Mr. B

From what I can gather most "Hammer in" type events are held down Anchor-town way.

sweet!!!

impressive, niice job.

I'm new to the craft myself, I've mostly been doing stock removal knives for the past 19 months and just recently built a gas forge with most of a coal forge sitting in pieces in the shop. I'm around though. You can also reach me at bizzarroblades@gmail.com.

I'm on the other side of the Borough, but I'm around.

Wow........ I'll listen to those that know more than I and ignore those that beef up drama and act like they are bored 22 year olds living in moms basement.

Good name and it's transportable too.

Up and running, thanks All. 20170422_185041.mp4

It is a sub-arctic desert here, There are two season up here. Winter and Fire Season. All around us burned back in 07, a few million acres that year. Looks like summer will be next weekend. We will probably cook out.

Gotchya, thanks for the help.

Niice.......

Thanks for the welcome, Gentlemen. I'm north of Fox on the Elliot, in the Haystack area. There is a local blade smith group that gets together at Mark Knapp's shop, but they meet at night and I live 45 minutes away, I visit with Mark and Angel during the day and pick his brain, but I don't really interact much with the other guys. North Pole is about 1hr and 1/2 from the house. My shop is getting there. I have a couple chunks of Railroad track for an anvil. I'm building my first gas forge presently and I cut a hole in the bottom of an old steel dishpan and set in a caste-iron grate in it. Then got a little blower plumbed into some black iron as a coal forge. I still have to build a hood for it. Other than that it's pretty much set up as a Homestead type shop with lots of old tools and a few new ones. The one draw back, I can't get Fire Insurance out there. So as you can imagine, the wife is terrified of all this hot flame and shooting slag in my old wooden shop. It sits about 10' from the house. If the shop goes the house goes. I must say I can see her point on the matter. I have covered most of the floor with cement board and I am cautions about proceeding huckaldy-buck into disaster. You see the problem is....... I don't have to make knives and pound on hot steel, I have to make knives and pound on hot steel. ;-) This little hobby of mine has me rethinking my whole life. LOL That little faded red building is my shop. It was the original Homestead, built in the 60's. This is an old picture from the day we moved in, please excuse the mattress.

Then you could most certainly answer a question I had on tube design. The gas nozzle/orifice is above the air ports in my "Mikey Tubes" and gas passes by the holes, (I assume making a vacuum) and speeds up through the Venturi, BUT I have also seen tubes built with the gas-orifice just below the air-inlet holes. Those I assume suck air from behind the gas-jet. You see every once in awhile, and most of the time before I dialed the burners in, gas would get expelled from the holes and ignite. It was unsettling to say the least to have gas and blue flame shooting out of the holes so close to the orifice.To solve this issue I was going to lengthen the nozzle past the holes, but didn't want to screw with the physics already in the design. You know, since I don't have a clue about such things at this point.

So they are your burners, just not made by you? If you ever want to post your Forge build on YouTube I know there are most likely a few hundred thousand Newbie souls out there that would surely grab a cuppa and sit down to watch........... Just sayin. Thanks again for your help. Much appreciated.

Anyone north of Denali?

So in the way of an introduction, My name is Robert. I live just north of Fox, Alaska with my wife Kristine and a spoiled Chocolate Lab named Brandy. We live off-grid, haul our water and poop in a bucket when it's -40'f outside. We live in an unfinished house as most "Alaska Bush People" do, but it's paid for and it's warm. I'm hear to tell ya it's no place for a Yuppie, they will not even come inside. ;-) We paint with oils, we hunt, we fish, we trap, (sorta) and mostly stay to ourselves. About 18 months ago I had my first grandchild enter our life and decided to build him a nice Diamond Willow cradle. After the cradle was finished I had a nice piece of willow left over, while twirling it around in my hand, I thought it would make a nice handle for a knife. That was the last reasonable thought I had. So... many thousands of dollars and hours of shop time later I can say with all Honesty. "Hi my name is Rob and I'm a blade a'holic". It was not long after my first few knife builds that I noticed a show on T.V. called Forged in Fire, I took it as a sign from the Gods and sat down to watch. From then on it's been my goal to not just do stock removal, but also learn how to forge my blades. I'm getting there slow, but sure. I've sold a few knives and try to be reasonable about things. Folks seem to like what I've made, so that is a start. Anyway that's pretty much it. I enjoy this and if I can make a few bucks so much the better, but I mostly work now to support my knife making habit. Peace.

My mistake, apologies. The guy on eBay is named Mike. I tried to down load your book, it's on AMAZON for $153.00. Not sure I could swing that. ;-) Rereading so my Burners are "Mikey burners" that means they are also not so good?

Newb here, Just on to say, I enjoyed the show and you both did a great job representing your craft. I've been mostly a stock removal knife maker for about 18 months now, but watching the show has inspired me try beating or should I say conjuring my steel into shape? What you all do is impressive. Again congrats.

Thanks for your help. I was wondering if that was you I have bought them from. You got them on e-bay, yes? Oh for clarification.....I did do away with he cement board. It fried on me when I did a test heat. Pretty much turned to dust. went with sheet steel/nuts/bolts and washers for a skin.

Well I'm not usually this easy, but. ... ;-) Só the blankets I have now installed can I turn them around and put the sodium silicate side towards the shell? Then regidize with the zi?

Hi everyone, My name is Robert I live in the Interior of Alaska and have long winters that I take up with my knife making hobby and part time business. I mostly did stock removal, but I am more and more interested in pounding my steel in shape rather than cutting and grinding it. With that in mind I have a few queries. (Wish I found you all a week ago). So I built a small propane forge and used two inch insulation with sodium silicate as the rigidizer and had planned to put a coat of IT-100 over that after it's first heating. I was planning on using the fire brick I have for the floor. After reading this thread my take is the straight (No water) silicate I used was not the best choice, it will degrade with flux, but will be okay for a bit as long I don't do any heavy welding. The Fire Brick for the floor will not work as it sucks up heat instead of reflecting it. So if I got this right, I have a pint of Sodium Silicate left over. Could I mix it with perlite in a form to make a board for the floor or it just good glue for multi-layered ceramic blankets sticking together? OR........ Should I just rip it all out and start over? P.S. The pic has the cement board for the skin, I took that out and put in sheet steel with nuts and a bolt as fasteners before I insulated and I hinged the top tube holder so I could replace the heat tubes without tearing it all apart in the future. any help is appreciated, Gentlemen.