mcraigl

Junior, How 'bout a BP on making saw blades some day. I can see from the vid, that yours work real well, and that's gotta be an art soon to be lost. I would love to see it anyway, and am sure many others on here would like to see it also. thanks for all the knowledge you've passed on here. I know I've learned a ton from your posts and BP's. Mike Limb

Charcoal is a basic ingredient in many traditional tattoo inks. My guess is that others have suggested the acetone carried some of it deep into your skin. Don't stress it man, I've been thinking of getting a tattoo for a long time. You just beat me to it. My guess is that it will wear off eventually. Frosty, I've eaten at Mike-hr's many times. You don't notice the "black" in the food at all. Never had anything over there that ain't good. Just use plenty of black pepper and you won't notice the "black" either. I think he was onto something there though. A few batches of Meatloaf and dishes will make anyone's hands clean and smooth.

Ok, guys. I got some cable from Mike-hr. It's about 1.5" dia. I'm wondering if it's a little too big. I cut an 8" piece, welded the ends up and then did the first welding pass. I'm a little worried that the center is either going to have a lot of inclusions, or isn't welded very good. It took a lot of heats to get the whole thing welded and I'm afraid a bunch of junk may have fallen in there in the process. I'm hopefull that if I use a welding/near welding heat for drawing it down to billet shape will help close up anything not welded and maybe evacuate any junk stuck in there now. Tonight I'll take another welding pass and assuming all goes well will forge down into a billet shape. Then hopefully tommorow night I'll be able to do the sandwich with the L6 and maybe start the pattern development. I'll post pix at that point I guess. Thanks for the help so far. ML

Do you have a guillotine tool? If so, use a set of butchering dies. You'll still have to do some file work to square up the shoulders, but it'll get you close. If you don't have a guillotine, do you have a handled butcher or a butchering chisel? The point is, to isolate the tang material before drawing it out. Use a tool that is struck to get a "crisper" shoulder started.

Welcome aboard Bill. I'm the "other Mike" from over the hill in Klamath Falls. There's a few of us that get together occasionally over here and have a little fun. CBA has a few hammer-in's etc. in N. Cal. that we frequent, and I recommend. Mike-HR and I are both instructors through the CBA. If you are interested in some instruction feel free to PM me. Mike Limb

I've been thinking about getting a largish piece of 1/2" or better plate from the scrap yard then hauling it over to the water jet shop and having them blow a bunch of holes in a pattern like the table you linked in your original post. Then tapping them with a 1/2" tap. I've had them cut holes in parts before and their tolerances are plenty good for tapping. With the price of even secondary/used steel these days it has moved this thought a ways down the todo list though. Then every time I do a welding project I wish I had done it...

I think I am going to give the L6 a try. Don't know if I'll get forge time this week or not. I'll show pics when I get going on it. Got a couple of other projects that "have" to get finished first though. Will the L6 by itself make a decent edge material if it's the core of said cablemascus ladder pattern billet? I've only heard of folks using it in tandem with one of the 10xx series patterns and I know they make a good edge, but with the finer layers the edge is being crossed by many of the alternating layers. In my mind this thing would end up with a solid edge of L6 assuming I can keep everything nice and centered. Just another thought...

Bruce, So you're saying you want the grooves wider than normal? Here's another thought I had, tell me what you think. What about drawing the cable billet out to say 1/4", then sandwiching a piece of L-6 between two layers of the cable billet, "then" putting in the ladder pattern? Might give a cool effect of waviness to the edge where the L6 is wavering back and forth, plus give a bit of contrast in the ladder part of the cable. Anyway, just thinking out loud and hankerin' to put together another cable billet. thanks for the input all.

Aren't most sulfides water soluble? Just seems that most of the sucker rod I've seen has been laying around in a pile out in the weather for some time before it was acquired by a smith and most of the nasty sulfides were probably gone? I've used a bit of it and never noticed anything but rust on it. Mark Aspery uses it all the time for the tooling in his classes (which is where I've gotten most of mine). I know there are a number of different alloys, but I recall seeing a chart that cross referenced the numbers on the female end of the rod to the alloy somewhere. Thought it was here. Anyway, the stuff I've used will make a serviceable tool, is easy and forgiving to forge, and easy to heat treat using a water quench / triple temper process also developed by Mark. It is a little tougher under the hammer than mild, so I'm not sure I'd make a lot of pokers or decorative stuff out of it unless I was broke or couldn't find cheap scrap mild though.

Anyone ever ground a ladder pattern design into a cable billet? Just wondering if it would help show off the cable even more than just twisting it and welding it up. Or would it not even show up and therfore be a waste of time? Just curious. ML

I've been thinking of getting one of the Drill Dr.'s specifically for the smaller sized bits. I do a pretty fair job with bits from say 3/16" up, but 3/16 and under are really hard for me to get consistently. I end up with a screw-machine length drill by the time I've got it fair. Over 1/2" are a lot easier in my opinion both because you can see what you're doing better, and because one millisecond longer on one side than the other doesn't hose your geometry like on the smaller bits...

SAIT are the best I've used. Not cheap though....

Steve, I'm kinda glad that someone from the family here is getting the blade. I'm a little sad that it isn't me though... Can't wait to see the finished product.

There's a couple of us in Klamath Falls too.

My .02$... Renaissance wax and that's it. I wouldn't "clean" it at all. That accumulation on there is part of the history of the piece. Maybe very light steel wool treatment to get the surface rust of. But the rest of the "patina" I'd leave personally.

