bigfootnampa

I like the look of that Glenn, thanks. For this project I want something permanently attached but I could maybe see something similar screwed to the wall.

I am wanting to forge a doorstop for our bathroom door. I have forged the towel bar brackets, the paper holder, and some clothes hooks for this room and I want to keep the hand-forged theme going. I've never seen a smith-made doorstop so I am struggling to imagine one. I have the germ of an idea for a wall mounted springy thing but I'd like to see some that others have made if anyone here has done them or seen them elsewhere. Does anyone have ideas or examples to share.

There are lots of small forge designs here. Check the blueprints. Check the forges section of this forum. Google has plenty too.

If I may suggest, another possible solution might be to work at odd times when there are few other users at the forges and/or to use a container of some sort to keep your iron from falling into the nether regions of the fire. A piece of black pipe with one end forged closed might suffice. Be sure to use black pipe (gasline) NOT galvanized. Thick pipe lasts longer especially at high heats.

MIG welding a rod for a handle to a sacrificial end of your iron might also work well and then you can do most work without tongs which is easier (especially if you are new at it).

Thanks Frosty;

I'll remember to heat the Wrought iron hotter in the future!

I may be able to work with the rake tines as they are because a little curve is good for a broadfork. The tines are long enough to get at least two broadfork tines from each. I could maybe get three if I heat and straighten the loop ends (then re heat treat of course).

They oughta make good fish gig spikes too. I am wanting to make some of an old style that uses a socket with a shaft that has been slit and drifted to a rectangular eye and then you insert two U shaped prong sets (one narrow and one wider) and secure them with a wedge (iron wedge). I think the idea was that you could replace or repair the spikes more easily and the socket would always be reusable. I'd have to heat them and forge a barb and bend and then heat treat again for that... still seems like they'd be a whole lot simpler than starting with a leaf spring.

I reforge and rehandle old hammers. Some of them have broken or worn out handles which I use for file handles and the scraps from that for wedges for the new handles. Scraps still unused then become fire starter for the forge.

I buy old picks and cut off the points which are slightly reforged to make nice drifts for my hammer reforging.

I get all the old jackhammer bits I find for reforging into mason's chisels, hardy tools, and other useful things.

I save the shavings from my drawknife and shaving horse (where I make the new hammer handles) for fire starter for the forge (saves propane... which I used to use to get the forge started... coal forge).

Thanks Mike and DJ for this info. I was at a farm sale a week ago an bought an old hay rake pretty complete except that the wood parts were all rotted away. I am pretty sure that I got a few hundred pounds of wrought there... now I can check it.

I also bought a couple boxes of hammer heads which included a pair of set hammers and about thirty nice hammers altogether (plus some junkers) for sixty bucks. The hay rake with extra tine sets (about 75 tines altogether) set me back a whole $45.00!! There was a lot of stuff to sell and few eager buyers.

I am thinking that the hay rake tines will make good tines for broadforks for gardening if I straighten them slightly cold. Does this sound like a good plan for using them.

I have had little joy working with wrought iron so far... it seems crumbly and frays on the ends of pointy tapers at least if I am right about the stuff I have worked with so far. I will test in the future and then does ANYONE have suggestions for what to do with it and how to get joyful when I work it in the future.

One thing I'll add is that I find water very helpful in managing my coal fires. I keep a spritzer bottle handy and pile coal around my firebox squeezing in at the top a bit. I keep this coal somewhat damp and it converts to large porous chunks of coke which I pull out when I need them and add to the top of the fire. Dampening also amalgamates the dust and makes useful fuel out of it. I try to keep one or several good-sized chunks of melted together coke as a lid or roof for my fire trapping the heat around my iron. It's a wondrous thing to pull a three pound hammerhead out of the fire that is entirely aglow in a bright orange heat! Do not drop such things on your toes! I haven't done that but I have come close enough to think about it!

A copper or bronze wire wrap would look good there and I think you could skip the welds.
A double tapered iron rod would make a nice wrap too. Perhaps a pair of them each twining around one large and one small contact point. These might have to be wrapped hot with a torch... I think the bronze or copper could be wrapped cold.

