JHCC

If anyone doubts that ours in a noble calling, please direct them to the works of John Lord Bacon.

There are some photos I took of my old rivet forge (no longer in my possession) at https://www.iforgeiron.com/topic/48129-need-a-couple-of-rivet-forge-dimensions/

Update: turned out to be bituminous or something that produces similar amounts of smoke. Given that my garage workshop has no smoke handling capacity beyond an open door and a stand fan, I won’t be using it again — at least, anytime soon.

Hardened and tempered the long hammer: Also made a new hot-cut from a jackhammer bit and another yarn bowl. This last is an important experiment: a woman who runs a local yarn store wants to sell these, so I wanted to see how long it would take me to make one start to finish, uninterrupted. This first one has about an hour of work, so I’m thinking about what to charge that will both compensate me adequately for my time and still give her room for a reasonable markup.

More specifically, something that’s supposed to be an anvil but isn’t, such as the cheap cast iron “anvils” one finds at discount hardware chain stores.

That’s a top-quality anvil at less than 40 cents per pound. You, my friend, are a lucky bug.

A while back IFI member Stitch gave me a bundle of big cotton terrycloth gloves that are great for heat resistance, but not so good for flying sparks. Remembering another use for borax and boric acid, I made up a bucket of flame retardant (1 part boric acid, 7 parts borax, 100 parts water), soaked the gloves, and put them out to dry. The first pair were great for use with tongs and tooling under the treadle hammer — until they caught a spark. I’m hoping these will be better.

In the furniture warehouse, we used to say, “Don’t carry what you can drag; don’t drag what you can wheel.”

Not precisely a machine as defined here, but while installing a new toilet this morning, I slid the old one out of the bathroom, down the hall, and out through the garage on a piece of heavy cardboard. Reduced the friction significantly, thus making it easier to slide, and kept it from damaging the floors.

Whole thing mounts on the wall.

The curved piece is pivoted at the top and and has a blade on the convex side. You stand up the stick with the bottom end on the little adjustable foot, place the blade on top of the other end, and pull down. If the stick splits all the way through, well and good. If it doesn’t, move the adjustable foot up a notch and repeat.

The linked article is short and to the point; Dr. Lazare’s longer work On Apology (from Oxford University Press) is extremely readable and quite enlightening. I had the good fortune to spend some time with him in connection with my professional life, and speaking with him on this and other subjects made me a wiser and better person.

Daguy, thank you for your eloquent apology to Frosty and by extension to the entire IFI community. It reveals a degree of character and maturity that we don’t often see from those who (for whatever reason) run afoul of the way things are done around here. It’s worth noting that your apology contains at least three (arguably all four) of Dr. Aaron Lazare’s “Elements of a Successful Apology” and accomplishes at least four of the psychological benefits of an apology. For the full list, see https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/what_an_apology_must_do. We look forward to your future contributions!

I’m sorry, did you say “a book on blacksmithing”? Who buys only one book on blacksmithing? Seriously, though, what Buzzkill said. I got started back in the day with Alexander Weygers’s The Modern Blacksmith and Jack Andrews’s The Edge of the Anvil, but I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend The Backyard Blacksmith to anyone.

That’s good — I was about to suggest taking a cutting torch to the car.

WELCOME BACK!!! We missed you, and we’re looking forward to seeing your next work.

That’s really useful; thank you!

Picked this up in the parking lot at the grocery store. Probably make a decent ball stake, if I can safely remove the chrome plating.

I picked up two ABC dry-chem extinguishers from the industrial supply place a couple of months ago, and within 48 hours my (ASD with no impulse control) son decided that the driveway would look good in pale yellow.

I think Fontanini Anvils offers their anvils in both finished and unfinished, with about a $200 difference in price.

Pictures when you're done!

Sweet! Thanks for the news!

Using something like a surface grinder? As long as it's reasonably flat, I don't see why not. Same goes for the smaller ones: if the milling dramatically increases the cost without adding any significant benefit, why bother? (Oh, and it's not "cheaper" -- it's "more affordable"!)

Go to your mechanic and ask if you can have a worn-out CV joint that would otherwise get thrown away (explain why you want it; mechanics generally think blacksmithing is cool and can be excellent sources of good-quality scrap). Take it apart and use one of the bearings inside. If you're lucky, the joint will come with some axle attached, which you can use later for tooling.