SmithCaleb

Update: I have since made my first 2 knives and this is what I came up with. The Tanto is rr spike with the head cut off and flattened and the smaller one is rebar. I quenched the rebar in water and tempered at 400 for an hour. The edge is hard and the spine is soft I tested with a file. The handles are pieces of pallet wood because that's what I had laying around and nails as pins. Next I want to do a knife out of good HC steel and nice handle material. I'm probly going to use 1095. Any suggestions or tips on heat treating or recommended handle material would be great.

Thanks for the input!! I have been doing lots of research on knife making and heat treating. I also fully understand that it is gonna be difficult and take some time to get the hang of. I'm just want to start forming things in the shape of knives atleast and see what I can do without investing too much money in good steel. I learn best by doing so I'm just gonna do it and see what happens hahaha

It's her initials only 3 letters. But hey if you can read 2/3s of it hopefully she can to and can figure out the last one lol

What's up fellow smiths! My name is Caleb and I'm a beginning smith from South Carolina. I've only been hitting hot metal with a hammer for about 5 days now. I finally finished my first project after coming home from work and immediately fireing up the forge everyday this week. I've always been interested in smithing and I finnaly got the chance to do it after lots of preparing. Here is a picture of my set up... forge is the shell of an old hvac system shop vac for air and a cheap harbor freight anvil. so on to my first project.. but alittle back story first. Since my girlfriend has had to put up with my constant babbling on about blacksmithing and put up with binge watching forged in fire for the past couple months I decided to make her a gift a my first project. I decided to forge her initials out of some 1/4" round stock (from tractor supply) once I finished the forgeing i painted everything and decided to mount it on a wooden block. Here is what I came up with (its a little girly but she likes cute little things so it works out) 1/4" round bar from TSC forging complete painted glossy white cut a cube out of a 4x4 and drilled a hole for mounting letters painted block finished product!! let me know what you guys think! Has anyone ever done any cursive? Or words out of a single puce with no welds if so I am very curious to hear about it because I couldn't don't any info on the subject so I just had to figure it out as I went along. Im hoping to start forging my first knife soon and get back into some more manly forge work lol ps. Comment if you can read the letters lol I can easily see it but then again I already know what it says so any feedback would be great!!!