winginit

Coal is always a problem 100 lbs 100 dollars ouch!! Lol

Railroad spikes are fun to use  and easy to get 

Welcome  Metal_Masher

Welcome Owchy  

there is a nevada face book page for blacksmiths 

 charismatic blacksmith, well that counts me out. LOL

big dogs ?

Welcome meancoyote 

frozenforge good job that knife looks great !!

​wow that's great I didn't think they would go the far . I have yet to make a set of tongs guess I am chicken .I know they will be ugly .

_{what I like about rr spikes is it helps you learn how much material you have and how far it will go, and they are dirt cheep to play around with .}

why was the print so small ?

Nice C/L find old mobile forge in  mesquite   Buffalo Army Forge No. 571 

http://stgeorge.craigslist.org/tls/4895419103.html

Hay guys , I have been trying to stay busy  and got a few things done . I finished the brake drum forge not that I need it after building the bigger  one , but I like to finish what I start .

   And I found some 3/4 x 2 x 16" stock and I'am almost done with my first hardy hole tool , a cut off, I still need to weld it and heat treat it .

   And I am almost done with my very first railroad spike knife . 

   I hope all is well with you guys !!!

http://

http://

http://

http://

http://

http://

 

It's been done.  With solar though, you either end up with itty bitty hot spots that have to be carefully adjusted due to focal length issues, movement of the sun, wind, etc, or great big contraptions that have to be carefully adjusted due to focal length issues, movement of the sun, wind, etc. (plus my wife said no more miniature solar death rays.....)

 

Also, they get a little too hot. It's like playing with a homemade arc furnace, normal refractory too close to the heat just doesn't hold up well.  Incidentally, there's a fun thought. Not as many casters over here, but anybody ever play with forging using a homemade arc furnace?  I've seen a couple of unwieldy looking rigs before, never tried making one. Heat control would be a righteous pain for one......and electric shock....and........

Thanks for the reply , I guess I will not be trying solar . Ones mind dose wander playing what if I try "fill in the blank "

this is not a fuel, but I have been wanting to try a big fresnel lenz . some I have seen can get over 2,000 deg no fuel blacksmithing with the sun its  free !!!  you got to love that .

http://my first project

Cool its backup again !!! now I can learn new ways to spend money !!

I keep going back looking at that swage block you have, I wish I would have thought about that one when I worked at steel eng we had a plasma with a bridge and trolley, program it on a turbo cut program, load it in the d6b and let it go, sweet !! It also had a tracing eye, paint it white and put it on a black background the eye would drop and load it on the floppy . Hind site is 20 20 I wish I would have made more cool stuff when I had the chance. Hate to see what they would charge for nice swage block . I'am sure if you have to ask it would be to much LOL . Thanks for the striker offer, I know it's a drive to vegas I think it was 97 miles from my house to echo bay "on the freeway" where I had my boat moored . I have about 10 bikes and drive lake shore all the time just for fun so I go through moapa valley quite a bit, if you need a hand on something just let me know . I am off on weekends .

Nice !! a lot of cool shapes on it . That's got to be a bare to make its a keeper for sure .

You may be fine on the other bottle. When I had my shop the gas company just swapped our tanks out even though we owned them. They handled the hydro's too.

Check with your supplier, and tell them what happened.

Have you looked into Oxygen Propane?

Yes, I have two propane cutting  tips for propane and two nice aluminum tanks but  I don't think my rose bud will work with propane and the welding tips are not the same I think , I don't know for sure .

Hay, check this out a nice swage block on C/L 14 1/2" x 14 1/2" x 4 3/4" 425.00 they want a bunch for these on  flee bay .

http://goldcountry.craigslist.org/tls/4872101737.html

Poor anvil someone cut it .

http://chico.craigslist.org/tls/4878775752.html

Well, you met some possible strikers last Saturday morning ;)

I would look at wheels that are at an angle, and won't touch ground until the item is tilted back onto them. Kind of like a wheel barrow except the wheels lift off the ground when the item is lowered onto the base.

