Shane Stegmeier

Hydraulic cyclinder rods I believe are supposed to be commonly 1040 induction hardened chrome plated. Old Caterpillar track pins are 1050, new ones are not very useful. Water hardening steels like Atlantic-33, and S-1 Atha Pneu, and 1040-1050 are very nice because of how easy it is to focus your heat treat on just the faces of the hammer. Some of the higher alloys like H13 and S7 are nice, but they are harder to work and annealing the eye and the edges of the faces.

Here is an awesome website with links to actual pics from museums in Europe of extent pieces, there are also plans on how to build medieval furniture Furniture Here is the link to my BP here on medieval splitwork hinges;-) I Forge Iron - Blacksmithing and Metalworking*-*I BP0218 Split work Hinges Most complex things are just a bunch of simple things all rolled together, remember that one simple thing after another done well will hopefully give you good results

They are heavy and take up a lot of room. I think Skunkriver is about right on the weight I am away from home and can't lay my hands on "Pounding Out The Profits" Bradley's were industrial grade hammers, and had good control. The rubbers are a bit of a pain to replace, but if these were in running condition they are a wonderful find, and if they all need tons of repair and refitting they are still a very good find.... If you find a bigger power hammer... BUild a bigger shop!!! ;-) And when you tell us you are getting paid to haul them away, then we can all be REALLY really jealous... instead of just really jealous;-) Oh and if you can haul them to Quadstate in Troy OH the four weekend in September I am pretty sure it would be worth your while... ;-)

Aquireitis is a dirty disease and I know a few people with a severe enough case, that it is sure to be fatal at some point, then comes the dispersal auction.

Habu 20 three foot long schedule 80 1.5" diameter pipes, a rope, and open the tailgate and drive out from under it... a bunch of 1' sections of 4x4s in the proposed fall area, and a high lift farm jack... a come-along and a tow strap... If you only have a 3" pad, or a dirt floor don't try this at home;-) Oh and I suspect you can push the hardness on H13 with an interrupted oil quench like is sometimes suggested for maximium hardness on S7...

I really like those, very clean pleasant design:-) Thanks for sharing those...

My Father-in-law was a shop teacher and the shop program was given tons of scrap steel from machine shops, welding fab shops, and mechanics. I got a bunch of graded tool steel scrap from him. If you can find a fab shop most of them will scrap odd lengths of steel just because they don't have the time and the set up to store and try and use these oddball lengths. For them time is more expensive than the materials, so you waste materials NOT man hours... Farm auctions around here often have plenty of interesting scrap, but the profesional scrappers often run the price up to close to actual value. If you have some old farmers that you know they will have a scrap pile that you might get limited access to, especially if you make them something nice and old fashioned;-) Look for spring shops, guys who specialize in replacing and upgrading springs under cars and trucks, if you are polite and make something nice as a gift you might get some good scrap. (I love to make tongs out of 5/8-3/4" coil spring, gives a really nice spring to the reins if you taper them nicely:-) Ask everyone you know, and meet if they have some scrap metal they want to get rid of. My father-in-law is an enabler and has drug home all kinds of good scrap for me, and called me from auctions seeing if I wanted an anvil or a swage block, or some wrought iron wagon tires (I got 22 tires for 45$) A few old farmers, garage salers, and auction hounds can get you a good supply of cool junk for not too much money... And I also buy new stock from the local welding supply house who stocks a fair range of solid and structural steels, it might not be as cheap as ordering online (although it could be...) but it is nice to support a business that might be there to help you out in a pinch. Develop a good relationship with your freindly welding supply house its just good for business. Goodluck

As a blacksmith turned farrier (who would like to switch back;-) you can use a farrier's anvil just fine to do blacksmithing, it is still better than most railroad track anvils I have ever seen. I have a 70# Mankel shoers anvil and fastened down adequately it does alright for blacksmithing, it gets HOT especially if I do much slitting or I am working heavier stock 3/4"<. If you are patient and ask ever person you meet if they might know where there is an anvil you can buy, you can with luck find a nice anvil, heck you might end up being as lucky as Thomas and find an anvil a year for a 1$ a pound or less. If you want the extra assurance of knowing what you are getting, check the reviews on that anvil and buy something new... Blacksmiths fall into two main camps guys who want to buy one really nice shop anvil, bit the bullet and get something that will last the rest of your life and you can hand down to your kids or grandkids, or the guys who will buy any anvil they can get for the right price;-) I would rather be a one anvil guy, but a nice new anvil is salty for what I would want...

