Dewnmoutain

one hit/quench is a pretty good idea. i'll give that a try and see what happens. i'll keep my eye out for some high alloy tool steel.

This is frustrating! I made a slitter to slit a 1/4" hole, with the idea to drift the hole to 1/4" so i can hot fit the 1/4"" square stock for this project im planning to build. But the darn slitter keeps bending on me. Im cutting into 3/8ths square stock. I get the steel plenty hot to do the cuts with, but every attempt just leaves me with a slitter that i need to redress. I made the slitter out of an old chisel, and the chisel is 1/4". I hardened and tempered it, yet with every attempt i try in learning how to slit and drift, the slitter bends. In the picture you

Not understanding what you mean

Decided to make a pot stand for camping. Going all fancy like and using some scrolls for decrative purposes. I drew out my scroll, as seen in the bottom right of the photo. I used some string and measured it out. Total length is 11.75 inches, made from 3/4x1/4" flat stock. I wanted to do a taper for the inner part of the scroll, so i did some math, and figured that having a 7/8ths" taper length for both ends of the bar would look nice, so 7/8ths plus 7/8ths equals 1.75", so i started with a 10" long piece of flat stock. I did my scroll work, bending, curling, and made the scrolls loo

New tongs New swedge New punch Just to make these 2 horseshoes

Lol im happy if i can get to within 1/8th.

Got a funny story to tell you. Today i was doing some finishing work on a basement stair project, and needed to cut some more 2x4s. I picked one up and set it down on my sawhorses. The 2x4 wiggled. I picked the wood up, looked at it,and saw a good warp twist on it. I said outloud to myself "meh, thats ok. I can put it in the forge and then hammer it flat." I picked the 2x4 up, took a step towards my shop and then reality hit me "wait a minute! You cant hammer wood flat! This aint steel" Yes, i smacked myself upside the head Hope you got a chuckle out of this

I think is an inch shorter. The blankie is soaked in oil to keep the anvil free of surface rust. Got sick and tired of hammering on the rusty face plate, so i sanded it down and just started covering it.

Was in the shop today, hammering with my forge hammer, and suddenly the head twistsd ever so slightly. I felt it twist on the strike and stopped. Sure enough, the wood inside the hammer head had come lose. i thought about it, thinking maybe a new wedge could work, but i knew deep down it wasnt. So i went scrounging through my hammer handle stash, trying to find an oblong shaped handle that best matched my old handle. Couldnt find anything, but i did have an old axe handle that roughly fit what i was looking for. I shaped the handle, where the hammer sets upon the wood, got the shou

Yeah i know it's not whitesmithing. Never said that thats what i was doing...

Well i ended up saying "xxxxxx it" and pulled out the file. Tongs work fine. Was trying to figure out why though my lines didnt line up to make it easier to for the tongs to actuate. Thomaspowers brought up an excellent question about the edge of my anvil...and yeah, the edge is a mess. When i got the anvil it had big chunks and gouges on the edge, so i had repaired it with welding. I had repaired it to a point where at the time i was happy to have a somewhat better edge to the anvil. It wasnt perfect. And i think that has translated to my work. When i set a shoulder, its not a nice looking "c

attempting to make some tongs...and im stumped. I watched black bear forge's video on making square tongs to get an idea as to how to make tongs. Looked easy enough, a notch in a few locations and some hammering, viola. And i did that....but now i hit a snag. Ive made a few sets of the business ends of tongs as practice, and keep running into the same issue. They line up well, but when i go through the motion of closing the jaws togwther, they snag on the metal left over. Looking at the picture, hopefully, you can see where the metal curves and interferes with the action. Sure,

Made some punches today... The right 3 i made today, the left i made last year and had a horrible bend in it. Decided to fix it

Life gets in the way so im not always in the shop all the time, but i average 6 hours a day, 5 days a week in the shop. I cannot help but look at what other smiths have made, especially ones who have less years hammering than me are making some nice looking pieces while i look at what ive made and it's like "what the heck is that? that's crap". i guess it's those "basics" you referenced anvil that i feel like im having a problem with.

(not sure how to ask this question, so please apologize for the ramble. i feel it helps convey what im attempting to ask) I decided that i needed punches, as the punches i bought at the local hardware store have a tendency to bend and upset when using them to punch hot iron. So i need punches with more girth and strength. I started pounding the steel, with the goal of making a 3/8ths punch, and then i had a question "is there a certain minimum size id need to make for punching through certain thicknesses of material?" for example, If im working 1/4" flat bar, and want to punch a 3/8ths ho