weissleo28

Thank you all for the advice and the time you took to give your responses, I now realize that I'm trying to make knives to early and I need to practice and get good at making small things. I will also look into getting better steel, like barstock or something similar. Thanks again!

Hi, I'm fairly new to blacksmithing and I don't know where I went wrong, but today I broke my blade. I was flattening the handle of a drop forged wrench, and I put it in the forge. It's bituminous coal and I use a hair dryer attached to a pipe as an air source. It gets the metal orange-white hot. I took it out after 5-6 minutes and I noticed a chip out of the blade, it was the spine so I dismissed it. But as I started pounding, a crack appeared that ran next to the chip from the spine to the side that the edge was going to be on. I don't know where I went wrong, but I have a few therioes. The first is that, since I didn't brush the blade each time before I pounded, that I pushed some of those chips that fly off into the blade. Another theory is that I left it in the forge for too long and it got too soft. A third is that, instead of just pounding it into a blade shape and then trying to get it longer, I should've pounded it into a long, rectangular shape, like a piece of barstock looks, then formed the blade shape. Sorry for such a long post, I am just angry that I broke my blade and I dont know why it happened, and I don't want to do it again. Any help would be appreciated, Thanks!