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I will interject because I'm all juiced up on black tea.. LOL.. You made some good progress. Great to see.. The nail header looks pretty good.. It's important to have a square hole.. In fact it is one of the most important aspects unless you are making a different shaped shank.. Other important factor is to have a slight taper to the nail header vs a steep taper inside the hole. A steep taper will trap the nail in the header if the shank gets deformed at all. a long taper will help to keep the shank inline with the head so easier to remove. I can see the ends of the nails are beat up a little. the reason why I addressed this is because every thing that is more correct will make the experience easier and faster. Next the 1.5X is a good rough estimate but nearly all old nails used much less stock than 1.5X and much closer to 3/4X stock size.. Nails should be headed when orange heat until you get the timing down. (this saves the header from unnecessary abuse and wear and heads better). and when you cut the nail and take the heading heat remember to leave it attached to the bar and snap it off in the header with the high side away from you. (away or towards is totally dependent on your hammer swing).. Nearly everyone pulls the hammer towards themselves when they strike a hammer blow. this will recenter the high side and push it into the center. Vintage nails are rarely ever round on the heads. It was only when commercial nails came onto the scene that round heads became more of the norm. IIRC. they made 1200 different kinds of nails from 1600's to when hand forged nails fell out of favor. they were not all the same and many of the heads were swaged to size.

I'm feeling frisky today and after reading some of or I should say all the information about clean shops vs unclean shops here is the unbiased opinion and the only one needed. LOL.. I have been into many shops that are spotless and the smith was terrible.. I have been into many shops that were falling in and had stuff scattered everywhere and the smith was awesome. (this does not mean that the opposite is not also true but it is more the case of messy is better than spotless).. I have over the years seen where that crappy smith because of the clean, newish shop drew a customer base dazzled by all that clean and tidy shop area only to turn out an inferior product but the customer being dazzled paid the full price.. (both in money and in an inferior product). I have also been to these dazzle shops and walked out half way through only to see the crap being handed out, both in knowledge and in skill set. I have also been to some of the finest hole in the ground, crap trap shops and the work is amazing and the smith has perfected their craft and does not need to pedal their skill set based on how the shop looks. Nor do they care to.. They work and that is it. My point is that there are 3 to 4 different sales aspects.. 1, A shop does not represent the level or quality of work done in said shop.. 2, Any shop that presents as immaculate for the most part I usually am skeptical of anything made in such shop. 3, It is the smith and only the smith that dictates the kinds of work as well as the quality of work.. (new vs old beat up gear). 4. The work should speak for itself. Not the building or how clean or unclean the area or building is. first opinions are nearly always wrong.. In todays world people forget smithing is a dirty job and if one is working at if for a living they to are usually dirty or they are covered in hair so you can not see they are dirty. It does not mean the work area need be spotless nor full of metal but after 40+ years of doing this there is an untidiness that happens during the work and is considered part of the normal work flow. What I have found and it seems to be consistent.. Every good smith, starts out with a workable clean area and by the end of a project there is/are tools and items used during the activity scattered about by the end. Then and only then is the area made fairly tidy again waiting for the next job order. @Ranchmanben you have stuff strewn around the shop which is the size of a football field so clutter would be a luxury.. LOL.. The smaller the shop the more strategist one must be with what or how things are put and will always seem dirtier and more messed up vs a huge open area with good lighting. Lighting plays in a lot as well as to someone perspective of the shop and items inside. If one has the time and skill set to make really nice equipment and present as such because they have the "TIME". That is one thing. But there are many whom do not have the time and make due with what they have.. More power to them.. Again, it is not the equipment or shop, that makes the smith.. It is ability and skill. It's a different world today and sadly much of it is about the show vs true skill set.

That will work.. is your floor one of those floaters? concrete in the floor.. I like it. did you try it without the dynamat? nice setup.

you can also use a gas torch with a cutting tip or welding tip and heat a spot on a corner quickly and as soon as it reaches the 1750 or little hotter, just shut the gas off. If done correctly and fast enough it will indeed harden.. you can also do this with a TIG as the heat is instant.

I"m slow on most things but even I was up to speed on this welding on the slack tub. I'm all ready half way thru on the footage I took. It's so fast with only 1 video stream. Other nice thing is its just straight 4K video vs 3D so this speeds things up dramatically. I'll be curious as to the ratio they use.. They mentioned they wanted it to be both condensed but also to have direct examples of the forging technique. It will be interesting for sure. Overall I believe it was about 6hrs for the complete chisel. The handle was pre done needing only to be drilled and furelles drilled and fitted. I was going to do welded ones but time wise didn't work out.