If I remember correctly the Japanese used softwood for their charcoal and in the west we tended to use hardwoods. Charcoal has a similiar BTU content to coal by weight, the charcoal is just a lot less dense so you seem to go through it faster. The fire tends to spread a lot more when using charcoal vs coal, but you can use bricks to build a deeper fire without letting it spread so much... Another nice thing is you can just dump fresh charcoal right on top of your fire, as opposed to green coal which you should always work in from the sides of the fire so it will coke up, and never just dump in the middle of the fire while you are using it...

For making tools start simple... -Chisels, punchs, and drifts. Teaches drawing smooth tapers and begins an understanding of volume. -Tongs. Again drawing for the reins, again an understanding of volume, as you use half faced blows to flatten the boss area, and bending as you use half faced blows to shift the bits off set from the reins, and then all the different ways you can finish off the bits, flat jaws, V bit, rivet, pickups, box jaw, hoop, railroad spike head, in all the various sizes... -Hammers. Either reforging old hammers into new tools like punches, or hot cuts, or cross piens, straight peins, diagonal peins Or make hammers out of new stock. -Hardy tools, and bottom tools. Lessons in working larger stock, side setting and setting a tenon down, upsetting a shoulder, or upsetting a larger block. -Turning fork, scrolling wrench, scroll jigs. -Smithing Magician (guillitine tool;-) I love making tools, wish I had more time to do it...

Welding skills are very usefull even to a "purist" or "traditionalist." Some things are worth doing, and therefore worth doing right. Somethings just need doing, you still want to do them right, but they are not the main thing. Most of us will never make a hammer rack like a gothic desk out of Samuel Yellin's shop, but at some point you will need a hammer rack. Welding skill will help you in fabricating a nice hammer rack, or other tool, or some nice bit of sculpture, or even a nice bit of fabricated railing with a few nice forged elements to spiff it up. It is amazing how diverse a skill set you will find you need, to see the things in your minds eye come to fruition. There are a wide variety of methods that you can use to do any reasonably comlicated project (stretching you might be able to come up with a dozen ways to make an S hook, but lets not get too silly;-) Having choices is good, having discernment and good judgement on how you choose is better. (and the bottom line, might not always be the bottom line... Money isn't everything;-) Don't take dangerous shortcuts, doing something dangerous and stupid to save time or money often cost more in the long run. Do not push yourself beyond your physical abilities, push right up to them and stretch yourself, don't break yourself. (It hurts a lot more as you get older, and often you feel the pains of your foolish youth long into your old age...) Protect anything you want to keep, this most certainly includes, your hearing, your vision, your lungs, your hands, your feet, and your back, knees and elbows are optional;-) Don't sell yourself cheap, but don't think more highly of yourself than you ought... I try and tell my young son that you can learn very little when you are so busy trying to tell everyone how much you know, fight foolish pride, stay as meek (in this case meaning having a teachable spirit..) and humble as you possibly can... (I missed a ton of opportunities to learn from a bunch of people because I didn't want to appear inexperienced, which was exactly what I was, there was no shame in that. You live you learn or die trying;-) You may meet someone who seems to be a complete bafoon and a blowhard, but if you learn one important lesson from watching or listening to them, it may have been worth suffering gracefully through their "instruction," and after they get over their insecurity you might have made a good freind who can help you out. Don't burn bridges causually or without a really good reason, firstly it isn't nice, and second you never know which way you will have to go later, and it might make it a much tougher road if you have to walk out of your way several miles, or take the time to rebuild a bridge you burned. It is good to be passionate about your craft, it is bad to monopolize the conversation to the point that no one else gets to talk, and more importantly you don't get to listen. You almost always learn more with your mouth closed, and your mind open, than the other way around. Use good judgement and discernment, but be polite and listen. I have been accused of being a personality grenade and just going off on some topic I am passionate about, or when meeting a new person. But despite my natural exuberance, I do try to shut my mouth and listen to practically everyone, you can't always judge a book by its cover, so you never know when God is going to use someone unexpected to teach you something important:-)

