TimB

I allways had a curiosity in the back of my mind about blacksmithing and knifemakeing. I tend to gravitate toward doing things for myself. I took up leather craft in highschool, so I could make my own gun leather. Taught myself to weld--oxy/acet and stick, so I could build myself more contraptions, got into reloading my own bullets, inherited grandpas fly tying outfit, and took up black powder--soon to gravitate into casting my own bullets. Blacksmithing was just the next logical progression in my own evolution I guess. I've always loved blades, and carried a schrade carbon steel bladed folder (the best blade IMO) since dad gave it to me in Jr. high. It broke my heart when schrade sold out to China. Bought my 6 yr old boy a Camillus knife blank off e-bay, for Christmas last year, (and one for me too ) and in the process of trying to figgure out how to heat treat them, found out that I had everything I needed to start forging, and beating hot metal, already collected over the years in my shed. I'm still in the process of building me an anvil, but I found the RR track one I started making 20 years ago--so my boy's useing that one, and the craft is growing on both of us. I've made a couple things, just hooks and plant hangers for my wife, which she thought were cool ( that'll buy me some more pounding time ) but the only thing I've spent any money on so far is a 50# bag of coal. The coolest thing about the hooks I made my wife , is that they were made from a small chunk of junk steel I cut off a chunk of I-beam with the torch. I havent thought too seriously about it yet, but you know, I'm gonna wind up makeing my own black powder rifle some day. It's just in my nature. :)

Any ideas on maybe smithing designs for lighting sconses? As long as I make stuff my wife likes, she's ok with me spending abuncha time at the forge. Today, I made a few hooks for her planters and pot rack that I made a few years ago. She thought they were cool, and I got to spend the most time at the forge that I have yet, before she got testy. At least I got in some quality learning time.

Caught a piece of scale the other day with my index finger. Lifting the hammer for another strike only pinched the scale between the hammer handle and finger. Halfway through the swing, I'm thinking about dropping the hammer...nope better not cause it will fly farther than I want it too...better just hold on....wait, where was the target.... Made a wege to hold my hammer head on a bit tighter, and while cutting it off, it evaporated. I have no idea where it went. While welding my plates together to form my anvil, I dropped a rod end from the stinger. I told my daughter, who was standing a bit further behind me watching, through another hood filter, not to step on that with her bare feet, cause it was hot. I turned to inspect my weld, and turned back arround in time to see her as she bent over and picked it up...briefly. :confused::confused: I couldn't understand why she did that, but it made sense to my wife. She said she probly figured that she better pick it up and move it so she wouldn't step on it. :rolleyes:

"huffing" is a result of poor air / fuel mixture. I assume your burner there is set up like any furnace inshot burner where a jet of fuel draws the primary air with it through the blast tube, into the fire box, or in this case, forge. The velocity of the fuel jet, acts on the air in the burner tube, causing it to move along with the fuel jet, which in turn creates a partial vacuum, sucking the air into the tube to replace the air moving toward the forge. once the gas burns you have a couple things going on. First the LP gas is converted into its various products of combustion--CO2, CO (incomplete combustion, itself flammable), water vapor, ect. Second, the primary air is heated, causing it to expand in volume--this back pressure, if not allowed to exit the forge volume, may try to force its way back into the blast tube, slowing the induced flow of primary air with the gas jet. A short chimney may be all you need to remedy this (or a bit higher one than what you may have allready). I couldn't tell by the pictures, but I assume you have a regulator on your LP tank. If it can be adjusted, you may try that as well. A smaller flame may give you more heat if it is burning more efficiently, (and less CO) and this would also cause less combustion gasses that must leave the forge to allow a fresh mixture in. Watch your flame if you adjust the pressure. You don't want it to lift off the burner, nor do you want it to burn inside the tube either. LP gas will only burn in a small window of air / fuel mixture, about 5 to 10% ratio. Above or below that it won't burn. Try adjusting your primary air too. It could be that outside the burner all that lovely O2 floating around it makes up for the air / fuel mixture

Where did the blacksmiths of yesteryear get their nuts and bolts? Did they make them themselves and if so, did they make taps and dies or did they twist square rods for the threads. Would useing threaded rod to make a swage work?

What I hate is when that little voice tells you what is about to happen just in enough time for you to ignore it, just before it does happen. Someday, when I grow up, I'm gonna learn to listen to that voice.

Over winter, we had enough snow my ram would get over the fence and challenge the German Sheperd. One day the sheperd (Ruger) took a hunk of meat out of his leg, so I wound up butchering him (the ram. I would have butchered the dog 'cept I just found out there's a sex offender living down the road.) I had spent all winter teaching my son the details of knife safety, and knew I should sharpen my hunting knife before finishing the butchering job, but it was just a ram and I was in a hurry. Well sure 'nuff, the tip of the knife slipped and the end of my left thumb went by-by. I turned to my son and said, "...and that is why you always keep your knife sharp."

So how tall is the neighbors dog? :D

not to change the subject...much...but what color safety glasses would you guys recommend. I'm thinking about being aware that my face shield is down, (sometimes with clear shields I can forget to put it down ) and yet still see the colors of the metal accurately.

