Shainarue

I'll preface this with saying I'm on a very short break so I didn't take the time to read the above responses. Apologies if I'm repeating something anyone else said already. My favorite way to try new things is to look at anything NOT blacksmithing. Woodwork, clay, glass, fiber. In my case, I'm usually searching for sculptural images so "woodwork sculpture images" for instance. Or unique variations of commonplace items, "unique twisted jewelry" or something like that would come up with all sorts of wearable jewelry made in all variety of mediums. Find one you like. Dissect the heck out of it. Try to figure out how you would do that with metal. Then try to figure out what techniques you need to learn to get there. I'm on the opposite spectrum from you. I'm new enough (4yrs) that I don't have the practice but I'm constantly pushing to do things I've never seen done before. I keep saying I'm going to take a few years to just PRACTICE. Pick a few of the techniques and get efficient and better at them. Then I see something shiny and new and that idea goes right out the window! I'm learning all sorts of things, but not sticking with any one technique long enough to really get good at it... I would suggest attempting to emulate those smiths whose work you aspire to. Pick a project and keep making that thing until you're satisfied. Then pick another project. You'll be learning/practicing various techniques and simultaneously getting the "eye" for the aesthetic you like.

I never knew this. I dunno if the rigidizer that came with my Me Volcano forge was silica based but if it was, it would explain why my coating chips off so easily! My forge is teetering on the edge of unsafe due to the amount of coating which has chipped off and not been repaired. Last year, I was going to do patch work. I kept putting it off. Now it really just needs completely redone.

Lee, that's happened to me in the past and I just clicked the 3 dots in the lower right corner of the video and downloaded. Then watched on my device.

I did slot & drift these - just with a smaller slot punch than I should have started with - and punching horizontal rather than vertical which was just a brain derp, I knew better. Another blacksmithing friend sent me a page from the Blacksmith's Cookbook after seeing my post, showing the ratios of starting slot to drifted hole. And after seeing that, all my memories came back of watching the Aspery videos a few years back covering drifting to size, lol

I tried recreating hook №310 from the book Hooked by Matt Jenkins of Cloverdale Forge. I decided on this hook only because it was the hook from November 5th, which was the day the Monthly Blacksmithing Challenge was announced on Facebook. I'm happy with the drifted/sized rings but I feel like the arms could have used a bit more refinement. I didn't notice how ugly they were till I saw the picture again, lol If I were to attempt this again, I would try a longer slot punch to start, which will maybe help me size the rings larger while maintaining outer mass. Here's a link to the original: https://cloverdaleforge.com/portfolio-items/hook-310-november-5/

Ted, those are all really nice hook racks! Tonight I worked on the trade item for tomorrow morning's club meeting. Theme was 'something made from a farming implement'. Awhile back, the hold fast I had, which was made from a hay rake tine, broke. It was the only think I could think of in my stash that would be considered a farming implement. I just had to find it! I had to search for over an hour but I found the broken hay rake tine and got my trade item (mostly) finished! This was my first time attempting a fire steel. I perused this forum and watched a few videos last night in preparation but I think I started with too short a length of the steel. It's kinda on the small side. It's currently annealing in a bucket of ash. I'll harden at the hammer in.

Hinges will be on the short side

I also recommend the book 'Hooked' for inspiration. Or if you don't have the funds for the book, you can browse through their Instagram page but you have to scroll WAY DOWN since he did it in 2016! Or just search hashtag #366hooks

It hasn't been mentioned nor (technically) accounted for - and I've picked brains with 3 different local smiths who have done multiple large gates. They gave me lots of info regarding hinge mounting but no mention of sag in regards to rise. One of them talked a little about potential for flex and suggested my design incorporate some elements that tie the upper corner to the lower opposite corner together. That's what the diagonal elements in the design are there. Another design (which he didn't choose) had the diagonal stretching from the highest upper point to the low opposite corner - which would have been even better for countering the flex. I'm with Gewoon - more info please! There is currently about a 3.5" gap between the two panels once hung - so any sagging won't impede on the function of the gate but visually, I'd like to keep it looking good, lol

I'm at the point in my gate project that I need to work at my friend's shop for the flat floor space to layout, adjust, then clean and weld. He's closed on Mondays and Tuesdays so I took today off work and got started on laying out out and tweaking. Next weekend, I'll go over after he closes and try to get the last tweaks in. Then maybe another Monday off to weld it up. Then start the other frame. Lol

Melted, I love that idea to use a swing out arm! I need to think on that to see if it can work in one of my setups.

