Double Y

My 8 year old son (soon to be 9) loves to smith as well. It is great to have them interested young. He is good help in the shop too, though he wants to fire up the forge by himself...I haven't allowed that as of yet.

Tell your son nice job from Montana, USA!

No CNC - I cut it all by hand with my Miller 375.

I like the results from the CNC, but I am too Scotch to buy the machine. I also like the fact that each piece is unique and a true art piece instead of mass produced.

Thanks for looking,

John

I took numerous pictures this weekend - must have had the bug - here is a bit of a 360 look at the inside of my shop.

I got the 50# LG up and running this fall/winter. Runs good and makes me think of new projects to use it for all the time.

Also the mallet is the second one I have made - the first was with a piece of 4x4, but it exploded. This one is a piece of cedar so it is very soft. I use the knot end for extra heft.

Enjoy...

JL

This is a Veterinary Codis for a Vet client that I have built a sign for and I attached pictures of last fall.

The snake is made from hoof rasps, that was more work than I thought it would be. I annealed the rasps, but apparently should have done it several times. Dang near wore my shoulder out curving the rasps.

The walking stick is drawn from 18 inches of 1x1 to a 36 inches.

I cheated on the V and cut that from some 1/4x3 that I had lying around.

When I install this, it will hang on the outside wall of the clinic and have Bridger Veterinary Clinc appove it cut from 10 gauge and then will have two signs below with the names of each Veterinary.

Nice to have a true reason to use the forge, anvil and trip hammer for a change!

Thanks for looking,

John

Nicely done -

I think the weld you are talking about is called a plug weld...At least that is what I have heard it called

This is a railing that I installed over the weekend.

The railing is 11 foot 6 and 36 inches tall. The designs are cut from 10 guage plate, acid colored and then coated with a Satin Powder Coat.

This is piece one from this family. I need to build another piece similar to this, though smaller for the other side of the patio and then build about 120 feet of fence.

The fence will be mostly a fab job with square tube pickets, but the kicker is the size.

Their son has a miniture Yorkshire dog that can get out of anything that has an opening more than 2 inches, though the dog can't jump per say. So the fence will be short - 36 inches - but the bottom 18 inches will have pickets 2 inch on center.

Keeping busy and keeping the house in beans is the name of the game....

Thanks for looking - comments are apprecieated,

John

Not bad at all, how did it throw?

New and improved with smaller pictures!

Sorry bout that...

Dang I thought the pictures were going to be smaller...I will change them and repost

Here are a few photos of some recently completed projects.

The Dragonfly hooks were a fun and quick little project for the young daughter of a friend of the families. I made a dozen of theses small hooks. I used rebar for the body, upset the head and used a ball die in my homemade "Smoosh o'Matic" I used a ball bearing, welded into a flat bar, as the swage tool to create the indendation for the mounting screw.

The ranch sign for Gates is 4 foot by 5 foot and is cut from 10 gauge plate. We are in a high wind area so the signs need to be heavy or they will fatique in time.

The same goes for the railing insert. These folks have a huge log home and I am not real clear why they had the builder leave an opening in the railing on the deck. The lady of the house is a professional horse judge and was very particular on the confirmation of the horses. I had to redraw the one horse several times before she was happy. I got the railing piece installed Tuesday and she was very pleased.

I use a Miller plasma and cut all my signs by hand - to cheap to buy the big machine and it gives each client a "one off" piece of art.

Let me know what you think.

John

Nice build, now for the fun part putting it to work.

Larry,

That is one heck of a squeeze, how many tons is that press rated at?

Nice looking set up

John

Okay I know I have it bad, when on vacation in paradise, I log onto Iforgeiron.com to check out what you fellows and ladies are up to.

It is HOT and HUMID down here. Lots of iron work, but simple. If there is any twists and curls it is very rudimentary. There are some cast finals on some of the fencing.

Dang near every window has iron bars on them, if they don't then the whole house is surrounded by tall fencing with spikes and/or barb wire at the top.

Very nice people, they just don't have anything and if something isn't bolted down...well they take it.

It has been 90+ the whole time, good air conditioner here in the condo though. The water is clear, warm, and the waves of medium height. A lot of fun for a dry land locked cowboy like myself.

I was wondering if there were any Costa Rican or central American smiths on Iforgeiron?

I checked the weather for home...they are expecting highs in the 30's and it is snowing! Good time to go south, however I have been Jonesing for some time at the anvil...

This is one xxxx of an addiction!

John

Very nice work. Thanks for putting up the pictures.

Excellent work

Nice set up...but be careful with that truck...it looks like some joker put the steering wheel on the wrong side! That could be dangerous :lol:

KYBOY,

Do you have a photo of the top of the rasp hawk, looking down on the top edge? I got one built this weekend and wanted to know if I had welded and tappered the bit down like you do...

Thanks,

John

This is a coat rack - honey do - project for my wife. It is made from 3/8 hot rolled. I riveted the hooks on in a random pattern, but kept many of them low so my son can reach.

I used muratic acid and bleach to rust the piece then sealed with clear coat.

Your thoughts and comments would be appreciated.

Only problem came with the install...don't you think that all stud work should be 16 inch on center? I built the hangers so they would be exact on 16 inch centers. I had the one stud located and attached one side of the rack....and of course there wasn't another stud where it was supposed to be! Oh well a molly bolt hanger and it will hold....

John

I think you just answered my main problem...I was keeping the eye back out of the heat. I am sure that is why I wasn't getting a good weld.

Thanks for the note as well Brian about the other thread. I had read that, but must have missed the part about doubleing it over.

I will give it another shot this week and see what I can come up with.

I appreciate everyone's willingness to share their knowledge. If I had any I would share back...HAHA

John

I have been trying to build a rasp hawk

I built one this weekend with some success, however the forge weld didn't stick all the way down the bit. I got about a half weld, which I didn't find until after I had put the handle on and was doing a finish sharpening.

I wondered if any of you had any suggestions? I use a propane forge and have forge welded before, but not a rasp. I have been using 20 Mule Team Borax as flux and it has been working in other situations.

The little hawk I built didn't have much heft from the eye out, so i thought I would double the rasp over after wrapping around a drift. I thought that would give me more matterial to work with. Is this a technique any of you use?

Thanks in advance for your help.

John

I have been working on a forge welded billet of roller chain. I had the piece stretched and was unhappy to see the center start to de-laminate.

I opened the section a bit, but in some borax, brought it up to welding heat and gave it a firm blow...firm not hard...and BANG!!! It really did sound like a gun went off and I had hearing protection on!

What did I do? And has this ever happened to any of you?

It ended up welding nicely and I have been able to draw the piece to my desired thickness.

John

Excellent! I really like the finish...is that wax?

Hofi,

I just spent more time than I expected pouring over the photos you have on Picassa. Thank you so much for putting those photos up. They are very inspiring.

All the best,

John

Great step-by-step photos...I am very interested to see how the whole works comes together

Nicely done

these drifts followed me home i will be selling some of them if anyone is interested i will figure a flat rate with shipping and i will donate some of that here if anyone show interest