Frosty

Okay, THAT gave me the willies! Frosty

Upsetting is driving the iron back into itself to make it thicker and it's probably the hardest smithing process to do well. Hence upsetting is upsetting. (to the smith) :mad: Frosty

Most of the old electric blower motors were in the 500-800rpm range so putting a new motor on one is likely to blow the clinker breaker out of your forge. Frosty

Do you HAVE to take the entertainment value out of everything? Ted: Another thought for keeping the smoke out of your work space is to make a downdraft welding/cutting table. The work rests on a bar grate over a plenum chamber. The exhaust fan sucks from the plenum and the output is piped outside. It is a lot easier to keep the smoke from getting loose than it is getting rid of it. In AK we have heat issues and heating with wood I'd rather not have to exchange the air in the shop 3-4 times to get rid of a little smoke. You're also breathing it till it's gone. Frosty

My worst burn happened while I was drilling. I'd jumped up on the cab of the drill to try seeing something through the woods and when I climbed back down grabbed the exhaust stack. I'd already stepped off so I couldn't just let go without falling through the steel rack on the way to the ground. I've had lots and lots of burns but that was the worst, took a couple weeks to get over it. Frosty

Oh yes, the holiday season is something to Mull over. Frosty

As do I, but Brother - M is a bit young to know proper beer etiquite so I had to ask. Frosty

Ted: You're right, it's been done though usually only when there's a problem with the draw. The reason there's less stress on the Motor restricting the intake rather than the output is the blower vanes are running in a partial vacuum rather than in thicker, compressed air. If you shut either intake or output completely off there's almost no difference in resistance. The air density around the vanes will quickly come to ambient and the load on the motor will lighten up. For an easy example you can hear a hair dryer motor speed up when you block either intake or outlet completely. A partial blockage of either will result in a different motor note though. Frosty

I'm right handed and mine usually points to my left though I point it wherever I find it easier to get what I want. One thing I do with my students is get them used to working the anvil from any direction. It follows from having them standing across from me when I demo something and just handing them the hammer without moving. They lose the notion of right or wrong direction no later than mid second session. It's a form follows function issue. Do what works best for you. Frosty

He means the back, hammer like face, of the axe. It may chip dangerously as any hammer on hammer action might. If you remove the handle you can shine up then heat the pol of the axe head. Let the color run to purple blue and quench in water. Take it easy on your vise, it isn't an anvil, it just looks kind of like one. They're cast iron and will not stand much hammering at all. If you have a store of RR spikes you can make all kinds of useful stakes and use the track plate as a holder. You'll need to upset a shoulder so they stop on the plate. That's a good thing, every smith needs to learn why it's called "Upsetting," the sooner the better. All in all it looks like a decent set up to start. Good for you Brother-M Frosty

A 20# anvil will pretty much limit you to 1/4" stock and smaller. Oh sure you CAN work heavier but it'll be a PITA. Nails as suggested, skewers and toasters, "S", "J" drive hooks, cabinet hardware, etc. There're lots of useful and beautiful things you can make in light stock. Then again, try your local salvage yard or even truck repair shop for something useful as a field expedient anvil. One of my hands down favorite anvils ever was a field expedient. It was an axle out of I don't know what but it was heavy with a large thick bolt flange. Buried to a depth where the flange was at proper forging height it made a wonderful anvil. Unfortunately I didn't bring it home with me when we left the job site, I was distracted by hauling the loot from the Seward Machine Shop home and forgot it. Frosty

That's an impressive days work Brother-M. Did you mean hammer eye drIfts? Looking foreward to the pics. Frosty

My hat's off to you Son. It's an honor to know you. Frosty

Even free spinning, precession will slow it down. You also can't ignore the effects of brownian movement. forever is a long time. Also, by definition a "perfect" vacuum would be ruined by a top or anything else in it. Forget steam power for your blower. Rig a turbine in the stack and use the rising smoke to power your blower. This is proven technology though not widely used. Frosty

Well, that description covers about half my friends here. You have a home town or is it a secret? I certainly understand if it is. I mention Meadow Lakes because I figure virtually nobody has a clue where it is. Google pins it in the lake itself so we're still in cognito. I'll mention the blower on the Association list. Frosty

Perpetual motion only works in the theoretical universe. No such thing as a perfect vacuum to spin your top in and anything less than perfect wouldn't work. Even if you could get perpetual motion to work, what good would it be? As soon as you tapped it for work of any kind it'd grind to a stop. At best it'd be a very long lived storage device. The best you can do is make the energy you collect and use do as much as possible for you before you let it go. It's fun to play mental games with though. Frosty