I've been fairly productive this week. I found a nice balance of working on the gate vs working on fun stuff. The winter ornaments heat quickly and are easy enough that I could work on those while the gate piece was heating. So I've made a little collection of ornaments. I've finished all the pieces for the gate. Here's just the frame pieces laid out. I was checking the fit of the top bars I had just finished shaping. Then today, I made an 1/8" monkey tool and trued up the hole on my 1/4" monkey tool then used them to clean up/upset the shoulders of the pieces with tenons. Ran out of oxygen in the torch setup so switched to using charcoal. A few of the tenons appear frighteningly close to easily breaking. Guess I'll just have to cross my fingers for those since I don't have more stock to remake. If needed, I will buy more but I'd rather not unless necessary. Tomorrow I'm hanging with a buddy at his shop to learn how to make a knife. I'll also be hauling all these pieces over there where they'll stay for the remainder of this project for layout, welding, and painting.

Good point. That seems obvious in retrospect, lol Just to clarify though, I wasn't filing to shape. I was just filing along the edges to sharpen. I didn't see any noticeable bulges or mushrooming. But it did shine up when I filed.

I would try the chimes personally before offering to make for anyone else. I am obsessed with wind chimes so I'll very likely do this one. Regarding the punching, I rounded the hanging end and tapered the other end. Flattened, then punched. I do have a bolster plate but couldn't find it, lol. And maybe the lack of bolster plate was the problem because it punched through the top just fine. It was when I flipped it to punch through the shadow that I had problems. I thought maybe the punch was dull so I filed it but still had the same issues. So yeah, bolster plate probably would have helped. I did work on the gate tonight but since I had to wait for the thicker bar stock to heat, I figured I would try these again in between heats. First batch was 3/4" x 1/8" x 4" long. Tonight's batch was 3/8" x 1/8" and I like them a lot better. I also doubled the length to 8". I drilled the holes. I don't have a punch small enough and didn't want to take the time to make one.

Frosty, I agree - a windchime with these elements in varying lengths does sound lovely. Chad, tapering, twisting AND punching! In fact, apparently my punch is subpar because the punching took nearly as long as the tapering/twisting, lol I need to focus on the gate again for a few sessions before I go back to a 'fun' project. So maybe this Saturday I'll try to make some more. I had some other sketches for hanging decorations that I also want to try out.

Not much but I knocked out a few hanging twisted ornaments on Friday. Posted them on my social media accounts and already have a buyer for 4 of them! These are about 4" long. Ashley thinks I should make double the length, tapered top AND bottom, and thinner. Thinner would be harder to taper but worth a shot. I'll look for thinner stock sometime this week. Saturday & Sunday was spent with the dog club laying a scent track for their Tracking Dog trials and then home to work on another burn for charcoal. I almost have all the logs left from the previous owners of our house cleared out! I think maybe 3-4 more batches and I'll be finished with that pile. And I'll be stocked with charcoal for a long while.

Yes, you can certainly use lump charcoal. It's my primary fuel choice. I only use coal when I run out of charcoal. Hot enough to forge and can get hot enough to forge weld. Frosty is correct - don't use the briquettes and use a side blast. Bottom blast will work fine, it's what I used for a bit - but it will burn up more fuel than is necessary.

Not a lot of foot traffic at the event tonight but the shop I demonstrate at had his kids there and one of them was hanging out with me most of the evening. She really loved the skull keychain and said she wished she could buy it. I asked if she had ten bucks. She sadly said no. I asked if she had any cool rocks. Her eyes lit up and she took off in search of some worthy rocks. Came back after I had finished my dinner (about 10 minutes of searching!) and presented me with the best rocks she could find. They even color on the parking lot! She threw in a nickel for good measure, lol. Her mom (whom I've known since the late 90s - oof) was also there and had a vendor space for selling her yummy treats. She refused to let me accept rocks as payment even though I insisted that's what I asked for - and sent me home at the end of the night with 6 various cocoa bombs and 2 mini loaf cakes.

I made a snakeskin keychain from an old rasp for the trade item at tomorrow morning's Free State Blacksmiths Club meeting. I really wanted to add some "stitching" along the sides with a chisel but I'm demonstrating at an event this evening and won't have time. Would be even cooler if I had the time (and skill) to inlay the stitching! Wow, there's an idea. Anyway, here is the pattern and then the finished item:

I do have other files and someday I do intend to make a draw knife! I've got a few smiths here who can help guide me in that process when I'm ready. But I didn't want to do what I assumed pretty much everyone else would do. File = edged item (knife, tomahawk, chopper, etc) or snake or lizard. I like to push myself to come up with something a bit out of the ordinary. Also - holy crap I LOVE that idea for filling the file teeth with braze. Lots of great ideas on this thread for things to do with files. I hope it helps others who might search and stumble across it in the future. Here's how my snakeskin keychain turned out

