bobasaurus

I made this as a gift for my father, it's a hammer used for shaping shallow bowls/dishes out of sheet metal in jewelry work. O1 head, Tasmanian blackwood handle.

That forged meat tenderizer is genius, never seen one like it. 

I forged this jewelers blocking hammer head out of O1 drill rod last week, and got the faces dressed and polished today:

Made this shoe horn as a late Father's Day gift for my dad.  Forged from 3/4" mild steel rod, walnut handle. 

Made a quick damascus bottle opener this weekend from a scrap cut off from another project.  It has some imperfections but it came out okay.  I also converted my steel bowl into a headphone stand (with my very first forged leaf). 

Thanks a lot Hans, I'm still a novice at welding and only intermediate at forging.  What is a welding post?  Using a regular grinding disc is a good idea to get the humps down first.  Might give this a try. 

Les, is a pipeliner disc just a slightly thicker cutoff disc that you can cut and grind with?  Good idea on the weld speed, one problem is my little welder isn't rated for this thickness (should have preheated). 

Any recommendations on how to clean up a weld like this?  Maybe flap sanding disc on the angle grinder? 

I forged this square bowl today from some scrap plate steel.  Made a ring for the base and welded it on (terribly).  I like how the welding heat colors halo around my touchmark. 

I forged this kitchen knife out of 5 layers of metal forge-welded together, using the “go mai” technique (my first attempt at it). The outer cladding is 15n20 steel (from an old sawmill bandsaw blade), the shiny line is nickel shim stock (scrap from my workplace), and the core that makes the cutting edge is 1080 steel. The blade is fully hardened and tempered to a hardness of about HRC 60. It has a full flat grind with a 25 deg cutting edge, and is acid etched to show the contrast of the nickel layer. My logo is electrolysis etched on the side, though it is subtle with the black finish.

The handle is made from cocobolo and has a piece of aluminum for the bolster. It has a hidden tang construction, pinned with brass rod. I’ve been refining this handle shape over a few previous knives and settled on this profile as my favorite. I finished the wood with several coats of amber dewaxed shellac, then a few lights coats of renaissance wax.

This was a gift for my coworker's retirement, gave it to him yesterday and he seemed quite happy. I was a bit nervous as they passed it around the room, as people don't realize just how sharp a knife can be.

Here are some progress pics of the build:

Here's a magnet tester I made for heat treatment.  Has a scroll handle and a magnetic tool-holding stud welded onto the business end.  Hard to weld a magnet without destroying it, had to keep most of it in water while welding. 

O1 also sparks weird... looks like mild steel. 

My friend saved me some scrap chain, gears, and axels/shafts from his workplace.  The heavy double-strand roller chain makes for a great hold down, and the hammer head I'm working on is from one of the shafts.  No idea what steel, it was 1 5/8" diameter. 

Wow, how do you find that much coal in the wild?  Did you have to dig it yourself? 

These are beautiful, well done.  What heat treatment do you use to prevent them from breaking on a lathe catch? 

On 10/13/2019 at 5:08 AM, pnut said:

. I used to have a friend who had a prop business in North Hollywood. I never knew what I might see when I'd stop by. It was one of my favorite places to visit. I sold quite a bit to him also. Good find. Any time a prop business is selling it's inventory it's worth a look.

It was a crazy place to wander around, here are some pics of the inside.  That same day I went to the sawmill and bought some nice pieces of hardwood (two maple legs, a maple stretcher, and a russian olive top) to make a side table for my bed.  I'll have to think about forging some hardware for it. 

So today I found a flatter in what must be the least likely possible location... a prop warehouse having a going out of business sale.  It was part of the mining display props.  Bought it for $20, thought it was a great find (been wanting one for years).  They had welded a tab to it for positioning or something, should be easy to break/cut-off and reface.  It was surrounded by giant tiki heads, mummies, pirate ships, leprechaun gold, and all sorts of miscellaneous bizarre crap. 

Amazing work on that railing, wow. 

Here are two recent projects.  The dragon was a collaboration with my father, who made the amazing copper wings with his chasing and repousse skills.  It was originally meant as a coat hanger, but now I might make it a decorative piece.  I made the hammer for his Father's Day gift, it's a jewelers planishing hammer made from O1 and moradillo with a design copied from the talented Saign Charlestein

Regular wire brushes are pretty weak, their thin flimsy bristles don't do a lot of heavy scale removal and smoothing compared to a block brush.  Block brushes have wide flat high-carbon bristles that scrape hot steel smooth. 

Eventlessbox, that's a great-looking anvil and mounting job.  Might want to forge the ends of those rods into something less pointy, though. 

I made three glowing rectangles yesterday.  They are going to become tapered extra-wide laminated hand plane blades for an upcoming competition (kezurou-kai colorado).  Starrett O1 cutting edge, 1018 body, ~3x6x1/4".  I mig welded all the way around to keep oxygen off the forge weld. 

There are adzes setup both ways, but typically an outside bevel (outcannel) is desirable as it allows for better control of the bowl wall curvature (you can adjust the angle of the adze and it will follow the bevel in a swooping cut). 

I made the dragon head into a key rack I can screw to the wall.  Also started making a small wooden box with dovetail joinery today. 

Das, those are some great roses.  I like the leaf details too. 

Frosty, do you have a photo of your vise rest?  I'm not picturing it, but it sounds handy.  I used mine today to make my first dragon head, and you're right about it slipping in the vise and scarring the shaft:

Wow, that's a great fireplace screen. 

I made this crazy-looking jig today.  It's roughly copied from one I saw in a Black Bear Forge video about forging a dragon head.  It allows the head to be supported in the vise and be supported from below (at an angle) while chiseling the facial features.  Hopefully it works, may have to reinforce the top lip.  I used random stuff around the shop instead of buying the proper materials, but it was fun to practice welding.