There are no shortcuts in life, if someone tells you otherwise they are lieing, or selling something. The closest thing to a shortcut is a good guide, but even then it still takes a huge amount of time. If you want real skill you pay for it in time. I read in a book that most complicated skills, like mountain climbing, or chess, smithing, there are about 40,000 bits of information that have to be assimilated to achieve a base mastery. The book was on the history of human acomplishment, and was primarily concerned with truly exceptional contributions to human history, in art, music, philosophy and science. Most of the people who made significant contributions to history were nearly monomaniacal in there focus. To make a sword properly requires almost that level of dedication. It is a very complicated process, and to do it properly it takes huge amount of skill. Almost anyone can grind an edge on a leafspring and chop through a cinder block and call it a sword, but that is no more a sword in my book than an ugly gaudy wall hanger. Forging and grinding long blades is flat out hard, and if it isn't done right heat treat becomes very hard, if not impossible. A 6" blade is relatively easy, and a 12" much harder, and an 18" blade is very hard, and swords are even worse about warping in heattreat. I have been smithing for twenty two years, and I'm fairly good with a hammer, ok at a grinder, but my fit and finish leaves a lot to be desired. I have one bastard sword blade that I did as a test piece, its not perfect but respectable. I did it so I could make a two handed sword for a freind of mine's son's wedding, again it wasn't prefect, the grind lines weren't perfect, but it did have a nice distal taper because I forged it out of 1 1/8" square disc axil. (I did the forging as a demo for our local blacksmiths group "Swordmaking for Dumbies: with Power Hammers;-)" I might send Glenn a CD of half the pics from the demo, course we ran out of memory half way through... In my copious free time;-) It's late, I'm probably stupid, sorry...

Most top tools and especially any tool that goes under a power hammer should have a thin flexable handle, you really don't want that going back into your hand. If the tool won't work with a thin handle it is probably a bad design and not safe to use... I have an edging tool that I will need to rework or replace because it is not safe, and just because you get away with using a tool like that a few times doesn't mean the hammer isn't going to spit the poorly designed tool back into and through your face, or trash your hand... As far as welding handles I have lousy luck getting mild 1/4 rod to stay attached to tool steels, I want to try fullering a crease around the tool and wraping the rod around the tool to hold it. properly heattreated S7 and H13 hold up beautifully. You can air harden both steels but maximium hardness is attained with an oil quench, both get VERY hard and you should either differentially harden, or temper back the striking end of these tool... Not only are they safer to use, they work BETTER up to 15% better according to some testing Robb Gunter did back in the 60s. Safer and more efficient who can argue with that;-) Sorry its late and I am wipped;-)

I probably got started in the fall of 85, I was in highschool playing in the SCA on the local university campus, and my best freind asked if I wanted to go out to his shop and play, I made some potatoes (ugly begginer pieces;-) and forged or helped in the forging of some axes, knives, and patternwelded stuff. I seem to remember being able to get practically every forgeweld I tried to stick like a gunshot. My senior art project in highschool was a beautiful phos-bronze and burgundy leather nasal helmet. My best freind Ernie helped me ALOT, it was years before I got to take lead(and keep it;-) In 1990 I moved out to California and did the young foolish starving artist blacksmith thing with Ernie, when he decided he wanted to move to Seattle I moved back home. (I squandered an awesome opportunity to learn blacksmithing while I was out there, insecure and fragile male ego the folly of youth;-) While I was home I met my wife and she had horses, I was a blacksmith, her farrier had a bad back, it was unavoidable I got tools and started blacksmithing and ended up working fulltime as a farrier (I suspect that I am about year 8 or 9 in the 10 year plan to get out from under horses;-) Started really smithing in ernest about this time, been going to conferences, and reading and utterly addicted to the internet. Did a major tool upgrade a few years ago and got a 75# utility style air hammer and have tried in my spare time to make a little money. I still hope to get out from under horses, and do blacksmithing full time, weither it is selling art, crafts, tools or teaching. We will see which path God open up before me