Billy, why is it that the "cure" almost always is worse than the ailment?! I feel for you. Hope everything heals up soon and you're better than new - heck, might even say bionic - yeah? lol Frosty, I had that phone too! Ah, the good ole days, lol I'm hoping the leak is just a result of some rocks I repositioned in the spillover basin. Maybe the rocks are causing the water to rise up and spill over the edges rather than just out the spout. Since the water level only drops noticeably after a few days, every thing I do for troubleshooting has to wait at least a day to see if it made a difference, lol. Yesterday I topped off the water and added tape to mark the water level. I'll check it again after work today. Then move on to the next step in troubleshooting, make sure the water is level with the tape and check again Saturday evening. I've been at this about a week already. First step was to fill and not have the recirculating pump turned on. No drop in water level so leak wasn't in either of the large basins. To check the pump, I put the pump and outlet hose in the larger pond and let it run. No drop in water so leak wasn't in the hose. Yesterday I put the pump & hose in the smaller pond - not really necessary since I already ruled that out but it's where my brain was. Tonight I'll leave the pump in the smaller pond but move the hose to the spillover. If I'm correct, the water level should drop. I'll then remove all the rocks from the spillover and run that test again. If water level doesn't drop then I know it's the arrangement of rocks and I'll just play around until I get a good balance of an arrangement I like with no leaks. If it does still drop, then there's probably a crack in the spillover basin somewhere. I do love this water feature. When we moved here, I had set up my forge on the backside of it - couldn't see it but could hear it. When I moved the forge setup, I moved to the front side of it so now I can see and hear it. I do love the sound of it. I don't sit next to it often, even though there's a nice bench there.

Well if all I wanted was the snakeskin texture then I'd definitely go with your suggestions and use a rasp as a texturing tool - they are both good ideas for making anything with a snakeskin texture! But for this particular project, the trade item is something made from a large file - so I have to actually use the rasp (unless I wanna get technical and say it was "made" with the large file by way of a texturing tool, lol). I've already folded and welded. Did it on a wood stump with wood mallet to retain the texture. I'm not going to try to forge weld the tabs on though. I'll use the fluxcore welder and just hope for the best. If it sucks, I'll cut the tabs off and drill a hole, then rivet a strap of leather there instead. I had also wanted to intentionally hammer out some of the texture along the edges and use a chisel to create a stitching pattern for seams. I don't think I'll have time to get that done though. I'll share a pic of whatever I end up with, lol

So, I changed direction. Meeting for this trade item is Saturday and I didn't have time to try the raspberry idea. I decided instead to make a snakeskin style keychain fob. First, I took a few hours with the grinder to make it thin. I ground away the side with the diagonal teeth. I wanted the scale texture on both sides so I was going to fold it. And folding as-is would have been super thick, lol Then I cut it to a pattern which I would fold over and forge weld. While folding over, both tabs broke off. Doh! I'm going to weld them back on tomorrow at lunch and see what I get. I'm demonstrating at an event tomorrow night and the meeting is Saturday so really, my lunch hour is my only shot at redemption, lol This might not happen ..

Desiccant works even better than rice. I had an OtterBox Defender case for the phone before last. Kept the USB flap closed but it didn't protect the camera lens when I dropped it on gravel. Saved the phone from a BUNCH of drops though! Last phone I switched to something with a sliding door that protects the camera and also had the military rated impact protection. Then when I got this phone, I couldn't find a case with sliding camera door and ended up just getting the Speck Impact Hero because it was available in a local store rather than having to buy online. I figured I would eventually get something else but still haven't. I have to wait a few days to be sure but I'm pretty sure I've narrowed the leak to the spillover basin. These are the rigid liner ponds. The larger pond has a flexible liner on addition to the rigid.

I was troubleshooting a pond leak over my lunch break (upside to working from home for a bit - I can get more chores done!) and heard a distinct 'plop' in the water. Then a noticeable absence of weight in my shorts pocket. Oh crap. My phone had fallen in. Only about 2ft deep but the water is not clear because I had been cleaning out leaves and moving the fountain and all that stuff stirred up the muck (haven't added the muck-out tabs since it's been leaking). I grabbed a length of pvc laying nearby and started poking around, going by feel and hoping I would be able to tell when I hit the phone rather than the rocks or liner. What seemed like forever later, I finally feel the pvc slip along something smooth. YES! I had zero hope for the phone surviving but figured I could at least try and get it into some desiccant and get it functioning enough to backup the data for the next phone. Imagine my surprise when I pull the phone out and it is completely functioning! I brought it inside, took the case & cracked screen protector off and wiped it all down with a cloth dampened with vinegar water to hopefully kill the muck yuck/smell, lol. Then I got a notification that there was water detected in the USB port. I dropped the phone into a baggie with desiccant and hoped for the best. In less than 30 minutes, I received another notification that water was no longer detected and that the USB port was safe to use. I'm going to leave it in the baggie for the rest of the evening anyway - just to be safe. I know the phone is dustproof/waterproof rated (IP68) but I never really wanted to test it, lol