Rantalin

I see Romans quoted on some of the pieces, and you don't list them above.

Alan, the reason that thre Romans are not listed as Celtic is that they were actually enemies. The Celtic tribes that came in from northern England were a threat to the Roman Empire, and I believe the reason why the Roman Legion's became such a powerful fighting force.

Although not a natural disaster or large scale emergency, I figured I should post this link, just to get word around. I know there are at least a couple of smiths from Iowa that use this site. This student was reported missing by his parents, and was last seen at Grinnel College in Iowa. He left a note that could be interpreted to say that he wished to disappear for a while. His parents want him to come home. I'll leave the rest of the reading up to you.

Paul Shuman-Moore Is Missing

Ew...knob and tube...not fun...I dealt with that all summer working for my dad. Definatly the most dangerous wiring type I've ever seen. Although I've seen some very poorly done wiring from today's electricians that's even more dangerous.

In my garage, which my father uses to store his inventory and has power tools in, there is an extension cord on a reel. I assume these can be purchased at a Home Depot or other home improvement store. You pull the cor away from the spool as long as you want it, and every few feet the reel clicks, engaging the gears that keep the cord from retracting. keep pulling until the clicks stop, and the cord will retract into the reel again. It's really easy to use, and is about a 25 foot cord I think. This extension cord is used for the table saw, drill press, and belt sander. All other power tools are directly plugged into outlets in the walls.

No, I'm not. For a while I never had an interest in kukri's, I always thought they were kind of ugly. But for the past few months I really like them. I'm not sure about the usage of the term.

The fullers on a kukri have their own "special name". They're called "aunlo bal", meaning something like "finger of strength". The aunlo bal is usually deep and narrow, and really close to the spine. The kukri fullers usually run just from the handle to the "corner" of the blade. Kukris can also have larger fullers called "chirras" that are in the actual "belly" of the blade.

That kukri combines the two into two smooth flowing fullers.

Unfortunaly, my normal source for material doesn't have ANY information about fullers, under any name I can think of. So after doing a quick wikipedia search, I ended up with this website.

Blood Groove -- A. G. Russell Knives

Enjoy!

My dad is an electrician, so in the summer, I get to haul home some of the scrap copper wire. Its pretty expensive, and "the guys" usually bring it to a scrap place for cash. Sometimes we'll make over 200 dollars per job. I think in centeral MA stripped copper sells for something like $1.80, and out towards Boston it goes for almost $3.50 or so. I gather what I can and take it home. I haven't tried it yet, but I'm hoping to be able to melt it down and do SOMETHING with it. It's worth a shot asking if you find a construction site with electricians at it, they might give, or sell, some of their scrap. Other than that, Either a scrap yard or a supplier would be the best bet.

Brian, to my knowledge, the fuller line in the sword is still called a fuller line, but some people wrongly refer to it as a "blood-groove". In actuallity, the purpose of the groove was not to let blood run off the blade, or to help pull the blade out of a victim. The fuller in the blade actually made the blade stronger, and lighter. I'll have more for you later (after class)

Kevin, let me be the first to tell you (as many people will) you should spend some time learning the basics of blacksmithing before moving on to bladesmithing. Practice drawing out and upsetting, practice scrolls and bends and tapering. Get a feel for how to work the metal and how it reacts to your hammer. Then start making some knives. I would reccomend making knives from pieces of mild steel first. Mild steel tends to be less expensive, but does not hold an edge like higher carbon steels. This way you can practice making the shape of a knife. Then you can move on to higher carbon steels. Some books I'd reccomend are The Complete Modern Blacksmith, and Practical Blacksmithing and Metalworking. I've never read any of Jim Hrisoulas' books, so I can personally reccomend them, but everyone who has read them highly suggests they be read. Have fun, and Good Luck!

That looks great Jeremy. Great work!

The furnace cement I was able to get as my first refractory for my coal forge was only rated to 1200 degrees or so, (Farenheit) I think you'll need to find some specialty cement through the internet.

Alex, the forum is a wonderful place to learn from. I've learned a TON just reading other's posts, and then contributed my own knowledge to others. I've been smithing for about a year a 3 months or so. Keep learning more, keep wanting to learn more.

I'd also like to say great idea on the tanto. No use wasting work because it didn't turn out EXACTLY as planned. Another question, what grit did you use for sand paper? I've got a 6" belt grinder with a 160 grit belt on it I believe, thought it MIGHT be a bit higher. As tedious as it would be, the results from a very fine grit sand paper would be worth it. I haven't done any heat treating, but from what I've read, it sounds as though you were correct in assuming the water was to harsh on the steel. If the metal was cooled too quickly, it could become brittle, and snap, as has happened in this case. In my mind, uneven heating could have cause the warping, but someone with a litle more heat-treating experience might have more to say about it. good luck with your forgings.

The polishing job looks good Alex, what did you use for it? The handle also looks good, nice and simple. Your next step, in my mind, should be making a collar and cap for the handle. I know the saya is the scabbard of the japanese sword, but what is the habikki, wait...nevermind. I just found it in my book. (Talk about up to the minute posting) For those like me who don't know what it is, according to my source the correct spelling is habaki, and is "A metal ferule surrounding a Japanese blade next to the guard." It's the little collar on the sword that keeps the blade snugly in the saya (scabbard).