New Guy. Vegy oil may not be the "best" quenchent, but it is darn cheap. Go to the supermarket and get yourself a few gallons. Cost you less than a movie ticket and lasts a long time.

They're not too tough to build. Are you considering that also? I just finished one a couple of months ago now. I'm in it just about a grand, but I didn't scrounge, and I didn't compromise on anything. It's got a Baldor 2hp 3phase c-face motor running through a variable frequency drive. I did spend a few hours massaging stuff into alignment once I had it all together, but now it's an incredible machine. 5 seconds to change belts and adjust tracking. Variable speed from 0 to 5500 sfpm with the twist of a knob. Solid and powerful. Anyway, the closest commercially available machine would've been at least three times what I paid. I paid $365 for my motor and $290 for my VFD, so if you went with a single phase motor that you had scrounged you could still put together the same machine I did for $350'ish. Motor would have to have a shaft that fits the bore of the drive wheel, and you wouldn't have variable speed. But variable speed could always be added on later with either a speed controller or a jackshaft. Good luck.

David, There's lots of good folks within reasonable driving distance of you there in Davis. Look up John Crandall of the CBA. He's currently the Education Committee chair, and has open forge / classes at his place on certain Saturdays. Unfortuneately I'm going to be missing Spring Conference this year. Only have two weeks of vacation time, and my family reunion is this year. But next year when it comes back up North I'll be there.

What good is a clinker breaker if you put a grate above it? Help me out here folks. My coal "sits on my clinker breaker", and that way when the tuyere starts to clinker up and clog, I just give the clinker breaker a twist and I'm back to as good as new. About every third time, or as needed, I empty the ash dump. Now it seems to me if I had a grate on top of that, twisting the clinker breaker would do nothing as the clinker would be stuck to the grate. So why would I even want a clinker breaker? It's a complicated part of the overall forge build and I'd not bother with it on my next coal forge if a grate is better. There's an aweful lot of old coal forges around with a clinker breaker and no grate, and that's what I modelled my forge after. I've only been to about 15 hammer-in's etc. and to maybe 8 other smith's shops that use coal and I've never seen both a grate and a clinker breaker. Only one or the other. Any help for this poor soul?

We had several loans that the payment came directly out of my paycheck every two weeks. Well, actually the amount came from my paycheck directly to my savings account at the credit union who then took the loan payment directly from the savings account. With me so far? Well, those two loans ( the boat and my dirt bike if you must know) have been paid off for several years now. Funny thing is, the money never stopped coming out of my paycheck. We didn't really notice for about a year, then I got a statement and had a PILE of money in there. Now that's my huntin/fishin/blacksmithin/tool buyin' fund. She's got her own purchasing habits, and I try not to complain too much, and she don't complain too much about me spending money on BS'ing.

Brian, Monte is almost exactly 9000'. If you've forged on top of Monte then I'm definately bowing to your expertise in forge performance at altitude. Basing my experience off of the difference between sea level and 4000', and it's dramatic. Even with a blown forge, at sea level can be so hot you can't even look into the forge, while the same forge at 4000' you can't get to a welding heat. Yea, I know where Hooper is. God's country huh? I guess I can't think of another place in the world I'd have rather grown up, but it's pretty low on my list of places to live now. If you don't own a rance, or work at the coal mines in Kemmerer, there's no way to make a livin'. You can only brand, irrigate, and hay for Deseret Land & Livestock for so long... I got deep roots in the Bear River Valley, but don't miss the winters. I think there's times when the weather in Randolph would make Frosty shiver. Brrr.....

Brian, Where in Northern Utah are you at? I grew up in Randolph, and I bet you money you can't make a naturally aspirated burner get to welding heat there. You probably can a blown burner though. I'm Hoping that someone with both types will jump in here and tell us when/why they like to use one over the other. ML

Stan, She did let me use her rotary cutter and mat. She did tell me her "good" scissors are off limits though. Still haven't re-done the micarta billet. Life keeps getting in the way. I bought a new/used millermatic mig welder a couple of weekends ago, along with a new kurt d-675 vise and a big industrial swage block. The gun for the mig was completely shot, so I ordered up a new Tregaskiss for it. It all came in day before yesterday. Yesterday before partent teacher conferences I bought 30' of 1 1/2" angle iron. Tonight after parent teacher conferences (I hope) I'll start building a stand for the swage block. Gotta get some time on the new welder! Once that's done I'll probably get back to the micarta. Plus it seemed really helpful to have another person there helping to pour/spread resin wile I'm placing strips of cloth. so... Hopefully this weekend I'll get it done. Then maybe by late next week the micarta will be cured enough to work into a handle for this little knife.

that tracking wheel looks suspiciously cylindrical/flat to me. I think it has to be crowned as others have said. Mine is crowned and when I first put it together I had some "issues" and got a little nervous. One additional thing... Check the centerline of all your wheels. Shim/adjust as necessary to get them all aligned. Either crown the tracking wheel you got, or order one somewhere and I think your problems will go away. Good luck...

Dave, Touche (sp?). Tru Dat. Will let you all know how it turns out once complete. Stan, Thanks for the additional intel. My wife (she must never know) may have been right. When I started cutting it up she said (and I quote) "Aren't you going to wash that first?" "You should probably wash that first." That'll teach me to tell her to "leave me alone, I know what I'm doing" when it comes to fabric!!!