Rantalin

My shop is behind the garage, out of site, as my parents consider it an eyesore and I have no place to put it inside the garage. The forge, a small two burner propane forge, is on top of a gutted propane grill lined with some brick. The "anvil" sits on a sawhorse, which has a lightweight vice bolted onto it. Not the best setup, and I want a permenant shop, but I'll be done with college and moving out in a couple of years, so for now my setup is just fine.

I believe someone on this site had this setup, although I could be mistaken. Use some section of PVC pipe and just drop your bar stock in. Obviously, the stock can't be shorter than the PVC, so you'll need different lengths of pipe for different size stock. Longer stock in the back, shorter stuff up front, so it would be stepped. You could make some type of frame for the pipe so its all arranged neatly, and not just free standing. It would also help if the entire setup was tilted a bit forward to allow you to more easily remove the stock.

That would make sense actually. The large surface area of the steel pegs would allow for large amounts of heat transfer.

Very nice! I really like the color and texture of the horn. Great Job!

Good Afternoon everyone. I was watching this video [Knives]---Sanjo Industrial Cooperative "Echigo Manufacturing Network" and saw that the smith's method of forge welding is not as I learned to do. It seems he uses either metal filings or ash applied onto the metal at an orange heat (possibly before scale develops) then presses the metal to be welded on right onto the flux. The new metal is not hot, and the smith just uses his fingers to set it in place. After taking a welding heat on the bar, it appears that the smith uses a power hammer to set the weld. Now, what was the flux he was using? I remember reading that wood ash could be used, but that grinder filings were not a good flux. Does this method of welding work well? Any input will be helpful.

Currently using the garage floor, but come summer (or maybe even spring break) It'll be back to using a sawhorse, or possible some stumps I have.

Torin, though I applaude your desire to disprove those who have gone ahead and researched this, I feel that the Mythbusters episode thoroughly covered this situation. They measured the force a human can hammer with, and ran multiple tests. They struck hammer on nail, and hammer on hammer; and they got the same results as you. Nothing but broken handles. If you do get some different results, e-mail them, I'm sure they'll run a "myths revisited" episode on it.

yes, I used a couple handfulls on top of a charcoal fire, and it smoked like CRAZY. I probably just need to let the pellets coke up in a way or something, but now I just use a handful of them on top of a wood or charcoal fire to help light the coal, works pretty well. Haven't actually tried forging anything with pellets alone though.

Thats really cool. I'm glad there are people who are trying to find cheaper, safer ways to perform daily tasks.

A similar situation happened two summers ago. A man was trying to light his grill, but couldn't get the coals lit. Frustrated, he put the coals back into the back and went inside to take a shower. Some of the coals were smoldering, and he had set the bag against the building. This was a large apartment complex, and most of the building his apartment was in went up in flames. A few of my dad's employees had to go check out the building to make sure it was electrically safe. We had another job at that complex a few weeks later, and the damage was pretty bad. Glad you're ok Archie.

Two books, Besieged: Siege Warfare in the Ancient World, and Classical Weaponry of Japan: Special Weapons and Tactics of the Martial Arts. Which I guess would make that some sort of karate/kung fu S.W.A.T. team. :-D

A slitting chisel and a pair of 1/4" V-bit tongs. The tongs are on backorder however and I have no idea when they will arrive.

Also got a Barnes and Noble Gift card that I'm using tomorrow to buy the book Weapons, which covers almost every type of weapon used since the beginning of time, all the way up to current firearms and artillery.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

Yep, not a white Christmas here either, it sleeted a bit, but no snow.

Very nice looking! I especially like the green handle. What's that made of? I also like the distinctive hamon lines.

Remember, nothing is truly 100% hand made. As the saying goes,

Actually Sam, most Sword distributers classify "battle ready" as being high carbon steel. And a lot of these a hand forged.

Example from museumreplicas.com,

"Real museum quality sword, knife and dagger reproductions that are hand forged like the originals. Made from high carbon steels and other authentic materials these blades handle and flex like the real things. The fully tempered, full tang blades are battle ready for your next crusade or just display ready for your office or den."

or from SwordsofHonor.com,

"All swords are of the highest quality, usually forged out of high carbon spring steel, and are battle ready."

I'm sure there are many sites and stores that make the claim "battle ready" for SS pieces of junk meant only to sit on a shelf, but most if not all of the places I've been too only make the "battle ready" claim on the higher quality swords.

It looks and sounds as though it might be used for making impressions in leather. That's my best guess...

One word.


Beautiful.

I don't know about how easy it would be to forge titanium, but the cost of materials would kill me. Through Onlinemetals.com, a 3 foot by 4 foot sheet of 1/8 inch sheet is $US 2,000. Not something I'd be willing to pay.