A question on the construction. Did you make the handle from one solid piece of wood, or two pieces? The only handle I've made was for a small dagger, in a style reminiscent of the roman swords. I made it from one solid piece of wood that I a slot into to fit the tang of the blade. The fit was so snug that I didn't need any epoxy or pins to keep it on.

Governments should be afraid of the people, not the people afraid of the governments.

Good line from V for Vendetta. Not an extremely wonderful movie, but a good message

Tim Lively's forge design is the one that I built about a year and 3 months ago, when I first started smithing. It worked great, I just don'thave the patience to deal with fire tending. So I bought a gas forge off E-bay that uns off a simple 20 pound propane tank. The Lively forge design got much hotter, I am only capable of a mid-orange heat with the gas forge. It's definatly a great forge to build, as all the "parts" can be bought at the local hardware store.

You did a great job with the pommel. I can't see any change in material where the weld is.

Excellent work. I really love it. How did you attach the pommel? Is the end of the tang peined over, or did you do it another way?

Armoring would be very tough to include, as it is very tough to do in real life as well. When reheating the sheet, you only heat the area you will be working with. Armor pieces were assembled with rivets, and when they were worn the defferent pieces were held together by leather straps

By the way, great idea. And I had another one. As others have said, make other tools available, better hammers and such. And the better the equipment that you use, the better the item comes out, more damage/defense, or better looking.

OK, I'm gonna skip reading everyone else's replies, and give my ideas.

First, don't make things TOO complicated. Yeah, there are a lot of steps in getting prepared to forge an item, but not ALL of them need to be followed exactly.

Instead of having a place to mine for fuel, have an NPC merchant that's already done the work. (Although you could leave the option open for players who DO wish do mine or prepare their own fuel)

Just got a good idead and don't wanna forget it. Each person should start off with very little skill. Only being able to forge basic, low quality items. As they progress, they "learn" to make new objects. This could be done by having a journal or notebook that has the techniques in it for making a weapon or armor. As the player "levels up" in smithing skill, a new entry is automatically added to the journal describing exactly what steps the smith must take in order to make the new item. It might be a good idea to do away with fire managment, as important as it is, and focus on just the hammering part. The ease of moving the metal could be determined by the length of time left in the fire, which has to be lit before each forging session.

Ok, now for the forging process. Picture this, your screen shows a piece of iron in the fire, maybe just a 1 inch square bar about a foot long, as an example. when you want to take it out, double click it. The tongs are shown taking the iron out of the fire, and the screen shifts over to the anvil, with the bar sitting on it, no tongs holding it (to make the gameplay a little easier in terms of visibility and ease of play. The work is done on only two demensions, for now at least. So you have this orange/yellow bar, and you look at the diagram in your journal, showing the steps required to make, say a dagger. Single click to draw out (make the area longer and thinner), double click to upset (make the ares thicker and shorter). The steps could be a combination of sketches and text, to make things clearer for the player. The steps in making a dagger could be something like:

1) Draw out the blade (with an image showing a series of single clicks [represented by a symbol of some sort] along the upper part of the bar.
2) Upset the pommel (shown by another series of double clicks along the very back of the bar
3)Put a bevel on each side of the blade (shown by single clicks along each side of the blade section to form the edge)

As the steps are followed, the image of the bar changes to reflect what is being done, ending in a finished blade. Further work could be incorperated, such as sharpening the blade, polishing it on a stone, etc.

A good thing to do, would be to make sure that the programming only allows pieces to be made by smiths with the appropriate skill. If a smith tries to make something that he/she has not learned, the iron becomes junk, and must be scrapped. And don't make it TOO long between forging level up's, or make sure the player has a few different items he/she could make at each level. (Swords, axes, knives, daggers, spears, helmets, shields, etc.) This way, they aren't just making the same thing over and over and over. I'm sure I could come up with a whole lot more. If you have any questions or need more help, feel free to message me.

I have a handful of pewter statues sitting on a bookcase, and boy is pewter soft! A couple of figures have bent and others have broken. Those that were fixable, I repaired just by bending the bent part back into place with my hands, but once I felt tension, I stopped and didn't dare go farther for fear of snapping it off. The cone idead should work, as long as the pewter wants to bend back into place.

Mills, I do the same thing. I have 2 burners on my forge, so I always try to have SOMETHING under each burner while I work Even if it's just a piece of scrap stock for practicing a technique on. In terms of slowing doen fuel consumption, I turn down the regulator and decrease pressure if I don't need to extra heat. And I have also found that the forge will relight if the chamber is still hot enough.

Spending the Summers working for my Dad (an electrician) has its advantages. It sounds to me like a breaker tripped, or a GFI tripped, as was mentioned, if the breaker keeps tripping, there is a short somewhere in the circut on that breaker, and should be fixed ASAP to avoid fires and electrocution. Check the outlets that run off that circut and see it any GFI's tripped, then reset them, if the breaker was tripped, make sure you turn it completely off before turning it back on again, that's how they reset. You can't reset them by just going from the "tripped" position to "on". If it isn't a breaker or a GFI, and you can't find the problem, there's a problem, and your parents should hire an electrician to troubleshoot that circut.