So far you guys covered most of my experiences. Once in hunting camp, we went out to get some fire wood. My dad dropped a snag on the road while me and his hunting buddy stood and watched from 50 feet away. As the tree hit the road, I remember seeing a 2" round x 15" chunk of limb rise 6', straight up in the air, (that's what it looked like from my angle anyways) and fly horizontally directly at me. No arc to the flight. I remember thinking that I should stick my hand out and catch it. Good thing I didn't, it passed my head about 18" away, and fast enough that it would have done some serious damage to my hand had I tried. I've thought about that a lot over the years. The energy displayed in that chunk of wood amazed me. The line of flight was 90* to the tree. I work in the HVAC trade, and I have a 3' diameter wire fan blade cover from a chiller, made from 1/4" steel rod, that was completely sheered off by an aluminum fan blade that let loose of two of the three rivets that held it to the fan hub. The aluminum blade was barely dented. My shop teacher in high school told us about a guy that just keeled over at the table saw...no blood or anything. They finally figgured out that one of the carbide tips had let loose and went through his forehead, killing him. I try to maintain respect for power tools, and about the time I get careless, something happens like the 4" angle grinder crawls up my arm or something like that.

That's the nature of these boards I been a member of another trade board, much like this one, for years, and one trueism in common is that at any time, any thread can take a rabbit trail and, 100's of pages later, might get back to the original topic. I learn a lot from rabbit trails too. Thanks again for the responses.

Thanks for the responses guys. I spose I should ask first, what was the quality of those swords that made them such a good blade, I guess I assumed it was a high carbon content that made them a hard steel. Another question you brought up Thomas is the % carbon in steel. I ran into it in the BP's, I think...maybe somewhere else on this forum...but what does the % carbon have to do with steel hardness? I've seen some softer steels listed here with higher carbon content than harder steels. I guess I'm getting a bit confused, I always thought a "high carbon" knife blade was a better blade than another, not "high carbon" (I prefer blades that hold an edge well, even if it takes me a while to sharpen it.) I'm getting the idea that it's all relative, to other elements in the steel.

I ain't been able to find anything on this yet, but I'm having fun looking through the BP's and threads. I heard once that the quality of the steel in an old Japanese sword was due to the steel being forged and folded 200 times. It has been my thought that work hardening metal by a repeated bending, is what causes it to break when a piece of coat hanger / welding rod / or tin is bent back and forth repeatedly. This "work hardening" effect can be canceled out by heating and slow cooling the metal, (as I do with hard drawn copper refrigeration pipe, in order to swage it)---conclusion : it isn't the act of folding the sword steel that creates the quality of the katana blade. I have also heard, that carbon steel is created when heating iron in the presence of carbon, I assume, as in a coal fired forge. My conclusion then, is that the quality of the steel in a katana blade is due to the many hours it spends being heated in a coal bed. I don't know if this is true though, it is just my speculation based on things I've picked up over the years. If it is true, it leads me to the question, is it possible then to turn a piece of mild steel black iron gas pipe, into a higher quality carbon steel by working it with a coal fired forge? A related question would be if anyone has ever tried an oil fired forge? I have a few residential oil fired burners laying around and a commercial hot water tank firebox (200 gal. size, still with the ceramic fiber refractory in tact.) that I was thinking of converting to my first forge.

I made me a leather watch band with brass rivets. The itching and irritation right where the rivets touched my wrist made me stop wearing it. Good to know ahead of time that I best watch out when I start working brass, I hadn't put that together yet, thanks for the heads up. My brother used to dust his arms and such with Johnsons baby powder when he worked at San Diego marinas installing electronic do-dads in the fiberglass boat hulls. This kept the itching down from the fiberglass dust from drilling into it. I wonder if it would help with metal dust?

Howdy folks, I'm looking to get started in blacksmithing. My hobbies tend to be oriented to skills I can use to make useful stuff with. I've done some leather work, only made gun and knife leather though, taught myself to weld--oxy / acet, and stick, and have made things like a new door for the wood stove, a plow, field harrow, BBQ's, 200 gal. fish tank,--simple stuff. I enjoy figuring out how to do things and have allways had an intrest in blacksmithing. My 7 yr. old boy's been bugging me for a knife lately, so I got him a knife blank for Christmas, and one for me too, so we're planning on makeing one together. I think he's a bit more excited to get into smithing than I am, and he's been bugging me to get a forge made. After seeing the price on some heavy anvills, I figgure my first project might be makeing myself a couple anvills out of an I beam or something. (Yeah, I know RR tracks work, but the challenge appeals to me ) I don't have a lot of money to play with, so any books I get, I want to make sure are keepers that both me and my boy can get a lot out of. Any suggestions would be great. It seems I don't get to the libraries much and when I do, they don't have many blacksmithing books. We'll probly gravitate toward bladesmithing, but I'll cut my teeth on tools and such first. Starting a shop from scratch with equipment I build myself appeals to me too, I'm just kind of odd that way--guess thats why I hunt with a black powder rifle, and heat with wood. :)