Daswulf

What if you made it like the first design with a changeable lower arm for the centered pattern roller?

Or make the bottom rollers movable on bolt down sleeves on the lower bar. 

Nice bender Bill!

There is the associated costs to it but I love getting clean welds using co2/argon with steel mig welding. Aside from cleaner welds you will get less spatter. Might just be me but I feel like you get better penetrating welds as well. 

I would say to go with a larger tank than you might think to start out with. 

Now maybe someone who knows more will chime in. I just know from doing, not really technically leaned in the field. 

I toyed around with using gears in a vise to pound the texture into hot steel but never thought of a roll mill type thing to do it. 

I could see that working well in a lot of ways including some of what Frosty mentioned with the wood grain. Maybe a feather pattern too. 

Cool idea that gets you thinking. 

Yup, thanks for the photos. Glad to see Thomas up and working. Also fun to see some of his shop. Looks more organized than mine. 

Wishing everyone a happy healthy new year.  May we be thankful for what we have, those we still have, and remember those we have lost, and work to do our best. 

Cheers. 

I've seen some anvils that seemed done with getting forged on as well lol.  Yeah good hard stone can and has worked as an anvil. Just for fun I tried on a chunk of granite and it worked fine, even had some rebound. 

With all the scrap chunks of steel out there, for many, it is just a matter of looking into the right places and asking around. Same with anvils. There are still many out there tucked away collecting dust. 

Sort of, I really wouldnt advise trying it. You wouldn't have much of the anvil side resistance as the hot metal you are hitting is actively burning away the wood. You would start having burnt away divots where you were hammering the hot metal.  Plus the smoke would be choking you out and blocking your vision of what you are doing.

Dishing can be done on a stump or with a chunk of wood.  Again, in practice where you dished at on the wood continually burns away as you use it so if you were doing a certain shape like a certain shaped spoon you would eventually need a new spot on the wood to start as the old spot would start to get too deep and wide for what you were forming. I realized this in using a hardwood stump to hot dish spoons before I made, then purchased a better metal dished swage block. 

Coal and wood will smoke more, coke and charcoal (use the lump charcoal not the briquetts to forge with) smoke less. 

Think of a bbq charcoal grill, they dont smoke much and when they do it is usually the food or juices from it burning off. 

I'm not a bladesmith but have made some knives and one of the most time consuming tasks for me is grinding, filing/sanding the blade to final shape by hand.  A good 2x72" grinder can make that work a lot faster and easier. They are also expensive. Other tools can be found or made much cheaper. A press and power hammers are nice time savers but you'll still have to do the grinding in the end. Were it me with what I know now, if I had the money I would start with getting a good grinder and belts. The rest of a basic forge setup can be cheap and easy to get, make and improvise when starting out. You just need some basic knowledge which is abundant here on IFI. 

Merry Christmas and many Blessings to all. 

It was so cold that my all wheel drive didn't seem to be all wheel driving too well on my way in to work. Still made it in safe. Was glad to not see any accidents on my way it. 

Thomas, that is just dead wrong of them. 

Nice work All. 

In preparation for the single digits we are expecting in a few hours, I got the chickens heat lamp and heater on their waterer, brought in the hose reel, covered a few plants and left the air compressor in the shop off and drained. Dont have the energy left to bring in all the rattle cans so they are on their own in the shop. Also put a new battery in my car today since the last two years it needed jump started everytime the temps were in the teens. Put it off long enough. Anyway, it will probably be 3° when I leave for work tomorrow. Lucky for liz and the kids they have nowhere to be. Id sure rather sleep in on a cold miserable day. 

If you are in the path of this cold front in the US. or in cold regions, Stay warm everyone. 

Billy, that would make an awesome incense holder laid flat with the quill curled to hold a stick incense. Nice work I think.

Nice work Goods.

And John, it is turning out great. Will be a great sign. 

Well done Alexandr. I like how the branches look seamless to the trunk. Nice placement of ornament holders as well. 

Get well soon. Hope you sell out. They aren't all winners but then you get that one great day that makes the effort worth it. 

Funny, whether at the fleamarket or vending my wares, I always seemed to sell more when I'm not there. Can't wait for my daughters to use their charm that I lack to do the selling. Lol, that's just me. 

Nice looking sales setup. 

Sorry to hear that D Harris. Little oversights doing this kind of stuff can lead to hours lost. I have to think we have all done it. 

I sold and forged at a pictures with santa event today. It was cold and a bit windy and not much foot traffic through the vendors. Even the line for santa was a trickle. I made enough to make it worth it tho with some sales and one rose commission delivered there. 

One kid (I'd guess around 17yo)  stood and watched me forge a leaf keychain. He was just amazed. Kept saying how amazing it was. He said he got to see a blacksmith shop in a class trip but they didn't forge anything. When someone is that enthusiastic about it I'm pretty happy to see it so I gave him the leaf keychain he watched me make, my card and wrote down this site for him to learn more. That is a good feeling to think you might have kindled the start of a new blacksmith. If I didn't sell a thing, that would have been worth my day there. 

As always got to see and talk to some people who really like what I do and make. It was cold but fun. 

On a side note, people in the summer say they wouldn't want to be me when forging. In the winter they say I got the best job. Lol. 

Also, as usual, got some tips on thing people want. Starting to get some loyal repeat customers at the events at this place. 

Best of luck to you. A little peace and quiet away from noisy places goes a long way to feeling better as well. 

From the old vaccuumes I've seen they are kinda powerful but are loud. Much better variants available today. Also in hood info and flue pipe size recommendations.  

Photos look highly compressed. Did you change one aspect without doing both? 

Either way it still looks like a usable anvil. It will have some quarks but you can get used to it. 

Having a 6" flue and that much open space around the hood, it would need the help. Vacuum motor might still be a bit much.  

Pat nice work. 

I like the cupcake holder. When I make the spiral holders I like to start with a point and angle it 90° then start the spiral so when you are done you have a little spike to keep the cupcake from sliding off. 

When I was in for my appendix removal, in recovery they had an iv in my inner elbow. My arms don't naturally stay straight when laying around. Every time I bent my arm ( including in my sleep) the alarm was going off on the Iv machine. After taking the nurse forever to get there a couple times to reset it I watched and figured out how to reset it myself. 

Accidentally setting off the bed alarm and my anxiety attack from it and them taking forever to come stop it is another story. I was up and all around that thing dragging my iv and drain tube in my stomach trying to stop it with no luck. 

Love the dragon sword holders. Lots of work there. I can picture some wings there tho. 

Thomas, I am praying and hoping you come out of this and stick around a while. Glad you have access now and are posting again. We all missed you and had some sad news at a point. This is much better. Keep up the healing or being too stubborn to die. Whichever works better. 

Top could be curled the other way for a more uniform look but it is great. Nice use of scraps. 

Wow, lots of good work and ideas.