Oh , kind da like a hand cart , I guess I could just take the wheels off and just move it with the hand truck . But--- but---, that would be to easy LOL 

Boy yesterday was a pain , I went to use the O/A and found out I was out of oxygen . And 

then I looked at the bottle closer, hay that's a rental bottle . I loaned my torches to a friend at work and he ran out of oxygen, and being a nice guy he took it down to get filled "exchanged" and they gave him rental instead of an owner bottle that was a few years back . well I am screwed .

So I went on CL, and found two bottles for sell whey were the 125 size not big but not small A young kid had them, he said they were his grandmothers and each one had it's own hand truck cool !! . 

He wanted 250.00 OBO and that's a good price but it said OBO so I offered 200.00 and we settled on 225.00 for the pair . Got them home and checked them out a bit closed they are out of date 10 of 01 but they had a + and a star so they will be good for 10 years when I get them tested . But that's ok . One bottle had 2000 LBS and the other one had 700 LBS so they will last a while .

So it cost me 225 bucks to be a nice guy and lone my torches out . No good deed go's unpunished LOL    

What size hardy hole does it have?

It would move easier if you have a striker with a sledge. I would not be opposed to welding shanks onto hardies to save some time.

Also search here for slitters. Slit the hole, then open it up with a drift.

It has an 1 1/4 hardy hole and it looks like someone buggered it up a little with a cutting torch , I had thought about making some type of sleeve to make it smaller so I could use a more common size square stock bar 3/4 or 1" ID

Yes a striker would be nice but I don't trust my 13 year old son that much LOL

I will look up slitters .thanks !!

Dear Winginit,

 

You might try putting some chocks (wedges) under the wheels while forging.  It would add some stability.  At some point you will be hitting the anvil in such a way as to give it a lateral push, e.g. if you are bending something down over the heel because the end of the piece bends back and has to go under the heel.

 

If you are going to make knives out of the RR spikes look up "super quench" on the internet.  It hardens spikes pretty well.  Quench but don't temper.  If there is a C on the head of the spike it is higher carbon steel than the regular ones.

 

Good luck.

 

GM

I have some 3" channel I may make a rectangle frame to move the wheels out farther  and then some drop down out riggers type feet that I can pin quick .

Thanks for the tip on the super quench I will try that .

     What is "Superquench"... ?

A super fast quenchant. So fast it can be used to harden mild steel but too severe to use with a higher carbon content. 

5 gallons water 
5 lbs salt 
28oz bottle of Dawn blue dish washing detergent 
8oz bottle of JetDry or other rinse aid.

As the quenchant becomes exhausted the color changes from blue to yellow/green.

How does that anvil work out being on wheels? I would think they would be somewhat of a detriment.

Also , the top of that anvil looks fine, I wouldn't touch it. Working on it will help smooth it out.

I have one of those mud flap springs, I was thinking maybe a knife since it is a spring steel.

I have never tried the anvil without the wheels so it would be hard to say , seems to be fine and it is very handy to move around although it is very top heavy   always push it never pull it it may fall over .

Man, its all I can do to not take a sander to it , but I will let it go for now, and spent my time making tools for the hardy hole . I need a cut off tool, other than a chisel in the vice and I need to make a tool to punch a hole for a handle some type of tapered drift pin . I have a 1 1/2 x 3 ft pin from a loader I am going to try to make fit the hardy hole but that's a lot of steel to move around we will see .  

I haven't tried to make a knife yet , but I will soon I have 50 RR spikes on the way, I will beat on a few of those before I make scrap  out of some good steel  LOL 

So I took the day off and played around with the forge , this is the first time to fire it up, or any forge for that matter . And I wanted to do something cool so this is my first nail header . I know the nails dident come out very well , I need to leave more steel when I cut it off to have some for a good head . So tell me what you think .