BillyBones

JHCC, well looks like you beat me today. Some of ya'll may remember me saying my granddaughter was with child, found out that i will be having a great grandson here in a couple more months.

So, how many pots and pans was she worth? for egg crackin i use what ever knife i have handy. If it is a butter knife i use it, a steak knife, what ever i have with in arms reach. I have also used the edge of the spatula. Xeno, my granddad passed in '84 when i was 14. By trade he was a carpenter but when we were living in the hills we had a small forge in the barn he would use to fix tools and the like. My post vise was his but my great granddads before that. My grandpa was the reason when i joined the Army i served on a tank. He was a tanker in WW2 on a Sherman under Bradley. My granddad was also somewhat mischievous, he did some time back in the 30's for running whiskey. My grandson turns 5 this year hopefully soon he will be swinging a hammer.

Charles, i was taught to crack eggs with a knife also, for years i thought that was how everyone did it.

CC, love that twist. Quite nice. Chimera, need to get some kast-o-lite on that. Those fibers from the insulation are very harmful. Need to seal it up.

All about the timing.

We love well thought out questions to answer, we also love pictures, beware of drift however and watch out for the puns. We are a punny bunch here. But when it comes to picking brains you will raise the ire of the curmudgeons if asking a question that has been answered 1000 times already. Think about the family vacation "Dad, are we there yet?". So before posting a question look and see if it has been answered already. The best way to do that is do not use the onsite search bar, use your favorite browser, insert question follow by iforgeiron. For example "Heat treat O-1iforgeiron", vey first entry was for this site. also if you have not yet, go to the general blacksmithing forum, then to "Read this first" and read it. Also, dont know why i did not say this earlier, but if you scroll down to the bottom of the home page you will find a forum on "Blacksmithing groups". It has listings for many of the known ABANA affiliates among others that may be local to you. There are also some tasty recipes here for racoon and possum if you ever need one.

That would be Ha-Ha's pizza. Peperoni, onion, fresh garlic and mushrooms on whole wheat crust. Oh-Yeah. Back in the 80's you could get the "special" mushrooms on a pizza there. Local lore says that is why it is called Ha-Ha's. Yellow Springs is a nice place to visit, but having lived there the glamor wore off real quick and i am glad i moved to Fairborn. I too am an essential worker. When the covid first struck i was working on cars then changed jobs to the machine shop last spring. We make parts for ventilators among other stuff for the medical and aerospace industry.

Never heard of Talenti. My absolute favorite ice cream is from a local dairy, Young's. Black raspberry, i get that on top of a brownie covered in hot fudge. They used to make all their ice cream in house but now they only make what they serve in the dairy. You can buy pints and up to gallons in their freezer but it is made by Reiters now. On the way home from or to Quad state this year you should make a trip. It is about 10 mins south of 70 on 68. If they still have it try the pumpkin bread also.

Ah, touché, Thomas, touché. Of course you can do more with pattern welding, i just always think of knives with canister. Probably becuase of that show that shall not be named.

Went to work today and was standing there talking the 1st shift guys when one comes to me and says "go look in your truck." So out i go. She's a little beat up, especially that jaw that is missing, rusty and dirty, but the screw looks good and it moves smooth. For the price, free, a pretty good score i think. I am thinking a good candidate for electrolysis.

Welcome. Great way to spend time with the grandkids. I would not start him out with tongs. Start with the basics. Drawing and tapering, upsetting, fullering, rounding square, squaring round, etc. Hammer control and technique. Many quality smiths have put videos on the you toob highlighting the basics. There is a whole list of recommended smiths to watch here. Our own Jennifer, JLP Services, has some excellent ones that i have learned a whole bunch from. For beginner projects i would start him with hooks, maybe a steak flipper or 2, skewers, stakes, etc. Look up the local ABANA affiliate. They will usually have basic blacksmithing classes. SOFA here has one once a month, in normal times that is. As for the forge, why buy new when you have a forge already? For the price of a new gas forge i can buy enough coal to last me a year. There are still a whole bunch of us using solid fuel. Also, grab your grandson, a cold drink and a sandwich. Fire up the old intra net machine and the 2 of you make an afternoon reading the threads here. There is more information here than any other place i have seen. Also peer reviewed by 1000's of smiths. I have only been doing this for about 5 years or so. This site has expanded y knowledge vastly and has made me go from that is beyond my skill set to i can do it. The folks here are a great bunch that encourage you to try. But the most important lesson you can teach him is safety. Keep it safe, keep it fun.

Thomas, i do not know. It is 12L14 which i thought we could not forge with but have been told different recently. I have also never done a canister. Maybe one day but i do not make a lot of knives so it is not real high on my things to do list. JHCC, variety is it then, i see you know much more about plants than i. To be honest i had to look up the name. I love mint one of if not my favorite flavors, especially ice cream with some chocolate chips, the shavings kind not the ones in a bag.

