Cross Pein

CurlyGeorge - Check Blacksmiths Depot.

Great looking hammer. I must admit I am a little disturbed to learn that you eat hot-dogs in France. ;)

Thanks Mark, That is doable for me from Massachusetts. I used to commute to Indian Point every week and that is right around the corner. Consider it bookmarked - I am printing the course catalog right now! Now I have to start working on the wife! Bill

In answer to your poll: I would not take a grinder to it. I would get to know it with a hand wire brush and only fix (smooth) any chips in the edge that will give you problems with your work. And I second the idea of trying some hot stuff. BTW: I love my PW blemishes and all. Bill

Brian, I covet one of yours! ;)

Good score! Which HD did you hit? Norwood be my guess. I should try that at Lowes or the HD in Framingham! I wonder if the guy in NY pockets the cash? Bill

Mills I am also 'green' although I knew the coking was a good thing, I am not sure that I am tending my fire correctly. My coal forms coke readily. but it is such a solid mass that I inevitably wind up with an empty oven. What is the process for keeping good coals below and not winding up with too much oxygen on my steel? Should this oven have a top? Should I not be sprinkling the coal with water because it cokes so easily? The answer may be what I am doing, which is to simply bust the coke up when I loose the 'floor' and then bank with more green coal around and above it - or is there a better way? I am using an old rivet forge and I use fire brick to give me some depth. I have never considered the coking a problem, but wonder if I could manage my fire smarter. What are the best techniques and/or alternatives for husbanding the fire? Thanks, Bill

I used to frequent the Ford section of the Yesterday's Tractors forum - a lot. I have a 1955 655. I recall two things that apply here. The 5000 was generally regarded as the best of the old Fords and stay away from any Ford with a select-o-speed transmission. The select-o-speeds are great when they work, but once they start to go they are a real pain. Hope this helps, Bill

I forgot to mention. I use Firefox and when a photo is too big, I hold the Ctrl button down and hit the minus button. This shrinks the contents of the window. Keep hitting the minus and it keeps getting smaller. When done hit Ctrl = and it returns to the default size. I don't know if this works in other browsers. This doesn't help with the download speed of giant files, but usually makes them viewable. Bill

Those are cool - you should make them for Glenn to sell here. I'd buy one, if the price was right. It would look cool on my desk at work. Bill

I re-size using Photoshop before posting. I find that a 72 pixel/inch resolution and then use the size that I want in either direction works well. You need to constrain the proportions or else it will stretch in one direction or another. I made your table 400 pixels wide. This brought the file size down from 44.7 Meg to 53K. (faster to load) Hope this helps. BTW, Nice Table. Bill

Charlie was an Amazon that we had for almost 20 years. Between his noise and our lack of attention to him we decided to give him to a real bird lover about a year ago. I still miss him sometimes, but I don't miss the screeching! We used to have a very large house and it was less of a problem. The mess was also an issue - they create a lot of dust but can give good companionship. He will probably outlive me by 40 years!

Hi Nazelhammers and welcome. I look forward to learning as much as I can from you if you see fit to continue here. I am new at this and I don't have the good fortune to have a mentor. These guys are great and this forum is a great resource for us new guys. I hope that you become an active participant in the forum and help to educate those of us that need it. Bill P.S. I don't know what the original dispute was about and I don't care. It is none of my business and probably should not have been aired in this forum in the first place. (No offense to anyone - I don't even know who else is involved.)

I have been having problems with a neighbor's encroachment for years. I won't go into the details here, but it has caused us to research the history of the property. My friend Jeremiah, Archiphile on this board, has been a great help with this. He is really into the research, I'm not so much. On Friday he bought us the earliest deed that he has found. It is from 1805 and documents the transfer of my land from Oliver Capen to Otis Harlow. Oliver is listed as a blacksmith! I think I may have found his son's grave on-line: http://gravematter.smugmug.com/Massachusetts/Dedham/Old-Village-Cemetery/3247358_NojoX/12/185966799_xDNCm/Medium I find it intriguing that my home may have been the site of a colonial era smithy! Last summer Jeremiah found a wrought iron nail in some earth that we had disturbed digging the foundation for the shed that has become my smithy. It could have been made right there over 200 years earlier. I wonder if there is a way to channel Oliver's spirit - I need all the help I can get! Bill

pkrankow, Here is My 100# Peter Wright on it's stump. I spent a lot of time with the belt sander making the wood flat. This anvil also rang like a bell, but it quieted right down when bolted securely. I had originally used 1/4" lags, but replaced them with 3/8 last weekend. If the stump splits I will got to a set-up like yours but so far the angle iron is working well. Now I need to add something to hang tongs and hammers on. Bill

Great job, great story. You know you could always use it - and bake her a pie!

Michael That cart looks a whole lot sturdier than the bolt together Chinese HF cart to me.

I don't even see it anymore - gotta go buy something - see ya! :blink:

Mike the prayer is on its way. Best of luck finding a donor. Bill

I will pray for Howard's recovery. I also pray he gets a laptop to spend the time in the hospital surfing IFI. Bill

I have had two vastly different experiences with safety rules: I worked in a corrugated box factory for 5 years. They had a rule that everyone on the floor wear ear plugs. The rule was in place before I started there. They had the ear plugs available at several stations (generally at entrances) and they provided molded plugs periodically. Everyone wore them and I never had a problem with the policy. Frankly, it was so loud in there that it would be dumb to spend 8 hours a day in there without them. You would wind up deaf - lots of the old timers were hard-of-hearing from before the policy was instituted. I worked in an electronics factory where they decided to bring in a safety glasses policy. It was foisted on us - just as indicated in above posts - by an insurance company. It did not take the work being done into account at all. I was an incoming inspector. I worked in a room where no manufacturing processes were performed. The most dangerous tools I worked with were a caliper and an ohm meter. My boss, enforced the rule selectively. I recall one day when he spent about a half-hour chatting up one of the design engineers who was not wearing glasses. Then, out of the blue, he turns to me and says "Biiillll" pointing to his glasses. I was POed. When I confronted him his response was he was responsible for me not the engineer - my answer was that if he felt the need to be responsible - he was responsible for his area. I sat and stewed until break time came. When I put down my glasses for break they shattered into 6 or eight pieces. He did not look happy. Needless to say, my next review was the only bad review I have ever gotten in 35 years working. But the real kicker is that the manager in charge of maintenance was the chief enforcer of the safety glass policy. He put yellow dots on the floor in the aisles. The yellow dots represented areas where safety glasses were not required. Well, didn't the yellow dots go right to the door of the maintenance shop! Can you imagine, the test techs - who spent their day looking at oscilloscopes and tweaking pots (variable resistors) all day were required to wear safety glasses - but the maintenance people - with their lathes, grinders, saws and drill presses were not required to wear them in their area! Stupidity breads contempt. Any safety policy that is based on stupidity is worse than no safety policy. Any policy that is not applied using common sense is stupid. My $.02. Sorry for the rant.

This might!

Hi Tom, Enjoyed the video. It is great to put a voice to the face. Enjoyed meeting the wife. I'm way behind you on the learning curve, so I enjoyed watching, but I won't be accepting any challenges for a while! I forged on Thursday and Friday, but the weather has turned here - so I have switched to shoveling snow in my 'spare' time. Bill

Also, the new stuff with the copper requires special fasteners (for outdoor applications)- it will dissolve steel nails. I found this out AFTER building my smithy! I still haven't had any problems, but you would think Home Depot would warn their customers. I used PT on the main beam and the sill - I am sure I used hot dipped galvy on the sill, but not up top.