I have a newly acquired 253 pound Trenton anvil that I am very anxious to get set up and working. I need to get it on some sort of stand. I have some old I-beam out back that is kinda short pieces but plenty long for an anvil stand. This beam is 8 inches tall and about 3 1/2 inches wide with approximately 1/4 inch thick stock. Would this make a good anvil stand seeing that it is free except for the gas to cut it. I have used stumps in the past but this would take a big one and I am wondering if the I-beam material might add to the effective mass of my whole set-up whereas wood might just soak up any hammer forces that reach it rather than rebounding them back into my material and thence my hammer. What is the feeling among those with more experience out there.

My old anvil was a smallish (80 to 100 pounds) Chinese thing which has very noticeably less rebound than this new anvil and I am anxious to maximize my new advantage with it. I also plan to swing some two handed hammers on this anvil.

Okay Frosty;

I tested this hammer and he is my favorite now! I love the way that I can fuller with all four corners of the face and the cross-peened end is much more useful than most. So far I like it better than any hammer I've seen or had a chance to try! I am eager to make some from scratch now! I picked up some old tractor axles and such for steel which I hope to make into nice hammers. The temper seems right so far. I picked up a new (old) anvil (Trenton 253 lbs.) at the BAM conference last weekend and he is hungry for big iron!

I have made some open ended iron rings that were sort of a rams horn design. It works in iron but gold is too soft. You might try twining the drawn-out ends though... that could work with or without solder. Of course for this type of product you will want hard solder... preferably of a true karat match (which is available).

Another approach would be to create a coin-like disk and punch a hole then drift and forge so that you have an unsoldered ring... this might be nice in iron too. Similarly you might slit a rectangle, drift and forge.

"How's it work?"

I haven't had a fire since I got the handle on it... but I'll report on that in a day or two, at least by next week, as I hope to use it in the forging competition at the BAM conference.

This is another remade hammer. I started with a three pound square faced cross peen that had been abused. The face was mushroomed and had shards broken off on the top corner. The cross peen end was in decent shape... no handle. I bought her for two bucks. I reforged the face and smashed the cross peen down to get a much wider one with larger radii and some rocker side to side. I redrifted the eye and reground the working faces to get some nice smoothly rounded corners and a fair rounding on the face. "Blue Boy" is headed for the BAM conference in Sedalia MO this weekend. Maybe he and I will meet some of you there. I believe that he is closer to 2 1/2 pounds than three now... scale and grinding lightened him a bit... just right for me though.
BTW the name comes from the tempering colors which are still visible and kinda pretty.

Okay, Frosty;

I didn't get to forge yesterday but I handled that hammer and he went to work today! I felt that he did just what I had intended and seemed VERY useful and seemed to save me a lot of time (not to mention producing more refined work). Here's the proof (not in the pudding but definitely HARD evidence). I forged this garden trowel from a piece of one inch by one inch angle 1/8 inch thick. I now have a buncha hammers in various stages of rework... nothing is ready to show yet though. My hammer-eye tongs are a huge help... I still need some more hammer tongs though. BTW I must have done a good job redrifting the eye because the handle was dead solid despite a very energetic workout. So, success! Happy I am!

Charlotte;

Send me your optimal and minimal stock dimensions (rough split green) for handles and I will try to get some from my persimmon stock and send it. I can also put you in touch with a few sources here (two are neighbors with small lumbering operations) that may help you.

I once cut a huge black locust from my yard back in Idaho and burned it (it burns better than coal and at least as hot too). If I remember right that tree was about 30" at the stump and quite tall. It seems like I got about seven cords of wood from it.

I read about a guy who had a sailing yacht built of it by laminating fence post rippings. His builders all disliked it but the boat was WONDROUS FAST and he sailed her around the world winning races wherever he found them and sold her to an Arab sheik.

Here's a website address for an urban-salvage-logger in nearby Saint Louis. They seem to have pretty reasonable pricing and access to a WIDE variety of timbers. It's a cool concept that I hope catches on!

