Josh Foran

Well played around a bit today and the Cullman chapter it'd the AFC is having their Christmas party tomorrow, so I decided to make another leaf to put in iron in the hat! First one failed twice. When I tried to twist it, I twist it in two. Then when I tried to draw out what was left, the leaf fell off. So I have a nail, a messed up looking bolt extractor, and a tiny piece of elvish armor for a chipmunk.

Welcome from a fellow rookie! I'm not a big name. In a sea of big potatoes, I am but a tater tot.

Unobtainium.

Yes... but... how do you do with horses?

@PVF Al Yeah! I would love to! @Michael Cochran That's right! That way when we got back, just open up the blower and it kicked right back up!

You curmudgeons and your high post counts! haha @ausfire Thanks man! Grinding is not so good, but it was more of proof of concept if I could make a knife shaped object haha. I have some better steel but figured I'd learn on the rough stuff. Thanks for the welcome.

@littleblacksmith I had a good teacher! Thank you very much for the kind words! @Irondragon Forge & Clay the Cullman group did something similar during their lunch break. Worked great!

I'll do that!

"If you hit your hand with a hammer while wearing gloves.... it still hurts." -Paul Street Still true to this day.

@TwistedCustoms I get more scale off the charcoal than I do with propane. Both are quite enjoyable. Hoping to continually improve the LPG forge as I go @JHCC Thanks for the welcome! You guys are a big part of the story so far!

Haha yeah that plate came with the car. It's a 1970 Datsun 240Z and the plate says T004TZ so I kept it. Thanks for the welcome! The little forge has hard fire bricks inside from tractor supply. It was more of an, "I want to forge now and I can have this today" thing. Both can get scale. Thanks! My family is from everywhere. I am the epitome of the American melting pot (I'm a mutt), so good possibility there is someone over there I'm related to!

Haha, glad to be here!

Hey everyone, I've been reading here for a while now. Just really got started in blacksmithing. I'm very excited to learn a new craft. I'm here to learn what I can and make no assumptions of my ability. My first experience with blacksmithing was the first weekend in November, I went up the Cullman chapter of the Alabama forge council and they let me hit on some hot metal and gave me a really good introduction to blacksmithing. He taught me how to make S hooks! From there I went home and built a cheap propane forge (Not perfect and I have since read a lot and am going to be making a V2 soon) I wasn't sure if I had enough air going in so I upgraded the inlet: The flame on the left of this next picture is with that cross and the one on the right is with the valve: For you burner experts, which one looks better? (I know nothing) Then I went to to the Tannehill chapter of the the AFC for their Christmas party and was gifted a piece of rail road to use until I can get an anvil. No worries, it will be used properly (vertically). Just need to get around to setting it up. Using a vice till then. From there I made a mistake with a shape: Then I wanted to build a small coal/charcoal forge out of a brake rotor... so I did: Used a $14 dollar fart fan from home depot as a blower and it seemed to work pretty well. I had modified a chisel to make a little fuller and decided to use this forge to take another crack at making a leaf. Then the wife asked me if I could try to make a knife. I don't care about making knives yet, but figured I'd give it a shot. Here it is in all it's poorly ground glory. I wasn't going for anything in particular, just a KSO (Knife Shaped Object). And that brings us the now. I'm learning and having fun. Glad to be here and am grateful there is such a good resource out there for new blacksmiths with just about all the info you could ever need and people who have done it before. I look forward to learning what I can from all of you! Thanks, -Josh