If you work up a design for the client, that takes your time, and your skill, and your ideas, you should get paid for that, and never let a design out of your hands without the client paying you for the design, they will take it to another shop and get it done for half the money and you will be left holding the bag. Especially if you do a full technical drawing with measurements... This is a weak area for me I sketch in iron much better than I do on paper, and both processes take time I don't have a lot of...

If you want to really learn how to make tongs on a power hammer take a class with Steve Parker. Steve works in an industrial forging plant and makes tongs for hydraulic presses all day long on a Nazel B3. He makes it look real easy and for the most part he uses very simple tools, one paddle. He sets the bite on the billet (to get the amount of stock need for the boss and the bit) then he draws the reins down to the length he wants. Then he pulls out this little paddle with two different radius on the top side, and offset the boss, then flattens it, then works both shoulders on the boss to get a nice tight little boss for the rivet. Then you work out what ever bits you want. His tongs are the nicest I have ever used, they are light and springy and just sweet. If you get the chance to watch him work he is awesome. You can get a DVD of him and Clifton Ralph, and Kurt Fehrenbach at the IBA Conference in Tipton, IN June o7 from UMBA well worth the minimial cost. All three of them are incredible industrial style blacksmiths (you should see what they can do with a decent sized steam hammer;-)

I believe that the Alabama Forge Council website has modifications to the Kinyon style hammers that they suggest. There are a few videos available on controling your air hammer. You should be able to do a search for both on Google or Ask.com Design considerations: -You want daylight between you dies, hand tooling opens up all kinds of possibilities... If you get some videos on flat die power hammer forging, like Clifton Ralph you will understand... -Bigger cyclinder=larger CFM requirements, unless you use it like Ralph, instead of trying to get it to run like a Nazel;-) -anvil to ram ratio should be AT Least 10-1, 20-1 is better, and after 40-1 there are diminishing returns... -If you have to weld smaller pieces together to build up an anvil of suitable weight, it is better to bundle rounds or squares, or even plate along the vertical axis of the anvil, and weld it up. Not laminating a bunch of 1' square drops of 2" plate to get the height and weight you want... -You CAN run most home built air hammers without a proper foundation, and tieing it down to that foundation, you can use a wooden "foundation", but The hammer will run better, hit harder, and run more "quietly" ;-) if you go ahead and make a seperate foundation for the hammer, and bolt it down securely. It also avoids the hammer wandering off and getting hurt (you or the hammer;-) -Compressors, bigger is better;-) especially if you want to do some drawing out, or production runs, you can bury a smaller compressor and waste a bunch of time waiting for the air to recharge. With air recievers, again bigger is better, 30gal is worthless, 80gal is better, 200+ is more like it... :-) -Air lines should be big enough to give you the free air flow you need... Larger hose, and larger fittings, and especially larger filters, regulators and oilers are more expensive but will give better proformance in the long run. -A large muffler on a bigger exhaust line piped well away from the shop air will be a blessing, again your hammer will run more "quietly";-) -Hearing protection is still neccessarry;-) -Use the Blue Loctite, and cotter pins, because an air hammer, especially a hammer that doesn't have a heavy enough anvil, and a sturdy enough frame WILL beat itself to death and nuts and bolts will back out, and it is a bother to have to keep tightening them... Not to mention a safety hazard... And despite how negative I might seem (although I am not intending it to be...) It is quite do able, and I do wish you good luck... Especially on finding a huge hunk of good steel for the anvil, generally it is better to size your ram to your anvil. I have a 454# axil forging that would make a nice 40# or smaller hammer, Not I want a 100# hammer how much steel can I cobble together to make an anvil for it... All that being said, I have a Bull 75 (a commecially made utility style air hammer) with a 2" cyclinder. I have a 7.5 hp Quincy Air Master light industrial air compressor with an 80 gal reciever, that develops 22.3 CFM @ 175PSI, I run my hammer at ~135PSI, I have a seperate isolated foundation, an extra 1.5" baseplate, and its bolted down. I have 3/4" airlines and fittings throughout the system. I do not have a long enough, or a bigger line for the exhaust, or a big enough muffler. I can bury the compressor on production runs with my gas forge, but if I pace myself it can keep up by running almost all the time, it is more than adequete for tooling use, and has great control. It is still LOUD and I do have to tighten nuts and bolts on a regular basis, even with all that I have tried to do right;-) YMMV Goodluck, take pride in doing a good job and work heartily as if unto the Lord, and take pics;-)

