JHCC

That would be a net gain.

Quoting is fine, but it's not necessary to quote the immediately preceding comment. IFI's quoting guidelines are available HERE. If that happens, I call dibs on your fly press.

My local industrial surplus place has this interesting item listed, and I was wondering if it might be practical for a small forging press: The cylinder has a 2.5" bore and a 4" stroke. There are no dimensions given, but they have it listed as weighing 115 lbs; I'm guessing its no more than a couple of feet tall. To my inexperienced eye, this looks like it could be very handy for some smaller jobs, especially since I have neither the space nor the budget (nor indeed the wiring) for a full-sized press. What do you folks think? And how might might I expect to pay for the actual hydraulic pump, control mechanism, etc (ballpark, of course)? Many thanks.

A little sarcastic, maybe, but not rude. You might want to look at the first two sections of the READ THIS FIRST page. As for not planning on listening to ThomasPowers's responses, that would be highly unwise. He may be a bit gruff at times, but he is one of the most experienced smiths on the forum and extraordinarily generous with his knowledge. Don't sabotage yourself before you even get started.

Walleye see what you mean.

I await my challenger, deep in thought.

I do my worst thinking in the shower -- it's bath-y po' logic!

Handled round punch.

There's a time and plaice for everything. That's as plain as a pike-staff.

Flip and rotate between hits. That will tend to even out any discrepancies.

I have a ring-shaped magnet hanging off one corner of my forge by a long string, and I test magnetism by moving the workpiece towards it from the side. If the magnet starts to swing towards the workpiece, it's still below curie temp. If it doesn't, I'll tap the magnet with the workpiece to confirm that it's not sticking. Works a treat.

It occurs to me that if you made a small fish from scraps from Japanese swordmaking, that would be a whole different kind of tamahagane smelt.

Welcome to IFI! If you haven't yet, please READ THIS FIRST!!! No. That product is designed for sticking refractory bricks together, not for providing a flame-resistant face. Take a look at the castable refractories: Kast-O-Lite, Mizzou, etc. Lots of good discussion in the gas forges section. Antique shops tend to charge premium prices; true junk shops can sometimes offer better bargains. Check out your local flea markets, garage sales, etc. Don't wed yourself to the incorrect notion that you HAVE to have a London pattern anvil; check out the improvised anvils thread for some ideas on lower-cost alternatives.

I bought a 0-30 high-pressure, propane-rated regulator with a pressure indicator dial and a four-foot hose from Amazon for less than thirty bucks delivered.

Have you read the forum posts that specifically address this question? We've had a lot of discussion of how and where to buy anvils, how much you might expect to pay, what to look for, and what you can use instead of the usual London-pattern anvil. Please look at those threads (especially those having to do with TPAAAT: the Thomas Powers Applied Anvil Acquisition Technique), and then let us know if you have any questions they haven't answered. Or to put it another way, you're asking some basic questions (here and elsewhere) that have already been discussed at length. Rather than making us say all of that over again, you can do some research and learn a LOT of other stuff along the way. Enjoy!

As I understand it, the main point of repeatedly flattening, folding, and welding the tamahagane is make the carbon content consistent through the entire bar. With bloomery iron, the point is to consolidate the bloom into a single mass; the slag that remains within the bloom becomes the silica content that gives wrought iron its fiber-like grain.

Lots of old videos show smiths using ball peens as their primary hammer, especially in Britain. There's historical footage of the great Samuel Yellin forging a section of railing; he's using a ball peen that looks to be about 2-3 lbs. This, absolutely.

As good a moment as any to repeat the amazing story of what Miles Davis taught Herbie Hancock about "mistakes":

Welcome to IFI! If you haven't yet, please READ THIS FIRST!!!

Carbon isn't the only thing that burns. Burning is an exothermic reaction between a fuel and an oxidant -- when metal burns (for example, when overheated in the forge), the metal itself is the fuel. Yes, it's a mixture of iron(II) oxide (FeO), iron(III) oxide (Fe₂O₃), and iron(II,III) oxide (Fe₃O₄, magnetite). Scale starts to form at (very!) roughly the same temperature as the critical temperature of steel, which is why many bladesmiths wrap their blades in stainless steel heat treating foil to prevent oxidation. However, scale doesn't fall off the workpiece on its own until about 1750F, much higher than the temperatures in a heat-treating oven.

No forging today, but I did knock out a part needed by my son’s robotics team. When I heard someone say “What we really need is X. If only we had someone with metalworking experience!”, I knew where that was going.

The hobbiest of hobbyists.

When I was working in art restoration, we took in a broken black marble sink that needed some missing areas replaced. My coworker Ed cast some thin plaques of epoxy tinted with white pigment, smashed them to bits, mixed the bits into a batch of epoxy tinted with black pigment, drizzled on some "veins" of white-tinted epoxy and dragged them through with a toothpick, and then ground and polished the resulting mix. Looked fantastic.

Welcome, Brian. I see you've already been directed to the READ THIS FIRST!!! post, so I won't direct you to that again. Oh, wait.... Check out your local smithing association and see if there's anything in the area for classes or open forges. And keep reading IFI!!!

Poking a hole in the top can help with airflow as you're getting the fire started. Once the fire is established, it's not so important.