Thomas that sounds like it was both a great time and a great learning time.. I love demonstrations like that.

Duckcreekforge. I originally tried to do full on photo's of the finished project with the initial drawing of starting metal and then steps to finished forging. It become to time consuming to include the photos in the journal.. So I started a photo journal of finished projects and would just date the back of the photo. Sadly as I went along I was forging enough that I started to leave data out and my last few detailed drawings were just of the starting stock, finish time per piece and any measurement that were unexpected. If I ever go full time again. I will document the information more clearly again. Adding the finish time was important for myself as it gave me a way to better estimate quotes and such. .

That is fantastic. I have 3 notebooks all partially full with forged items and notes on how to make that item with notes for making it easier. It's funny how now looking back at the items the listed times it took to make them.. This spring lock has 1.5hrs.. Now to make that same lock would take 3hrs. Be sure and put down how much time it takes. This will become important later. Nice work Duckcreekforge. Nice job. did you copy it out of your notebook?

As a side note. Anytime I donate my time or forging knowledge i don't expect anything in return other than a credit as to who is doing what. I do it because it's what I enjoy.. I got to work in a nice shop, work with nice people, answer some great questions and share not only my knowledge but love for a thing I still find to be fascinating. Chelonian, Thanks, I don't know yet. I wasn't able to try it. When I put the first bevel on it felt good on the cutting edge. Usually will take a few sharpenings to get back behind the rounded edge.. I left it full length vs docking it back.. (at the end of a file stroke the file has a tendency to fall downwards rounding out the metal. This is fixed by filing straight across with a file plate so the file does not fall away/rock.. Or the end is cut off or docked. I did neither.. So once it's used a few times and needs to be sharpened it will be worn back instead.. ) It will be shipped back to me in a few weeks once all the stills are taken and processed. It will be a great show and tell piece.

Thanks. The EAIA was the sponsor and the guy who filmed it is a member.. I did it because I was asked by Bob and I like Bob and his work ethics and know that if he puts his stamp on it, its going to be a quality production.. I really can't see anything less.. The person who filmed the work was in video production some years ago and he was particular with the shots.. By the way.. this is not a full feature, full length film. It is going to be used as a commercial kind of arrangement where much of it will be dubbed and sped up.. From what I was told they want it to be about 2 to 3minutes long so they will have ample footage (4hrs condensed). Its one of the reasons I requested to get footage. So I can then edit my own version. I try to donate my time and skill set towards worthy entities. ABANA, NEB, EAIA. Youtube, IFI..

Frosty, I'm the customer.. The request to me was for the video footage. I told them as the stipulation that I will be taking the story board and finished example for the shop. I also asked for a copy of the finished video and raw footage.. The finished video will not be modified by me.. but the raw footage will be put into the video I had taken to offset some of the lost footage as a set and forget filming method, which somehow the lens ended up out of focus on the last 1/4 of the build.. I of course will give credit to the videographer and run it by him before publishing on the footage I do use. Thanks.. I like this kind of work so it was extra fun.. Here is a photo of the shop which was from the last time I demonstrated making a Carving hatchet for the EAIA, which is an exact copy of the original shop which was moved to Old Sturbridge villiage this the Moses Wilder blacksmith shop in Bolton, MA. Well the copy.. the orginal shop is in OSV.

That is kinda cool. If the welds are decent a full penetration weld is not needed. 4140 which fork lift tines seems to be can be heat sensitive in the HAZ zone so some preheat or skip welding can be a good thing as is crater fill. I don't think I would make it one sided though. If you really wanted to have that bridge aspect to the setup. I would weld that loose leg to the other side and better yet cut off flat section and double stack it vertical instead of horizontal to get some mass under it. If you have extra material you could just add that under the flat bridge section and that would work well too.

Nice work.

Thanks CGL. In certain circles I get some respect.. LOL.. Thanks for the kind words.. Your well on your way and your work is very nice and well finished.. These are the tenets to a great smith. Getting some 1 on 1 time with a good smith can help out but you are doing very well. I love seeing what you have going on. I got the report back that it cut nicely and it survived the initial test on cutting a mortise in yellow pine.

Robert, your very kind and for sure welcome to come for a visit. Building hasn't gotten any further but tomorrow I am hoping to get some plowing done and back to work with some clean ground next week before the next snow storm.. So, here is the chisel handled and ready for use. I like the " Your work and your youness, inspires me.".. LOL.. Thanks