MacLeod

They’re great bowls..

Das, they are very nice. Great horse heads, and great finish on them too. Mine always look like fish hope you’re well pal.

I love that poster. Looks weirdly familiar to me. Is it a well known image?

Great Roses Les L & Chad J! Thanks again for the designs Les.

Love IFI. It’s like having an old knowledgeable blacksmith leaning over your shoulder and guiding you. Was given the blanks George, will be doing my own naturalistically correct ones in future! All tips taken on board, Frazer, these are awesome

That will cut! My first attempt at roses, very satisfying when you’ve assembled the petals and bending them into shape. Enjoyed doing these and not too difficult.

Nice set up. It’s amazing how having a new space to work in inspires and motivates. Tight budgets are a challenge these days over here Dax, I thought about every cut I made and where I would be using the offcut before even a marking line was drawn. Your joinery looks very neat.

Great thing is that after a wee clean of the cogs it’s turning as smooth as silk. Watching it turn and moving slowly down is almost hypnotic. A dewalt or makita has never brought me so much joy

Rescued from the jaws of a scrap merchant. A thing of genius and beauty.

Wishing you all the best pal.

I accept cookies.

Brilliant getting the kids into it Billy. Most are wrapped in cotton wool nowadays.

Finished this test piece for approval. Thought I’d add the snail and the dragonfly on magnets so customers children could move them about. The customers themselves were playing about with them when I dropped it off though.

Looks a lot like my beautiful french mistress. The slanted hardy hole has proved to be very useful for me, when at first I thought it was terrible. Nice to see a tool being used.

Brazing is a dark art. I like these poppies. Alexandr, inspirational stuff there. I’ve been asked to make bannisters and landing railings for a house that’s being renovated locally and started yesterday. The customer supplied sketches and I’ve agreed to do the smallest panel as a test piece. In between working out bends on heavier flat bar than I’m used to for the top and bottom rail, and working out how to make a penny roll kind of leaf thing, I knocked out an inoffensive bottle opener for my cousin who is a carpenter. Spot the rebar.

You can’t help smile at that fella! I’ve added an improved pair of coal tongs to my to do list, thanks for all the feedback. George, the Lamps usually Weigh approximately 2lbs depending on the leaf springs I start with. I do enjoy making them and they’re not difficult. My brother in law was recently showing me his new wheeled steel tool cabinet, a thing of beauty that cost a small fortune. Rather than dwell on why Santa saw fit to give him one and not me, I made my own last night. Also on wheels.

George and Daswulf, I’m going to make another pair and follow your advice. Thanks These ones fit my hand and get a good grip on small rocks that I was testing them on. Here’s perhaps a better perspective. George the seagull lamps I am doing either have a wooden or a stainless shade on them, I hammer the feet out of leaf springs and weld on a bit of worked hollow tube to allow me to hide the cable to the lamp holder. Here’s photos that a fairly happy customer took of one recently and the very first one one I made.

Made a pair of coal tongs for someone tonight, I treated them in my head as tongs making both pieces the same and put the twists the same too, only after riveting them did I realise I should have twisted in opposite directions. If it was a paying job I’d have started again.

I now know what a Caboose is. Always know a little bit more after a visit to ifi. Now, look what I found half buried beside an old road last week when out feeding sheep. What a lovely lump of steel. Not sure what to do with it, but I couldn’t leave it where it was. I'm thinking of cutting a few slots in it to hold my most used stock for twisting and maybe some holes where I can place pegs for bending. Any suggestions welcome apart from what Mrs MacLeod already told me to do with it.

Hi Machine Shop! A pleasure. I’ve done a bit of forging using it now and am getting to grips with it. I am stunned by how little gas it uses in comparison to my T burner gas bottle forge and enjoying the relative whisper it makes too. The speed at which it heats is also a game changer for me. Frosty was right about localised heating when you have a lighter bit of steel on a piece of work. I lost the beard off a dragon I was making for a lamp stand and an antler off a stag head. I’ve persevered though and as the ceramic chips are very light, fine and easy to rake around your work I’ve found that a bit of practice and care allows you localise the heat quite effectively. I have no negatives so far. Great for making the hand bottle openers, got these down to two in an hour now. The other ‘achievement’ I have made was to straighten a two metre length of coil spring for another job- impossible in my other forge. You can pick them up cheap - but some sellers are still wanting mega bucks. I think there’s a general fear of them as there’s a lack of information on them. Will update more as I move on. Any aspect you would like investigated just give me a shout Happy hammering!

All the best! They say there’s a great woman behind every good man, or something like that. Seeing the work that you churn out I reckon she’ll get get on great. give me a shout in June when we’re shearing, if stock is low

You’re more Scottish than me then I look terrible in a kilt.

Hi Thomas, hope you're keeping well, I've found a few now in the UK although I got quite a lot with the forge to keep me going. There's also a few on mainland Europe that ship. Took a wee while on the phone, google doesn't tel, you everything. I thought about shiny side out for the sheets but passing neighbours would think I had won the lottery also the holes were already on the ridges of the sheets and the roof took most of them. All that being said I do like the rustic look of it and there's a good few years left in them. The pipe I burst was a spur off the mains that goes to just a handful of homes, I knew it was there and thought it could withstand me flattening the crushed rock. No real harm done. JHCC, you sure you're not Scottish? Good spot, I had arranged to purchase the leg vice which is a bit wider than mine at 5 inch and is in great condition. It was going for a song, so I wanted to sweeten the deal for the seller. When I went to collect it while down south i brought a couple of miniature bottles of good malt in the van, the gentleman I bought the vice from was so taken aback with that wee gesture he threw in that heavy machine vice as well. I was delighted. He offered more tools as well but I knew my van was going to be on its axles heading back north and I didn't want the ferry listing. It's back to fireside sets for a while now. Since Frosty educated me on technique the order book has swollen.

The air and gas is forced up through a grid of 1.5mm holes, before I got this one running I had to drill them all out as they were full of burnt steel and solder so I imagine that’s that issue. I didn’t pay thousands for this one, picked it up for £200. It’s very quiet, a lot quieter than my gas bottle forge. The ceramic chips are very light so no deforming of hot stock yet. The only issue I had with them was that on the first go m they started spitting and shooting themselves out of the forge, in a tin shed it was like a soundtrack from a gun fight in a John Wayne western! They soon settled down so I put this down to them being stored in a bucket in damp conditions for the last however many years. I’m looking forward to using it more and discovering its and my capabilities and shortcomings. I’m still getting distracted by the steel bonnets George! Didn’t realise that MacDonald wrote the Flashman books I enjoyed years ago! One of the most gripping history books I’ve read in a long time.

It’s one of these mysterious ceramic chip forges circa 1980. First impression is it’s sipping on the propane and getting things hot quickly. I bought it from someone who picked it up from a college, I had it stripped down but think I have it tuned quite well now. Looking forward to working with it. There’s not much information online about them, so happy to share my findings