NickOHH

i tend to like a nice curve in a chopping blade as it will penetrate deeper with less effort so it a nice design. alot of edge that will see little resistance, post a pic once you get it all cleaned up.

Quenching, you hardened it by doing so it gets very brittle so it needs to be tempered to reduce the it to a manageable level. Gotta be careful working with steel with medium to high carbon content I only quench to do the final cool once it's lost most of its heat already.

Welcome aboard chan! You came to a great place to learn! Lot of talented people here that will share there knowledge just gotta show interest and ask if you can't find it , search is your friend. Bring a lunch you'll be here for awhile!

welcome Corey, you've stumble on a great resource here! Im intrested to see your progression through turning that clip into a knife, it will be quite a work out, but that doesnt mean not to go for it! it would be nice to see a post when your done of various points along the way, best of luck in your en devour. 

Nice hawk there eseemann, like the blade shape, get the most out of the material, shape it up with the grinder alittle bit, and you'll have a fine peice there i have yet to try my hand at a spike hawk, i have a few layin around, my have to try it soon.

yea ive been havin some trouble lately too, but not bad, not bad at all! nice even long tapers and sharp points, good for your time! the first thing i did was flaten a triagular file! but i had a blast doin it and knew i was hooked! then i was hooked as i made about 500 hooks learning! but its a good way to learn the basics slowly moved on to more and more projects. 

a good layer of coal dust will help your body filter out all the germs and bacteria as well as all the city pollution :D


Key is to get coal dust on everything so ya don't notice it anymore.

heres a pair i made yesterday, getting better.

those are some awesome mini tongs Crazy Ivan

welcome Anunzi! Frosty has a good point about making a portable forge atleast for the meantime until you get used to it and make sure you dont want to modify it. there are some relatively easy to build that dont require welding or slightly better designs that you dont need to be a very good welder if you can get your hands on one for the afternoon (mines holding together just fine  :D ).  just need a brake drum and a peice of pipe with some kind of fan. can prop it up on some bricks if you need, theres a post on here about the "55 Forge" with differnt takes on using a 55 gallon drum to make a forge out of.

hey AZGUY, welcome to the forum. Do you have pictres of them? im not seeing anything. As long as you had fun, thats what really matters not good or bad. Theres always more to learn no matter how good you at this. Be warned though, its very addictive! the more you forge the more you'll need to forge! This forum is great for helping build your skills, alot of useful information and a lot of helpful people just browse, and dont be afraid to ask questions, and you will get answers. 

You'll like the upgraded forge a lot! When your building up around the drum you will only need to smooth out the transition over the lip of the drum enough to be able to rack in more charcoal don't need to use a ton of clay. And I would suggest start with a bunch of smaller holes all over the cap and maybe one large in the center because you can always add more to suite your needs or enlarge them but I think you will find with your gate to control air flow as many holes as you can get in there with still maintaining a grate to keep the fire in the firepot will be perfect.

Just broken in!!

Well put SJS, good advice. Your mental toolbox is as important or more than your actual toolbox .

i had the same problem tryin them with rebar, it can be done, and not a bad option for how cheap rebar is, i still use iit for make leaf keychains because i can make 20 of them for 2 bucks, but be prepared to lose a few due to cracks, if you keep using the rebar, work it really hot yellow to bright orange heat as soon as it cools at all heat again and it will help with cracking, but rebar doesnt have the same standards for quality as other metal unless you get it from a rebar manufacturer that specializes in it but then your not getting it as cheap anyway, best of luck keep at it!

So true Nick, as can all your friends and relatives.

 

Don't get discouraged Marcy, making the same thing over and over may seem like you're not progressing but as SJS says, you're programming muscle memory. Once you have the lizard brain programmed you can start thinking about what you want IT to look like, not how to get it to look like you want. Your forebrain will become the director, not the crew running the machine. If that makes any sense.

 

The most complex things I've ever made were just simple basic things connected in the right order.

 

Frosty The Lucky.

 

Im noticing that frosty, the more i make hooks and the things i started out over the summer with, the easier they get and the nicer they start looking, so the more details i can put in them, faster, and not think about how im going to do that as much or how to fix something, and the more im learning how the metal is going to react so it has made everything else i want to try easier, and with less thought required before hand, which results in less mistakes (but there are still plenty  :) ). 

This weekend i plan on making some punches and drift to start trying to make some make some wasted eye hammers and top tools. I have been talking to some people about design and am getting a better idea of the profile i should be looking for on it, and how to go about making it, and materials to use. I figured i might as well post and see what others punches and drifts look like so i can get some visual ideas of what people are working with, Thanks for sharing in advance!

Smooth reins are definitely better.  An oval shape does give better control at times.

 

As a sidenote, I have noticed that some beginning smiths want to texture their hammer handles (grooves, dimples, checkerboard, etc.) to get a "better" grip.  They usually grind or sand them down smooth very quickly!!!! 

 

a little grip is nice, but you dont need to rough it up all to much, i usually just dont sand my handles to much just hit em with 60 or 80 grit and oil them and you get nice grip but still comfortable for long use.

 

- Will increasing my pipe diameter to 2.5" (nominal) make a big difference? It's definitely true that the "hot spot" in my my fire seems to concentrated, so maybe as Nick says I have too much pressure and not enough volume?

 

Thanks again!

From my little experience with forge design it seems like it s the way to go, im using a 2.3 inch pipe with a 50 cfm bathroom exhaust fan, i didnt want to go to crazy with amount/size of the holes tuyere so i started minimal on both aspects, but the more holes i got in it and the bigger they got, the more the size of the sweet spot has grown now with many holes 5/6 and some 3/8 on the sides and center, and the fan on high i get quite a big fire ball that will get some laregerish stock hot quick and can control the fire with fan speed or blocking the inlet off a bit.

a good beginning blacksmith should be able to stylishly hang all there possessions in only a  few months  :D

What size is the hole in your drum you may want to jump up to a. 2.5 inch pipe for air bigger cap more holes more air you don't really need the pressure just volume . Any kind of clay will work from creek clay to furnace cement mix it will some sand or vermiculight to shape the firepot and build up around the lip if you don't want to mount the drum from under the forge.

There are lots of recipes online for different refactory cements that will work for lining the forge. Just search diy refactory cement. You can take a tub furnace cement from lowes or homedepot and mix it with some silca sand or vermiculite. Shouldn't need a whole lot to line the forge.a bent blade is a likely cause you could throw some washer in the bolt holes to see if there is clearance and use automotive liquid gasket at any parts store to seal the case .

Having a punch that exactly fits the eye will help with straightening, I quite like long axe punches as you get a much better idea as to how straight the axe blade is in relation to its eye.

im gonna work on making a couple drifts this weekend the one for the hatchet will be first, see if i cant get it straitend out if not ill just bevel the one side and try again, i want to start doin punched eye heads anyway so thats the first step anyway, that and some hammer eye tongs probably.

i had good luck posting in the tailgating section on here, had an anvil in the car a few days later.

Put the drift in and put it in the vise use a bar bent in half with parallel sides to go over the blade as a twisting wrench and twist the blade back to straight. Or put the blade in the vice, use the drift as the twisting wrench.

Thanks I'll give that a try next time I'm forging just have to make a drift first. :) but that's ok I wanna get into punching the eyes anyway. How big of a punch do you normally use for a ball peen size eye?