Frosty

Hmmmm. Let me see, why DO guys love blacksmithing? You HAVE to play with fire, not just any old fire either one that'll melt steel. You HAVE to hit things with hammers. HARD! You get to make STEEL do what YOU want. You HAVE to make lots of noise and not just any noise, it's noise most people enjoy hearing. Most people think that the dirtier you are the better you are. You get to see the results of your endeavors right then and there. Hmmmm. Why DO guys like smithin? Beats me. :cool: Frosty

Sheep not goats. Goats are browsers and while they will eat grass they much prefer leaves, branches, bark, etc. especially from the decorative plants. Sheep are grazers and they wag their tails when they drop pellets (how's that for a family friendly term?) so the berries are spread out. The manure isn't very hot so it's fine on the lawn right out of the animal. Buy a couple lambs in spring and put them in the freezer come fall. 2-3 should keep about 1.5-2 acres trimmed to around 3/4". Come fall be sure to feed them a premium sheep feed for a few weeks before the big wrap so they taste their best. Unless you like mutton don't keep them over the winter or buy grown sheep in spring. Lamb is excellent with a little black pepper, rosemary, marjoram and garlic. Sheep were the standard lawn mower till the mechanical reel mower was invented around the turn of the last century. The White house had two herds of about 20-25 sheep each, with herdsmen, dogs and all. Frosty

No worries, we all get caught in the same trap now and then. You should see how excessively I can overdesign the simplest thing. Frosty

That's beautiful. Black and red with gold trim really looks good on old iron. I painted a buffalo (I think) post drill the same and it looks just as good. Frosty

Thanks for the updated pix. You have one seriously clean shop! Have you sought help for that? I notice you had the consultants in on building the tire hammer. What do they charge, our's usually settle for a good ear scratchin but an occasional biscuit is appreciated for special services. Frosty

I don't have anything planned for the event but will light a fire and hit something just because. Frosty

There's an old saying that goes something like this. "It's a wise captain that doesn't change the set of the sails when he first comes on watch." It means you should learn to use the tools before modifying them. As said, if you need flat and square make a hardy tool. A flat face isn't nearly as necessary as thought and the soft radius makes a decent fuller. (accelerates drawing down) If you really need a flat face for something flip it over and use the bottom of the flange. Flattening processes usually don't require the force drawing does. You can also straighten and flatten on wood with a wood mallet, or other soft hammer without marring the forged details. Straightening is easiest over a gap like the hardy hole or open jaws of the vise. This only bends the metal without changing it's cross section. (drawing or upsetting) I have two "real" anvils, the rail anvil I made before I realized how one should be made and probably nearly 20' of various weight rail to make specialty tools from. Anyway, use it while you keep your eyes open for a "real" anvil, or better expedient anvil, or just more rail. Build a fire, hit metal. Have fun, play safe. Frosty

This followed me home this afternoon. Saw a yard sale sign painted on plywood pointing to an older neighborhood so figured I'd take a look. WooHoo! 9" Milwakee AC/DC slowstart $60. Darned good pickens around here. Frosty

Good grief Dave! A thing like that could make me hate you! You lucky dog you. Frosty

A smaller type bellows that works well is an accordion style I don't recall a name though. They move vertically and have a pretty small foot print. The produce about the same amount of air as a hinged bellows because the two halves hinging makes less air per sq/ft. Nice looking tire hammer, how's it work? Frosty

I don't remember my first piece very well, a screwdriver I believe in shop class. Being able to recognize when one project is going south on you and being able to adapt to another on the fly is a good sign you have the knack for the craft. Well done. Frosty

It's pronounced lots of ways, including: the doo-hicky under the fire pot. To air is close to the original pronunciation. Tweer is okay. For all y'all sutheners Tyree is regional. There's another I can't recall at the moment as well but those are the main ones. The audio pronunciation guide is cool. Frosty