I've occasionally picked up steel balls from the cement plant, after they're worn out of spec in the ball mill. I've never heard of a "ring mill" though and a quick google search didn't tell me a lot. They must be a complete figment of your imagination. No matter, if you're looking for a ball or mushroom stake you can get "headache balls" from the cable and wire rope guys. These are the cast iron balls you see just above the hook on cranes. They're intended to keep tension on the cable when there's no load. They come in many sizes from a few lbs. to hundreds. I have two, I don't recall what the smaller one is but the larger is 9" dia. A little polishing and they make dandy stakes. Frosty

It's no trouble brother-M, ask away. I'm mostly self taught and would've loved to be able to ask questions when I was your age or twice your age. I was over 40 when the net went public and I was finally able to talk regularly with smiths and other metal workers. Frosty

Doc: Up yonder and to the left? Mark maybe knows you too? Are we by chance neighbors? Okay, scratch that question I looked at your web site. So where are you in AK? Want to join the Association? I've been building efficient propane burners for quite a while and having a lathe makes it a 20 minute exercise. Frosty. From Meadow Lakes, a bit west of Wasilla.

Credit where credit's due Kevin. RR spikes make better letter openers than knives, not enough carbon to hold an edge. There is enough carbon to make resilient tools though like small pry bars or hay hooks. I made a couple sets of RR spike hay hooks a few years ago but drew them way thinner than was good. They still held up well enough on lighter bales in the 50-60lb range but I don't need hooks on light bales. Oh well. Frosty

Sometime around 94' we were doing a job near Seward AK and I got word the owner of the Seward Machine Shop had passed away and the executer was selling stuff. That sunday I met him at the machine shop and we looked at all the stuff. I'd told him I was interested in the smithing tools but would look at everything for things I might want. He figured he'd make more with a direct sale than at auction. We dickered briefly over several hundred lbs. of miscellanious hammers, tongs, sets, swages, etc. and both were happy with the results. What I passed on was the anvil, not that I wouldn't've loved to have it, I just couldn't figure out how to get it home. It had 1,278lbs. stamped into it's side. I couldn't find a makers mark, just the weight. Frosty

Well done Kevin! Making uniform bar from larger material is an excellent exercise. The bolt might be a bit small for a hardy but it'll work. I'd shorten it and put the shoulder an inch or so from the head, then forge the head into the blade. It's a fine first session at the forge. Keep it up. Frosty

I have to say this is a really good idea; recuping waste heat to make charcoal, making steam to power anything is not only dangerous but highly regulated. First though the idea of making a flash boiler, see fed, state and local regulations first or your insurance co. is likely to skin you alive while the sheriff puts you away. This seems very doable though. Find yourself an old turbocharger and pipe the steam into the exhaust leg. A waste gate will deal with any excess air you generate. Both links are the same site. O'Conner has had this site up for a number of years but it's got the basics right. Don't use cinderblock for containing the fire around the retort chamber, it'll spall away from the heat very quickly. Enclosing the retort chamber is a good idea, anything that helps contain the heat where you want it is a good idea, anytime you're generating heat on purpose. This is why we insulate our homes and wear coats. Find a steel bucket with removeable lid to contain your coffee cans. Better yet, use SS stove pipe to contain the 5gl. steel bucket. SS reflects heat well and once you get a reaction going you can burn the volatile fumes from the wood. Not in the forge though, they won't generate high enough temperatures outside a very oxidizing atmosphere, this is one reason you're not burning wood. The other being the adverse effects of the volatiles on your steel. I'll be trying this method of generating charcoal for sure. Thanks for the idea. Storing heat, especially waste heat from the forge is a good idea, here's how I'm doing it. I installed a sub-floor exhaust system under the shop's slab, there are 2" sq. tube sockets (gozintas) to the surface on a 4' grid. The gas forge will get a hood that plumbs to the exhaust system through the 2" sq. legs it sits on. Waste heat and fumes will be drawn away from the forge and down under the floor. (The final exhaust is above the surface outside the shop of course) I also laid hydronic heat transfer tubing in the floor and will make a water heat exchanger for the wood stove for infloor radiant heat. It's just hot water so no need for the extremely hard to aquire permits for a steam plant. The pic shows the Pex tubing and Gozintas before I poured the slab. An alternate plan I'm working on for making charcoal is building an air tight stove for the shop. Not what passes for air tight in commercial stoves but one that will smother the fire if I shut the draft off completely. I'll load it with wood, get it roaring and shut it off. Later, after it cools, I'll shovel out the charcoal. Frosty

Stop by the local spring shop and ask to buy some drops. Be sure to tell them what you're doing, they'll probably give you all you want. If you make a habit of hitting their drops, making the foreman or owner a nice blade will pretty well seal your supply. Frosty

The anvil looks a lot like my 202# Trenton. Weight's in lbs. as well. Frosty