NickOHH

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What the? How the? Huh?!?

man, you guys are brutal, i thought we were all friends here :blink:

 

i did wake up with all my hair, made it threw one more night safe and sound :D

I may just be easily side tracked though.

Well I coke it first just don't push it in to fast only really have much smoke startin it up

I'm with em I keep my green coal and fines nice and wet helps cut down on the smoke since I'm in a fairly crowded neighborhood

That's awesome nice lookin hawk.

It did get a little side tracked like every time I get on this site :)

Just bein smart, Marcy is probably about ready to shave my face in my sleep.

Nick: You might have wanted to consider the number of lady smiths on IFI before saying something like that. Hmmmmm?

Frosty The Lucky.

*pulls foot out of mouth*

I thought it was required to have facial hair to have a forge or an anvil.

That's a nice flatter there, might have to add it to the tools to make soon. Like the handle easier than punching an eye and shouldn't transfer much shock through.

sm she gets way more stressed to not be touching me.

The most stressful part of that dogs life is having to get up to find more sun to lay in.

Me and Marcy were wandering through a little antique shop up here in flushing michigan and stumbled across some tools and I spied a nice little 10 #anvil in nice shape would maybe nice for doing some small work they can't want to much for it as I see similar ones all over. Oh wait they want 12.50 a # for an unmarked 10# anvil yes $125.

I'm gonna work on a stack once we get home. One that's removable so it's not bad to move in and out still just has to be tall enough to get it over head level

I bought a Brooks new like that one back in the early eighties. Mine was just short of 80 pounds. Used it for demonstrations for years. It was great little anvil. I would advise keeping the Brooks because that one is an especially good anvil, and having a smallish anvil around is always a good idea.

Having that Brooks will allow you to take your time to discover what size and pattern you really need and then to find one. The Brooks is a keeper.

It's more of a personal preference but I like the shape of the brooks too. Nice and stocky feel comfortable with heavy work over the heel, don't feel like I'm abusing it

I bought a Brooks new like that one back in the early eighties. Mine was just short of 80 pounds. Used it for demonstrations for years. It was great little anvil. I would advise keeping the Brooks because that one is an especially good anvil, and having a smallish anvil around is always a good idea.

Having that Brooks will allow you to take your time to discover what size and pattern you really need and then to find one. The Brooks is a keeper.

It's more of a personal preference but I like the shape of the brooks too. Nice and stocky feel comfortable with heavy work over the heel, don't feel like I'm abusing it

Brian brazeal's videos are really good the subject there's one of the whole process and another were he uses clay to explain his one he tong blank in depth. Worth a look.

I haven't tried square bar for tongs yet(although I may have to try just to see) but I've had good success with the round. Also liked I didn't need to worry about the reins so they're perfectly even and smooth.

I have the same brooks in roughly the same condition and I love it. Great rebound . Radioused the edges a bit and the inside of the hardy . It will serve you and generations to come. I've been beatin mine pretty good and it looks better than when I got it! Tops gettin a nice shine to it now.

Round stock works just fine, something you can try if you want to taper your reins not just leave em straight is do a hexagonal taper insted of square. Rotate 60 degrees insted of 90 and it's easier to round off and keeps the taper straiter and more even.

There's a pic of the ones I made last real easy to make and they work great. Just flatten our 4-6 inches for the jaw area flip and flatten and taper back to the round bar . Shape the "c" behind the jaw and punch whole in the boss rivet and set the jaws.

Mild steel are a good choice for your first goes at tongs, as said above bolt tongs are nice I think they are easier to make more forgiving to line everything up once they riveted. The problem with medium to high carbon steel is they're gonna be getting hot and then quenched while heating your project again which will harden them to a brittle state that can tolerate the stress or you have an oil hardening steel which when quenched in water can cause cracking. You can however use mild steel for the jaw and boss ( hinge) area and weld on spring steel reigns so you can have thinner lighter reins.

You can use medium to high carbon steels for the whole but have to be aware of the risk of breakage and let them cool before quenching if they are more than a low black heat. I've had good luck with bolt tongs from 1/2 inch mild steel.

That would be a neat trick getting her to forge. She has expressed an interest in lost wax casting and hammering gold. She wants a small jewlers anvil and has told me no cast iron. She pays attention, and the pounding of any metal would be a nice start. You never know, I will tell her about you and your forging MarcyP. Might spark an interest, scroll work would be fun for her. Thanks for the tips all. Next time I will take my lil trailer, 90+ miles round trip is a long way for a single bag.

Thats a pretty good trip for coal we have about a 50 mile trip,might as well make it worth while. I need to stock up again we have been goin through it faster lately.

I want to get a smaller anvil in the 10# or so range for doing some more detailed work and for Marcy working on some small stock or copper/aluminum type work. Get your wife a small setup and some easier stock to work with and show her some of the possibilities I like workin with Marcy she just has a whole new perspective to stuff than I do.

Very interesting approach to the axe. Well done , nice for your first one. Make another out of spring steel and see how it performs!

nice post a picture once its done, i almosted used mason hammer, im curious wide/ long the blade turns out, theres some meat there to work with

Yep those look pretty nice. I prefer to use claw hammers because they tend to have more meat to them than a ball pein of the same weight.  I have always found ballpein hammers to have undersized handles, which if you OCCASIONALLY hit too hard, tend to break... Very annoying;-)  Less muscle, better technique;-)

im glad i ended up using claw hammers instead, they turned out pretty decent, still need to give em a proper try on carving a bowl with em, but from the prelimnary test they seem to work decent, and i havent gotten them razor sharp yet, coulda left the claws on for a bit more weight, but they still have pretty good bala tnce. i want to make a couple wider ones now, these around 2 inches across, i want to try for something near 4, just figuring out what to use or how to acheive it.