You should cajole Thomas into teaching you his technique for acquiring anvils. Keep your eyes open, put the word out, hit garage sales, flea markets, farm auctions, etc. Till then most important of all, don't wait! Find some RR rail or other heavy steel or iron object, build a fire and start practicing. I was an exploration driller for almost 20 years. We did soils investigations for bridges, foundations, etc. not oil patch or seismic drilling. Anyway, I spent about 3/4 of that time somewhere in the bush and not having a talent for knocking off a half rack of beer after work every night I had to amuse myself other ways. Reading being the most used. Still, when possible we always had a fire in camp so it was pretty natural for me to heat something and beat it into something else. We'd spend time wandering around collecting stuff, then depending on what we found we'd do things to it. We melted untold aluminum cans and other various pieces of abandoned al. Forging fire pokers, toasters and branding irons was a standard when we found steel. It was years before I even brought a pair of tongs along, finally I welded up a rail anvil and packed a pair of tongs. Till then though I used whatever was handy, often the casing jack if we were close enough to it. Sometimes a boulder was handy, sometimes something else. The smallest field expedient anvil I used was a RR spike driven into a birch log. I flattened the head some by heating it in the fire before driving it into the log. My best ever and one of those, (I'm still kicking myself for not bringing it home) anvil was a big axle I fished out of the Resurrection River. I don't know what it was out of but the shaft was close to 3" dia. the flange was a good 12" dia with 12 1" bolt holes around it. The center was domed up about an inch and reasonably flat for the center 3-4". I buried it flange up in a sand bar we were camped on and used it as my camp anvil for a couple weeks. All that depth of steel under the hammer made for one really sweet anvil. I would've brought it home but got distracted by a pallet load of smithing tools I found for sale. Anyway, my point is do NOT wait for the "right" tools before getting to work. I don't think you're going to fall into this pitfall, I hope not. This is why we recommended, "The Complete Modern Blacksmith" by Alexander Weygers. Sure there are other, some better, books on how to learn smithing but there is NO better book to show you how to improvise the tools to BE a blacksmith. Good hunting Dave. Frosty

Why you young Whippersnapper! Soon's I find my cane I'll show you what for! Frosty

I know there are a number of you who know as much or more about trouble shooting burners so lets put our ideas together and make a blueprint. Frosty

Will do. Frosty

Pea is a size designation like walnut and has no reference to quality. Blacksmith's or metallurgical coal is a quality issue. Frosty

I like to use cardboard to light coal. I cut or tear a strip 1 1/2" or so wide and a couple feet long. I roll it into a tight coil and place it over the air grate. I then pile coal around it and let it open up a little bit. I continue to pile coal till the top of the coil is at the bottom of a crater with an inch or so (dia) showing. At this time, I give the blower a real gentle turn so a little air is moving and drop a couple stick matches (lit of course) into the coil. Keep just enough air to it to get the cardboard burning, then bury it the rest of the way with coal and give it a moderate air blast. The burning cardboard will behave like a blowtorch blowing through the coal. It also burns hotter than paper. Not saying it's the best method but it's my favorite. Frosty

If you save pics in an easy to find file it makes attaching them easier. Write your posts in the "Go advanced" mode. Below the window a ways is a "Manage Attachments" button. It will take you to a window with a number of "browse" buttons. Click on one, go to your easy to find file folder and get the pic. Do this as many times as you have pictures you want to attach. Then click "upload" and wait for it to do it's thing. When it's finished close the window and finish your post, then click submit reply, etc. Takes most of us a little time to figure it out. Frosty

This is their listing on the ABANA affiliate page. Frosty CALIFORNIA BLACKSMITH'S ASSOCIATION * Pres: Herb Upham 4747 Vine Hill Road Sebastopol, CA 95472-2236 (707) 823-1251 herbu@cds1.net * Ed: Eden Sanders 620 Angels Rd., RR 3 San Andreas, CA 95249 (209) 754-1502 editor@calsmith.org * www.calsmith.org Spring Conference April 24-27, Vista, CA. See events calendar or website.

I was just teasing you a little. If either of us needed to apologize for giving offense it'd be me. Sorry if I offended you. What'd really make me happy would be if you lived close enough we could get together. There aren't that many youngsters around here interested enough to actually come over. Good new handle, Sabre. Welcome aboard. I second the vote for Wyger's book, it is one of if not the best book I've seen for field expedient smithing and general shop set ups. Wygers traveled the world during a time travel wasn't easy. He was an artist in many media and liked to do what struck his fancy at the time. He did a lot of wood and stone carving but painted, drew, worked in all kinds of metal, ceramics and more. He liked trying regional variants of the arts. There was no way he could pack enough tools to cover all his potential interests so he only packed the light and compact ones like paint, etc. he couldn't improvise. If he found a piece of wood, stone, etc. he wanted to carve he'd build a smithy from whatever was available, make the tools he needed, make his carving or whatever and move on. After a while his tools started taking on aspects of works of art themselves. The guy's a personal hero of mine, just for his McGyvering abilities. Frosty