Lumber Logs LLC :: A Woodfinder Supplier

I think that knife would look good with some home made micarta scales on it. A fly-rodder will appreciate having a waterproof handle too.

Charlotte;

Black Locust is a legume, related to peas and beans... also of course Honey locusts. Not closely related to ebony... though it is a hard wood and dark in the heartwood. It is often available as fence post material, which should yield decent stock for handles (though green of course).

Persimmon wood IS of the ebony family and also hard and dark in the heart. I have a little that I have been wanting to experiment with but much of my stock is pretty wormy. It also tends to be difficult to get straight unbranched pieces and of decent size... once you split them down and remove the pith and sapwood it takes a bigger log than you think to yield nice handle stock. I also have the handicap of seeming to always be busy when a log is available so that the thing is all weathered when I get to it.

You might try Craig's List for a source. Or contact some of the small operators who trim and cut trees in your area. I trade with some of them for the rarer stuff that I hanker for.

I like the rim work too... also the rivets are very nice! Did you make the rivets from scratch (i.e. wire or rod).

BTW it seems like the kind of piece that is thirsty for a nice rack/holder/mounting.

"Most of the work is already done by having the eye already made."

UUUMMmm... I have to differ with THAT statement... there is some time and work saved... BUT PLENTY is left to exercise your hammer hand! It is REAL WORK reshaping a decent hammer head into anything at all. Good exercise and skills practice though. Want a chance to practice hammering technique... here you go... this'll do the job. It'll test your anvil, your tongs, your arm, your forge, your patience... temper, language skills (haha). A good way to use up that excess coal in your stash too.

Fresh air! Definitely! Recycled air would indeed have less oxygen. If forging in an enclosed room he'll want to pipe in fresh air from outside (this is for safety... otherwise the fire could deplete the air in the room and become DEADLY).

I have decided that I need some new hammers with features not found on standard hammers. I have been making some heavy-duty trowels and I want to spread the metal for the blades and the sockets more efficiently. I reshaped this ball peen today and also redrifted it's eye to square and stretched it a little to get a stronger handle on it. Along the way I had to make myself a square and an oval hammer-eye drifts and a pair of hammer-eye tongs. I found these hammers are some kinda hard stuff to pound into new shapes! The three-pounder that I worked on will take a few more forging sessions to take shape. I am trying to get a sort of fuller shape with a larger radius than my cross peens have.

I heated and quenched the hammer when I had the shape pretty well defined. Then ground the scale off and baked it in the forge again till I got about a medium blue color and requenched. I will handle it tomorrow and see how it works (I hope).

Well actually Thomas, I do hammer my steel as it cools when I am refining my shapes and in specific areas (like hook curves) where I desire some work hardening. However I also find that MY metal gets stiffer after being worked even when I haven't intentionally forged into the black heats. Maybe this is not theoretically predicted but it happens when I am working and I generally find it useful.

As a consideration for smithing work it seems to me that the greater yield strength of the 1018 would be overwhelmed by the work hardening and grain alterations inherent in the forging processes... not to mention any quenching effects. The extra carbon in the A36 might well be lost in the forging cycles but the 1018 might also lose some and having less to begin with end up softer rather than stronger. I would typically favor the 1018 for an axle for a small wagon/cart where I would use the steel as bought (without forging or heating/quenching cycles)... for general forged items I tend to buy the A36, which is slightly cheaper, as I feel that I would get little gain from the nicer surface or the higher yield strength where these properties will be so thoroughly impacted by my forging and heat treatments.

Only a guess but... did you have your anvil anchored with staples before and now it is standing loose in it's routed depression. Perhaps it is not connected tightly enough to the new mount.

Okay here is a picture... sorry I was a little busy before. I am also including a picture of the trowel that I was able to complete with the forge. My wife reports that the trowel is amazingly useful! Much more effective even than it would appear to be. She has ordered another narrower model (which I have completed except for the handle finish and final assembly... pics of that later).
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