you ever considered a gas forge? Simple and cheap to build, not real cheap on fuel consumption though. I've been using them for over 10 years, but they are not as good as a coal or charcoal forge for spot heating and decorative work. But they are nearly perfect for Damascus and blade work.
  18. I like it, don't know how I missed this thread. Only real concern I'd have is the hole for the screw in the channel iron. If it was mine I'd probably add a 1/4'' thick or so plate to stiffen it up a bit, but that may be over kill. I got to wondering about brazing the screw threads and even heating. What about a gas forge? Would still get some movement, but my main (non welding) forge is horizontal and has a chamber big enough to heat the whole screw at once. I've got acme threaded rod and nuts on the way to fix mine, but if it doesn't work I may try the wrapped thread, I'm not a good enough machinist to turn threads yet. Anyway, love it, though not sure about the purple paint!
  19. Cool, never thought of using a bat for a handle, looks great.
  20. Thanks, the only other option I have is to do the old fashioned blacksmith method of twisting square rod around a shaft and brazing it. If the acme thread doesn't hold up that's what I'll probably do. The jacks your talking about are even rarer down here than a good used post vise. There simply isn't a lot of that stuff floating around down here, lots of pine trees and cattle and miles between houses, not much in the way of old tooling. I could always order one from ebay, but hate to order something like that sight unseen.
  21. I used to have my Harbor Freight ASO mounted on a pipe filled with concrete, it made a poor anvil useable.
  22. Refflinghaus makes one like mine with the side shelf like your talking about, both have an upsetting block on the opposite side. Comes in handy for upsetting pieces that are too long to fit in my press. I'd been looking over new anvils for several years and was really interested in the Refflinghaus. A buddy of mine got one and playing with it convinced me Refflinghaus was the way to go.
  23. Just got my new anvil in the other day and finished mounting and trying it out. Can't speak highly enough of it, after mounting it will put a ball bearing back in your hand. I managed to play with it for a couple of days and zero marks on the surface other than a slight burnishing and polishing action. The corners are slightly radiused and I've been rounding them just a bit more. My old anvil was a cast steel Russian that I got from harbor freight, it was OK, but pretty soft and even though I was careful was getting pretty marked up. What a difference. The base is a piece of 3/8" thick pipe with 1/2" top plate and 1/2"x4" bracing and filled with concrete and buried 6" in the ground. Base weights rite about 600 pounds. Absolutely no wiggle or wobble and the ring is pretty subdued as well.
  24. What was the bearing manufacturer? If Timken then I'd bet 52100 and be confident enough to forge a blade out of it and test, especially if I had enough rollers from the same bearing. I've got a bunch from a triplex mud pump that are quiet large and test out as 52100. I don't use it for my higher end knives, but when I'm playing around doing one off's I use them, or any time I want to use 52100 and don't want to use my expensive virgin stock. Before forging I'd spark test with a known sample, if the same then try forging out. 52100 can be a bear to forge without a power hammer or press at forging temp.
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