My pleasure Mark. I don't know about a sticky, many more and we'll have to go straight to the second page. There are a number of other guys here who're as good or better at trouble shooting burners. Perhaps we should get together and write a burner trouble shooting blueprint. Maybe even a trouble shooting blueprint section. Hmmmm. Frosty

Howdy acoop101. I once owned a lot on Lake Nacimiento in the 70's. . . :confused: Try contacting the CBA. smithing tools are available in S. Cal. but not common and they're generally expensive. Frosty

Using the choke plate to restrict the intake air will work. However it may not solve the underlaying problem. You may get a reducing fire but not enough heat. A properly tuned burner is the REAL answer. What kind of burner are you using? It'll be easier to make suggestions if I know what kind of beast we're talking about. Can you post a pic or two? the burner at least and your whole setup would be more helpful. Occasionally problems are external to the burner itself. Still, some other things that will effect it regardless of type are: Over pressuring, try less pressure and see what happens. You might find you have to run at high pressure to get the forge hot and start heating the steel, then turn it down and partially close the door to bring it to final welding heat. Alignment of the jet, if it's hitting the side of the tube it'll hurt air induction. If that happens you can have both unburned fuel exiting the forge making CO AND an oxidizing flame in the forge scaling the steel. This occurs because propane and air do not mix naturally nor easily so if there's some segregation in the burner tube the gasses will enter as discrete units and not mix. Incomplete combustion AND excess oxy. It's counter intuitive but exists in almost all forges to one degree or another. Another really common problem is crud in the jet. Pull it and clean it out, clean the supply line back to the hose too. If you have a little bit of something in the jet you may be getting the volume but not enough velocity for proper induction. Those are the generic problems that apply to any naturally aspirated burner. At least the ones that come to mind at the moment and I'm trouble shooting a new adaptation of one of my basic designs right now so it's on my mental front burner right now. Frosty

Well Canadian GANSTA ? It's good to see you getting into smithing, I don't think you'll make it as an english major. Sorry, couldn't resist, I'm weak that way. The list of things you need to do some smithing is ridiculously short. #1, Hot fire. White heat is almost more a matter of perception than an actual temp though it's marked on charts. Usually it's wanted for welding but there are guys who can weld at low orange heat without flux and others that have problems at any temp. What you need to start is a good working heat, high orange is plenty for general work. For that you need a hole and a blast. A brake drum or an old sink will work, as will any fireproof container resembling a hole. For the blast a hair dryer or shop vac are pretty popular starters, I've used both and both work fine. #2 On the list is an anvil. Virtually any heavy piece of steel or iron will work. RR rail is probably the most common improvised anvil around. Another common starter is "I" beam, not so hot if laid flat but okay standing on end. Then there are all the other really heavy THINGS from forklift counter weights to RR car couplers, to 1,000 crane hooks, to shaft cutoffs and all the other stuff like it. #3 Tongs. A blacksmith invented visegrips because he was tired of dropping things using tongs. Then there are "Twist tongs". These are really simple things you can make with little or no tools. Cut two lengths of strip stock, say 3/4"x1/4"x16" long. (to pick a usable length out of the air) The next step is to punch or drill a hole in each piece in the same location, say 2" from one end. The hole should be about 1/4". The next step is to either rivet or bolt the two halves together. If bolted either double nut it or pein the threads so the nut can't back off. leave enough slack so the halves move but aren't sloppy. This step involves heat. Bring the bit (jaw) end to a good orange heat and place it in a vise gripped by the rivet or bolt with the reins (handles) down. Using a crescent wrench or adjusted vise grips, etc. give the bit a 1/4 twist. Quickly remove the tongs from the vise and work the handles to make sure the hinge joint is moving freely. Shape the bit to the stock you need to hold and they're ready to go. Lastly, you need some hammers, a saw, chisels, files, measuring device, scribe, punch and other various misc tools. That's it. With those simple tools the smith can eventually rebuild virtually every tool and machine you see in the world today. It may take a couple generations but we did it once (well, more than once really) we can do it again. :cool: A vise is REALLY handy but you can do without. 3rd world smiths without a "real" vise will wedge a piece against a boulder with a foot. Your most probably first vise will be a machinist's vise and they're good for holding and twisting but being cast iron will NOT stand up to hammering. Oh yeah, Welcome aboard and you CAN edit your posts after they're uploaded, the button is at the bottom. Frosty