Me too on the hearing loss, and it sucks... I am very protective of what little hearing I have left and work hard to avoid loud noises when I don't have my safety equipment with me. I work alone most of the time and wear Worktunes muffs, and a half mask resporator, and kevlar sleaves, and gloves a good part of the time. I live in safety glasses and steeltoed boots. I would like to make a leather apron that didn't bother my back and my neck, but I only catch myself on fire once or twice a year so no hurry on the apron;-) Burns on your body heal, your eyes, ears and lungs don't. Protect any part of your body you would like to keep, wear the right safety equipment, and know its limitations as well as yours

Peyton I would have to set that thing on the floor to get it to the right height;-) It is a dead sexy anvil though... Did you father-law order it new, or did he have to find it... Just curious in case I get the opportunity to squander my inheiratence before my mother does;-)

Lots of little comments come to mind... ;-) You can't have too many pairs of tongs... unless all you forge is 1/2" square and railroad spike. If you can't hold it securely, you can't hit it safely.! As to Peyton's devotion to Tom Tongs, they are decent, but I prefer tongs like Steve Parker makes, and taught me how to make. Light springy and sweet. In general I like tools that I make myself, or that people I know make. I like Tom a lot, and he is a very good smith, and a sharp businessman, but I like my tongs better (though I would really like to get my pair of Tom Tong scrolling tongs back that got swiped at a hammer in... )

Actually you can, if you really want to... Put eyes on a Dragon with a power hammer that is;-) Just need the right furniture for the hammer, and the right design for your dragon... and if you are doing it on 2" square stock it is probably easier with the power hammer;-) An open die hammer is still "handforging" the skill is the same it is just a matter of SCALE and efficiency;-)

Make sure you have a wide range of stock in the lower approachable price range and then have a good selection of more expesive pieces. Value your time and price accordingly, somethings you might like to make, but won't be able to sell at a price that would give you a decent shop rate. But be consistant in your pricing (or as consistant as you can be;-) People like to compare prices and see some rymm or reason behind the pricing structure. There are some things I stopped making because I could not do them quickly enough to hit the customers pice point, if you want to do something really fancy and nice, you might have to wait to get the right client who can drop what it is worth, but in the mean time all the people will get to look at the "hook" Most of the time you want to have a big nice item that will catch the crowds eye and hook them to get them to come over and look at your both. Evaluate you markets as you work each fair, take notes, review what worked and what didn't. Some markets you cannot sell anything over 50$ and except for hooking peoples attention all the fancy stuff might as well not be there... Other markets people come with the idea of dropping money on something NICE and expect to pay for it (obviously these are the ones you want but they are fewer and farther between in my experience;-) The economy at any particular time will effect things a bit, so it is always nice to have small nice inexpensive items that are unique that will sell even in a crowd who has little money to dispose of... Door knockers, and handles haven't been mentioned. Stand alone pieces sell better in the markets that I have been to. If it require screws or a hammer most people can't instal it themselves, and just as sadly can't imagine what or where they might put it... Furniture, even or especially multimedia pieces are also nice, here in America people don't think about dropping real money on cheap furniture in a store, but might balk at paying real money to a craftsman at a faire for something that was much better built. This is where you can educate and impress your potential client hopefully;-) You have to market yourself as well as your wares in a way, you have to convince the buyer you are a talented a solid craftsperson who is well trained and deserving of their respect, and their money... I hate selling myself too, I would rather just make cool stuff and have people give me money for it;-) and silly me I just cut off my long artist's pony tail;-) I may have lost my credibility as an aritistblacksmith;-) I certainly won't look as dashing at the opening in October;-) oh well its been really stinkin hot here... Goodluck and even if your luck isn't good have fun anyway.

