SinDoc

It seems there are all kinds of options for what material to use for handle scales. For wood, I get the gist that iron wood seems to be a favorite with some very close contenders. I have a rather large log of cherry that I have had laying around for years (always inside) that I had initially wanted to make a small table top out of, but alas, that project never panned out for various reasons. Would cherry be an acceptable material for handle scales? If so, would being un-stabilized be ok since cherry is fairly hard and naturally resistant (at least I remember cherry being quite resistant to damage/wear and tear). Would be nice to finally put this log to use, although I don't quite know how I will get it chopped up enough to get manageable pieces for handle scales. Bad boy is little over a foot wide and roughly 5' long and I don't have any means of nicely reducing it

I kind of figured that was the case. Speaking of the shell getting hot, I have been meaning to weld up a sort of little stand out of angle iron since the shell has always gotten quite hot and I use a stack of masonry blocks as a stand. The angle iron stand would keep it a little ways off the block and allow air to flow under it. If I forge for awhile, that top block gets hot enough that you can't touch it. I am sure it will start crumbling soon if I keep letting it get that hot.

Cool. I will look into getting your book! And speaking of all these anvils, I need to get a different one since mine is nearly dead by rebound standards

Out of pure curiosity, could I have kept using that liner? At what point do the cracks cause problems/safety issues that the forge should not be used until a repairs are made?

Yup! I really try to do it every time since I tend to go days without ever lighting it and being in Ohio, it is quite humid most of the time. I normally get all setup, light the forge with the gas turned on just enough that it will stay lit then let it run like that for a few minutes while I get everything else setup. Once I am ready to go it should be all good as well then I just crank the heat up to let it warm up to forging temps. I think I simply did not let it go long enough at one point which caused the cracks, so I by no means blame Majestic for anything as it was more than likely 99% operator error. All in all, I am quite happy with the forge I purchased from them and have not had any issues outside of this and it works like a charm.

JHCC, speaking of drills, I managed to coax the old man into giving me one of his Milwaukee M18 drills since he recently bought another set that had one it in. Thing has tons of power/torque and I am hoping I can rig up a home made drill press using it.

Being newer around here, out of curiosity NJ, what made you get into curating anvils? Fishers in particular? Also, I know I said that was a lot of anvils in my previous post, but in that picture you just posted, that is A LOT of anvils!

Ah yes I know where 5th is. Small world!

I got a replacement liner for the top. I never got around to patching it with any kind of refractory cement. I was able to weasel it out so I think once I get around to it I can patch it and have a back up liner.

I was wondering while reading that if you were talking about Columbus Castings/Buckeye Steel. I work on high street, one exit over from Parsons where its located. I "think" PSC metals took it over. I could be wrong however but I am positive there is another entity in there now. We always had horrible dust problems from our close proximity to the plant. Black soot was always on stuff and you could tell how long something was there based on how black it was. I had been in there years ago with some of the electricians. Probably a year or so before they shut down.

I have dealt with 2 companies that used arc furnaces. One had an accident nearly every year, one of which was right after their new building went into operation and a crucible full of molten steel was dumped all over machinery, including the brand spanking new motor control center (I am sure you know just how absurdly expensive those are Steve, as I believe I seen read somewhere you are an electrician) for one side of the plant and melted it. It had been in operation for less than a month before it was turned into charred scrap. The second facility dealt strictly with copper. They were a major supplier of copper for wiring. That particular plant also produced what I believe they referred to as 101 copper, which is used for undersea cable and has zero impurities so it doesn't corrode. They said a single ounce of the wrong copper would ruin an entire multi-ton batch. While walking their plant with some of the big wigs while designing them a new lighting system, I got to see one of their furnaces during a "burn out". The guys working around them were in heat resistant suits. The heat was so intense, I don't think I could have gotten within 50 feet of the furnace if I had even wanted to. It was so hot, they had problems with the light fixtures on the ceiling around it as it was melting the bulbs in the high bays 30 feet up! The average life of a lamp in those fixtures was the cycle from one burn out to the next. Also, the place was FILTHY and everything was coated in a carbon powder.

The puns! *groans*

Who started the puns? Frosty was it you?! Although the thread has become quite energized!

Not at the moment. He plans on building another assembly so I can just switch the two. However we had a failure over the weekend that needed addressing and a redesign lol. The bearing in the top wheel came loose and caused the idler axle to become unbalanced. I had noticed something was wrong as I couldn't keep the belt from moving while I was grinding. I messed with the tracking knob to try to bring it back and nothing worked so I stepped off to the side and sure enough 3 seconds later the belt popped off and I shut it off. I could have shut it off before the belt went, but was honestly curious to see what would happen when it comes off so I knew what could happen. That and if I had shut it off it wouldn't have spun down fast enough to really change anything.

I was being very careful to keep everything relatively thick for the quench. I ended up leaving the tang too thick and had to grind a decent bit off to make it reasonable. I'm curious how hard I actually got it but will probably never really know.

I think its a myriad of things causing it. Copper is being pushed because of a strike in one of I believe the largest mines. A lot of factories were forced to shut down for a period then came back at reduced capacity, all while most demand didn't drop but if anything went up. Now the plants are playing catch up and are struggling to get caught back up. One of our suppliers is over a million in the hole on single pole 20A breakers, something they should NEVER run out of, let alone be a million behind.

I thought about throwing it back in the fire to straighten it back out and try re-quenching it, but that warp isn't bad enough to risk that I believe. It is only ever so slight, so I think I can live with it. This knife is mine and ain't goin anywhere anyways lol.

I am eventually. Since I have never done this before, I wanted to make sure I could even get the little bugger sharp before committing to putting a handle on it. I figured I would just tape it up while attaching scales then if it all went well, finish polishing and put the final touches on the edge afterwards. Even if this proves moot, I can say I am proud how this one has turned out. Downside is there is a slight warp in it that I was unable to correct after heat treat with grinding. I don't think it is a bad enough warp to cause functionality problems, but it is there.

We had our typical start of the week meeting at work today (I work at an electrical supplies distributor for those who don't know) and the topic of soaring prices came up. 2 years ago we could sell a 500' spool of 12 gauge THHN for roughly $100US, however with todays pricing, that same spool is now over $200US. Market projects are stating that with this drastic upward trend in copper price, it is entirely feasible that within a few years copper could be as much as $14 per pound! That means that same exact spool we sold in 2019 for ~$100, will be closer to $600! Now imagine that price hike on Romex wire for houses. a 250' coil could be close to $200. That plus the cost of lumber and other materials could add 10's of thousands of dollars to the cost of building a home. Say for example a house you could have built in 2018 for $300k could cost $350k or more just because of the added material cost. Copper is going nuts and lumber right right behind it or tied with it.

Tried my hand at sharpening it on the whetstones yesterday as well. Did the majority of the work on 400 grit and was about to move to the 1000 grit when my hands said they were done. Still feels like it has some burrs on it and still isn't quite up to clean paper slicing sharp yet.

That is a lot of anvils in that photo

End up back in the shop somehow so decided to work on it a bit more. Per your advice Steve, I tried making the bevels bigger rather than simply having an edge. Still needs more refining.

Frosty deleted a wise crack and didnt share it? I feel cheated.

Will do Steve. Taking a break from it today but once I go back out ill work on the bevels more and report back. I tried to forge in a ricasso, but that went nowhere lol. Iron, yeah this one went much smoother. I used a heavy hammer and gave it hard yet accurate blows. One or two hits then flip it on the side to keep it even. Work in progress, but I am getting better.

Went a little better that time. Pretty sure I got it hardened as well. Only problems are my bevels aren't 100% symmetrical.