gote

Oh yes Frosty. Look up "Phallus impudicus"

It all depends upon what you are doing but sometimes it is possible to us some kind of external marker or stop. If you use a pipe for bending, you can put in a bar inside and somehow fix it so the pipe stops in the right place. You can use a suitable piece of heavy wire fix it to the bench or vise with a couple of C-clamps and bend it so it points to where the end of your stock (or previous bend) should be if the vise grips in the right place.

There was a method of producing iron using air by mouth only but the production rate was very slow. The "kiln" resembled a large tobacco pipe and part of the trick was the moisture from the exhaled air. The oxygen in the water forming CO/CO2 with the carbon and the hydrogen reducing the oxygen in the ore. The result was of a very high quality. The method was abandoned at least 1500 years ago maybe 2000 years ago. I tried in vain to find the reference but it was in Norwegian anyway. As far as I can remember Norwegian archaeologists found a number of these "kilns" and even made some tests. The report presented production rates and percentage of the ore that was converted.

It depends on what you make and how you do it. I am using what in Sweden (and Germany) is referred to as a field forge (Fältässja). They were used by cavalry farriers in the field. So there is a lot of them around and they are still made and popular among hobby blacksmiths. The fire pot is 45mm deep thus less than 2". However, it sits in a good sized steel table so it is easy to build a deeper fire. I usually end up with a total height of 4-5". Usually I have a barrier of clay brick around half of the table edges. Obviously I would have difficulties in forging a sledge hammer head in it but to me it is adequate. I rarely work on stock thicker than 3/4". I took a look in Angele's catalogue They are presently offering fire pots from 57mm to 100mm deep.

Joe, It is very difficult to find any type of coal in Scandinavia since we have no domestic coal burning tradition. Unless I buy a 20 ton lorry load I will have to take what I get and it comes with the designation "smideskol" (Smithing coal" ). It certainly is not lignite (brown) and I think the supplier would have used the word anthracite if that is what it is. . You write above " Coke will die out rather quickly". The coal, that I put on top of the fire, turns to coke rather quickly so it is not very relevant to make a difference between coal and coke on top. One has to take the size of the fuel in account. Burning takes place on the surface so the same amount of oxygen will support a smaller and hotter fire ball if the fuel size is small. This is something that does not get much attention in the west. Contrarily, Japanese sword smiths put great importance to the size of the charcoal they use. Obviously the size will decrease as the fuel burns but at the same time it produces clinker. .

Yes Charles I agree to what you say. Outside the controlled situation in the center of a a forge, (such as in a barbecue or open fire) coal and charcoal even more so, will burn by itself and fire will spread. The reason why I do not have spread of fire in my forge is that he gases coming from the fire ball are depleted of oxygen and have enough bulk to prevent oxygen coming in from the sides. I can even sometimes see blue flames (which I assume are burning CO) hovering over the (black) pile. I agree with you in what you say about "good breeze " and "adding more air". That certainly will tend to increase the fire ball but that is precisely my point. The fire spreads because there is more air not because there is more fuel. When the blast is running, there is fire close to the tuyere. Air is entering through it and the oxygen is consumed as it passes through the fuel. No oxygen comes in from the sides because the oxygen depleted gases are in the way. If the blast stops, there is no longer exhaust gasses preventing oxygen from entering the fuel pile from the sides and the top and nothing prevents the fire to spread through the whole pile of fuel. My experience - and the discussion is about about coal. I can imagine situations where charcoal might so to say burn beside the fireball.

I repeat wit the tenacity of a lunatic. I put coal Not charcoal not coke, directly from the sack, on the top of my fireball and the fireball does NOT expand. Fire does NOT spread. Observation!! I prevent the fireball from increasing by limiting the air. I do not care what "all the smiths" say. I am able to see what is actually happening and I trust observation more then hearsay. If you do not believe me that is your problem.

It seems - as can be expected since we both have experience of actual forging - that we agree on many things. I think that it might be unwise to use the word "fire" in a discussion like this. To some people that word means a pile of combustibles even when not actually burning. To me the word means something so hot as to actually radiate visible light. For that reason I use the word "Fire ball" I could as well say "Burning zone" but zone suggests a flattish shape. I agree that it is wasteful to make the fire ball bigger than is needed. That does not mean that more fuel means larger fire ball. I habitually keep a 3-10 cm layer of non burning fuel on top of the fire ball and that does NOT start burning until the material below is consumed to the extent that it moves down - at which time I pile more on top. Even if I happen to rake up a burning piece of fuel into the top layer it will stop burning. NO! Oxygen does not enter from the sides. The N2, CO2 and CO going in the other direction prevent this. Please understand that this is not conjecture - this is observation. The extra fuel does not ignite. I do not get HUGE wisps of smoke (=volatiles) when I put more coal on top. I sometimes get some but not all that much and quite often it goes up in flames. I get more smoke when starting the fire - probably because there is not enough heat to ignite the smoke. However, smoke generation is beside the point we discuss. Yes the circumstances at the start of the fire are different from steady state. However, I fail to understand the significance to the point of discussion. Personally I use more air at startup because I want to increase the fire ball from scratch to the size I want. I then close down on the air to keep it that size. Coking is the driving off of volatiles. The incombustibles (=ashes) stay inside the fuel regardless of where the coking takes place. They are released when the carbon is consumed i.e. in the fire ball. Ashes do not migrate from the inside of the pieces of fuel on top of the fire ball into the fire ball and make the fire less "clean". Regardless of where it takes place, driving off volatiles is an energy consuming process. If it is done using the heat of the gases leaving the fire ball, less energy is wasted but that is also beside the point. Yes heat moves by conduction in steel and in fuel and I think you are right in that coke conducts less than coal but coal conducts much less than steel and the steel does not heat up all that fast outside the fire ball. This means that heat lost by conduction in the fuel is insignificant compared to that lost by convection (carried away by the exhaust gasses) and by radiation. By keeping the fire "black" I stop radiation losses. I cannot do much about convection losses but I can use them for coking. I and some smiths prefer to keep the fire black - You and some smiths prefer to keep it red. I think you are wasting fuel and inviting IR-damage to your eyes doing this but there are more consideration to be made and your forge may be different. Yes I agree with you that the fire ball should be kept to the minimum size needed but I disagree with you in that this is achieved by limiting fuel supply. My view is that it is better to limit air supply. I also think that this should be clearly spelled out to newcomers to the art.