Several more things come to my mind as I listen to your problem and the solutions offered. 1st relax,develop an intentionally loose grip, you can't choke it and make it do more work for you;-) let the hammer do the work. The hammer is Labor, and your brain and your tongs are Management, you need to tell the hammer what to do and make sure it gets done, it is up to the hammer to get the job done in the best way possible. Additionally you might indeed be trying to hit the material too hard, and you might have too heavy a hammer for your present skill level and strength. Don't rush your work while you are learning. Do strive to work more efficiently and better, but give yourself time to access your work while you are at it. Speed will come with strength and skill after long hours of practice. 2nd Concentrate on results... Watch the steel not the hammer 'chase the edge' of the previous blow. If you overlap and concentrate on making the transitions between the blows smooth your work will improve greatly. Focus on where you want to hit, and hit it, and how hard you want to hit it. 3rd there are several mechanical issues that could be contributing to the problem (though to be honest it most likely is mainly a lack of control and judgment at the moment that is the biggest factor...;-) The anvil could be set too high, which would tend to cause you to hit with the heel of the face. If your marks look mainly like smiles, it could be partly that your anvil is too high, if they look like frowns then it might be too low... If they are all over the place, you need more hammer control (dressing the crown on your hammer will help the symptom, but will not help with the underlying problem...) Once you have the control you can use a rounded face, and still get a fairly smooth finish, or a VERY flat face with an unforgiving radius on the edges and still not leave marks. Once you have the control and the feel for the different hammers you are using it won't matter that much, you will be able to get good results with which ever hammer you are using. If the hammer has a pronouced chamfer instead of a smooth rounded radius around the face fix that, go ahead and smooth things out, it will help... If you need to customize a hammer to your hand and style take a hammer that is a weight you like and can do good work with, and pop it off the handle. Heat it to bright orange and then let it cool in the fire till morning, this should anneal the head so it is soft, or atleast normalize it so it is somewhat soft. Re-mount it on to a handle and then use it on HOT steel ONLY, after a while the face will develop a "set." This is where and how you hit, on that anvil, and if you pop it off the handle again and heat to bright orange, which should be above nonmagnetic, then quench in oil (it is safest to assume that it is decent steel, unless you know otherwise, then quench in water first, like a water hose with a nozzle full blast sprayed at the face of the hammer, they try to heat just the pein and do the same thing...) Bruce Wilcox recommended this method of finding your set to the hammer/anvil combo, and being a tool maker such as he is, he should know;-) relax focus on the results, and modify your behaviour accordingly interpert the results, and figure out why your getting them, then fix 'em... (simple should only take you a year or two to be pretty happy with your hammer control in familiar situations;-) (unless you are working in the forge day in and day out it takes a long time to get to the point where you are truly satisfied with your hammer control... so don't give up hope, it is difficult and challeging, but if everyone could do it would it really be that much fun??? Good luck and keep at it:-)

I read a lot and that helps, and I have gone to local hammer-ins and picked up a few things, and the internet tosses out a nugget fairly regularly, but it has been the trips to SOFA, and the IBA conference where I get to see high quality demonstrators that has taught me the most. I have only taken one "class" which was Tong making with Steve Parker, at the Sun Foundation in western Illinios. Which was a fabulous learning experienceand really helped with my tongs:-) I only regret that I hadn't made it a priority to attend more conferences and classes and hit up every talented smith I met to learn more. It reallys is a shame that it took me so long to get serious about this... ;-)