No, just some species of Mentha Spicata. It grows wild around my shop, i love the smell in the spring and summer. I took Latin in high school. I remember very little, but we did have to translate Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar" into Latin. We were each given one part of the play that was translated then we had to stand in front of the class and read the translations. Not my shop but at work. Just though this was kind of cool looking and thought i would share. After i shut down for the night my chips had made pillar under the chute the parts drop out of. Edit: Just had to be the first to post on THIS page, my luck.

Did some weeding in the shop.

while the majority of pallets here are made of either pine or oak there are many other species that are used. These include maple, ash, birch, elm, and a few others. If you can obtain them, SOME pallets from overseas are made of exotics. It is rare but they have been made from rosewood, purpleheart, and even very rarely ebony. A while back ago i was looking for info about pallets and ran across an article on wood for pallets. While pallets are made of "junk" wood, they are made from whatever the mill has left over basically. They can even be made of mixed woods. what the people making pallets are most concerned with is hard or soft.

I can see this going south real quick...

Blue, Snap-on tools are quite collectable. In the 1920's they started with date codes. On the tool usually next to "Snap-on" is a small emblem. This shows what year the tool was made. I have run into a couple dealers who collect these tools and would give a new one for the old one even though nothing wrong, they just wanted the old one for themselves. Those codes are easily available on line and most Snap-on dealers keep a chart on the truck. Also the "Snap-on" logo has changed and some are more collectable than others. WW2 Snap-on is highly sought after. I cant remember the exact measurement, but i think they shaved 1/16" off the anvils of their ratchets and some other small changes to preserve materials for the war effort. Warranties on Snap-on are mostly up to the dealer. I had a wrench that broke because one side was ground down my dealer would not replace, changed shops, new dealer, he exchanged it without a question. You can also get them exchanged through Snap-on, not a dealer. But you have to contact them and send them the tool and they will send a replacement. I went through that with a bunch of Cornwell tools. Sears Craftsman, Ah...the bane of the mechanic, maybe? Craftsman has made and still does make quality tools, from time to time. They are notorious for contract changes. take a cordless drill for example. They will contract say DeWalt for their drills. When you first get one you get DeWalt with a Craftsman name, after time Sears will have DeWalt make changes, say a plastic gear in place of a metal gear for example. There by making them cheaper for Sears to purchase, after a time of doing that the drill went from a quality tool to a piece of junk.

I get the occasional stone in my coal. Glenns suggestion is not only the easiest, but sometimes the rocks will be so covered in coal dust that they are easy to miss and put in the forge if just screening and looking by eye.

Didnt the Beatles use a portable hole to escape the Blue Meanies?

Back a few years ago when i was working in a garage a kid i was training was having problems getting the bolts out of a cross member. I said to him "Burn 'em out" then showed him how to use the cutting torch. He came over to me a while later and telling me he had discovered his new favorite tool. A cutting torch is one of the most important tools to have in a heavy line shop. I learned very early on dont mess with it, burn it out. One problem i saw in a garage with them is that a lot of people do not pay attention to where the hoses are at. working on cars is almost alway over your head and the molten metal drops to the floor. I have seen more than 1 set of hoses get burned through in my time from the metal landing on them. But then you have people who dont know when not to use a torch. Had another kid doing intake gasket on a mercedes, he had the fuel rail pulled and was having a problem with getting the wiring harness up. So instead of using the dykes on top of his tool box he used a mini butane torch to melt a zip tie. The fuel on top of the engine from the fuel rail ignited setting the car on fire. I saw it grabbed the fire extinguisher and handed it to him and went to go open doors. He looked at me and i had to literally tell him "Put the (insert cussin' here) fire out."

I used to have a nice raw hide mallet that last i knew of was with my dad, of course he has no such recollection. I have also been looking for an old farriers rasp and knowing of 1 farrier locally that has been to no avail except for "antique" ones that they want and arm and half a leg for. So i bit the bullet and just bought new ones. The mallet faces are smaller than the one i had and the handle is spindly but should do the job.

Well the redbull can wont be much use but i could think of a lot of uses for some of that stuff. Stake anvils jump out right away.

Sinsdoc, when i get to work tonight i will ask if i can get a list of local steel suppliers. I know there are a couple that specialize in tool steel, however i do not know if they are open to the public. Local for us will include the Columbus area, we get stock from all over the country.

I have not had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Powers...but i have seen pictures.

Sindoc, the Alro here in Dayton sells drops. Much cheaper than buying new. You cannot how ever get 8', but i have bought pieces big enough to make hammers and bottom/top tools out of. Actually i have seen pieces in there big enough to use as anvils, but really 6" thick x 20" round of S-7 is a little beyond my scope of using. They dont list the drops on line you have to actually go there and look and see what they have. They will also have brass, aluminum, nylon, etc. Alro does mostly manufacture supply so a lot of what they have on hand will be specific for the area. But they do handle a lot of tool steels so you will find them. I believe that the metals supermarket also sells drops that you can go in and look through but i have never been there. About quad state, our governor says all Covid restrictions will be lifted on June 2. So i am making plans.