Yes that is an interesting observation. Silver can be quite black as in niello. Do you know how the silver leaf was put onto the steel? Glueing?? I have some gold leaf lying around and I would be interested if I could fix it onto steel rather than gesso, Will try to Thanks.

I am referring to your statement: " The larger and higher you pile up, the more fuel gets consumed." Not to the video. I love our videos especially that you also use text (please put in even more) Far too many videos are just someone staring into the camera and moving the lips in a deafening background noise. You cannot consume more fuel than what can be burnt by the air supplied - that is a basic scientific fact. If the fire grows because you pile more fuel, you are feeding it excess air - something that increases the scaling and fuel consumption. If the air supply is limited to support the size of fire ball that you need for your work you can pile as much fuel as you want without increasing consumption. If you do that, (pile up) you will use the extra heat above the fire ball to coke the fuel, you will have less radiation heat loss, you will have less scaling in the upper part of the fire ball and you will have less IR reaching your eyes. Since you coke with heat that is above the stock and since the unused fuel decreases radiation heat loss you are in fact more fuel efficient if you pile up - providing you have means to limit air supply. The drawback is that you cannot directly see the stock and how hot it is. Personally I am happy to pull it out or raking a hole to look. I definitely agree that fires should not be bigger than necessary but the way to keep size down is is to limit air (and fuel size) not fuel. Many of those who seek advice on IFI are proposing too big fans and are told to limit the air supply. What is not so often discussed is fuel size and, as Charles pointed out above, fuel type.

Fiskars are known for using ergonomic design. I think that the ax is good because the edge has the right shape and the right angle to the handle and the handle has the right profile. I doubt that any flexing has anything to do with it. Some tools are just badly designed. Some are designed to do a different job than that which they are put to do. When you get a tool designed by a real pro for the job you are doing, that makes all the difference; be it hammer, sledge, ax, spade or whatever.

This is a really great gate. I am amazed at the talent that some of you guys show off.

Very wise words. A combination of the posts above would be an excellent part of a tutorial in hammer control. I am amazed that the students did not realize the obvious.

I never feel any shock or rebound in the hammer handle. I do not think that there should be any if the head hits square on. I get shock in my left hand if I hold the stock in the wrong way and hit it when too cold. If I have to adjust something cold I put a heavy winter glove on my left hand. Splitting wood is adifferent thing but I usually I get no rebound there either. I do not hold the ax or hammer very hard and I use the whole handle. I do not use the edge of the head as a fuller - I use the edge of the anvil or the pein. I keep thye anvil at the height recommended by Glenn, Frosty and others, i.e so that a natural swing hits squarely.

That is why I keep everything on my own hard disks - with backup. I have seen to many "cloud services" fail to trust something like photobucket.

Certainly but his blanket statement about fuel consumption is wrong since we can limit fuel consumption by limiting air.

The fan allows me to have both hands free and I can do other things when the stock is heating (Yes I also burn things if I am not careful). The design of my tuyere is such that I regulate the flow just there. Thus I have the highest airspeed in the tuyere and nothing falls down in spite of it being a bottom blast. Advantage: no tuyere block, disadvantage: clinker must be fished out. I have high regard for Technicus Joe and his videos but he is wrong when he states that more fuel means more fuel burnt. More air means more fuel burnt - at least when using coal or coke. I always pile up so much fuel that I hide the fire ball just as in Glenn's pics. It preheats/cokes the fuel and keeps the heat where it belongs also I am not tempted to gaze into the fire.

I will check later about sparks. I assumed that a file would not touch it since it was too "hard" for the grinding wheel but I will check that too. It did not smear in any way. I am very happy with it. It does not rust, it is light and it seems to be stronger than a steel bar of the same thickness. I bought it from the "US Cavlry" site several years ago.

Quiz master: You have a 6 feet long board if you cut it into two, how long are the pieces. Paddington: 6 feet. Quz master: Haha wrong they are 3 feet long. Paddington: I cut lengthwise!

Are you telling us that the stick welder draws 70 Amps from the 115V grid?? That is about 8000 watts.

Will try

When Louis XIV made war on the Germans his army destroyed most of the medieval castles along the Rhine and Moselle. The family Eltz, however, had French connections (even then ) and their castle was spared. No I do not have the work on Wirtshausschilder but I will look for it. Perhaps we should have a thread about interesting ironwork we have seen. There is a lot of it out there.

I like haggis. What is kimchi?

I have a titanium crowbar (supposed to be Russian surplus) I tried to sharpen it on my grinder. It was next to impossible. Is that a different alloy or should I have used file??