I make chain mail armor in my spare time, which is diminishing since summer ended and I'm back at college. It's not hard, but its very tedious and takes a long time. Since about a year and a half ago, I've managed to get a sheet about 16" by 12", and I'm starting a mail shirt, so I've got a square that goes over my head, which isn't more than three rings wide. Whenever I have time I coil, cut, or weave the rings and do a little more, but to coil, cut, and attach about a 16" length of 4-in-1 rings takes somehting like an hour and a half to two hours.

With regards to the helm, Anvilfire has a handful of videos about armoring that include forging a norse helm. If I remember correctly, the helm is dished out to an extent and then a cone stake is used to finish the top. The smith in the video used a steel cutout of half of the shape of the helm to check for high spots and low spots, and then hammered them down (or up) to flatten the surface.

The MA General Laws do not define daggers or dirks, I did a search for dagger, and came up with only one hit, the law saying you cannot carry them. In that case, I would go to the dictionary definition of a dagger or dirk. In the case of a dagger, I get "a short knife with a pointed blade used for piercing or stabbing" The problem with daggers ISN'T that they are double edged, it is that they posess the thrusting and stabbing power capable to penetrate deep into tissue, and in some cases through ballistic body armor. A dictionary search for Dirk gets me "a long straight-bladed dagger, especially from Scotland", illegal for the same reasons as daggers.

It varies, but many US states are pretty strict about their dangerous weapon laws. I know the MA laws like the back of my hand, and carry a copy of them with me in my wallet. In MA, it is LEGAL to carry a single edged fixed blade knife on ANY length. Switchblades over 1.5 inches, daggers, dirks, stilettos, ballistic knives, and various other bladed and non-bladed weapons are ILLEGAL. The Karambit seems perfectly legal in MA according to what I see, as long as the false edge along the spine remains a false edge.

What state do you live in Mooch? I could look up the knife laws and send them to you in you want.

Could be wrong on this, but the way I pictured the procedure, the "can" actually becomes part of the blade, and later gets ground away to reveal the pattern.

In my mind, a well balanced knife is one in which the the point of balance is directly at the hand guard. Balance points on knives and swords can be more of a personal preferance thing also. Some sword have a balance point that is about 6 inches above the hand guard, with others, the perfect balance point is closer to the hilt. The purpose of the balance point is to keep the sword easily wieldable. For example, if you hold your hammer at the end of the handle and try to swing it, the momentum of the head makes it difficult to control. Flip the hammer over and hold the head, and your speed and control increase greatly. The same principle works for swords and knives. The closer the balance point is to your hand, the wasier the sword or knife is to control. When dealing with swords however, to make the balance point that far down the handle is impractical. The pommel would have to weigh as much as the entire blade to balance it out. As blade length increases, eventually the point is reached where an unbalanced, but lighter sword is preferable.

I've never made a gas forge, so I can't really input on that, but the one I bought works really well. Immediatly after it's lit I throw something into the chamber to heat. As the forge gets hotter, I throw another piece under the other burner. I can get a railroad spike (about 3/8 inch square) up to an orange heat pretty quickly. It's been a while since I've used the washtub forge, but from what I remember it took a little bit to heat up a spike. The catch with the gas forge I've got is that the max I'm gotten the forge to is about a yellow-orange. I want to get some fire bricks and reduce the size of the chamber, which I'm hoping will increase the temperature of the forge. It usually took about 15-30 minutes for me to get up to a nice forging temperature with the washtub forge, from lighting the match to hammering the steel. I've only been smithing for about a year and a half, and this was the first year of that time, so I wasn't exactly an expert at getting the fire going. The great thing about the gas forge is that I turn on the gas, adjust the regulator, and light. Then I'm pretty much set to go. In a few minutes the forge is hot enough to start working.

I used the wash tub forge for about a year, my first year smithing. It worked great. However, I ended up spending too much time tending the fire and not enough time forging, so I switched to gas. For my birthday, my dad got me a gas forge off e-bay for about $130.

The construction of the wash tub forge is incredibly simple. As soon as I thought the adobe was dry enough, I threw in some sticks and used a small desk fan blown into a small cone to direct the air into the tyure. I was able to heat some pieces of metal up to a mid-range red using just scrap wood. When I switched over to natural hardwood charcoal, the forge worked even better (as expected). I eventually ran out of hardwood charcoal and had to use charcoal briquettes, not my favorite thing in the world. My parents were able to find and get me some Nut Coal last Christmas which worked really well. It was amusing to see my relatives in a state of confusion when I told them I had recieved a 50 pound bag of coal for Christmas and was excited. I then found that pea coal, due to the larger surfae area, burned a lot better than nut coal, and thats what I stuck with until the switch to gas. Although I do plan on building a new coal forge eventually.

definatly, but it isn't so much that I burn things, as well as myself, but I can feel myself begin to fail. Hy hammer strokes aren't as precise, my arm is feeling heavy, etc. At that point I call it quits and pack up before I really screw something up.