well not my first attempt but the first finished pair I used some potato digger chain it is 1/2 inch round 13mm for metric folks. I got this material years ago and now I cant remember what it is it gives a good spark of high carbon nice tight patern. the top pair is what I used as a guide to forging they are tom tongs actually tsur tongs I believe I needed 1/2 inch tongs and they look like they will work good and they feel good in the hand. anyone know what they use for the potato diggers? also I am resising my pics can someone give me some feed back on the dowload speed and quality of the pics I am on dsl and some of the pics I look at take too long to open up can imagine the folks on dial up

Nice pair of tongs. Just think that 75 years from now some antique dealer will be selling these as Early American Folk Craft items for a $100 on Ebay.

Really nice job, Clinton!

Nice looking tongs Clinton

Clinton,

Nice pair of tongs. I need to make some similar to that sometime soon.

Oh, and the pictures open nice and quick. I am on DSL, but I know what you mean about some of the pictures lately. Some are taking forever to open. What did you do different? is it all in the size of the file?

I live in potato country, and used a lot of digger chain for punches and chisels. It's got a narrow heat window to forge in, put it back in the fire if it's not red. Mark Aspery said it behaves like 1090-ish steel. It's hard to heat treat, I was breaking 2 or 3 tools out of 10 with an oil quench and blue temper, then Mark got us using the triple draw water quench method. I would recommend doing a full anneal in ashes on your new tongs, and never quench them when they get hot. I now make chisels, etc from S-7 and use the digger chain for dinner triangles. The high carbon triangles ring lots louder than mild steel.

they look fantastic clinton. excellent job

Nice job Clinton. Those were coming together nicely when i saw you yesterday. Thanks again for the sweet deal on the post vise. I'm gonna mount it up tomorrow. I need to forge a spring for the jaws, and make a bracket. Next time i come by i will be happy to swing the sledge for you! You have alot of neat stuff in your shop, i look forward to stopping by in the future when we can spend some time forging.

Clinton,

Nice pair of tongs. I need to make some similar to that sometime soon.

Oh, and the pictures open nice and quick. I am on DSL, but I know what you mean about some of the pictures lately. Some are taking forever to open. What did you do different? is it all in the size of the file?

I am running windos xp on that computer and when you open the folder with the pictures you right click on the pic and it gives you an option to resize I have been using the med i think its 600 x 800 my other computer windos vista does not work that way thanks for the input brian d

I live in potato country, and used a lot of digger chain for punches and chisels. It's got a narrow heat window to forge in, put it back in the fire if it's not red. Mark Aspery said it behaves like 1090-ish steel. It's hard to heat treat, I was breaking 2 or 3 tools out of 10 with an oil quench and blue temper, then Mark got us using the triple draw water quench method. I would recommend doing a full anneal in ashes on your new tongs, and never quench them when they get hot. I now make chisels, etc from S-7 and use the digger chain for dinner triangles. The high carbon triangles ring lots louder than mild steel.

wow thanks for that info i did not realize that stuff is that tuff i was going to oil quench but after posing the pics and trying to research the digger chain my fire went out

Very nice tongs, thank you for sharing.

Nice job Clinton. Those were coming together nicely when i saw you yesterday. Thanks again for the sweet deal on the post vise. I'm gonna mount it up tomorrow. I need to forge a spring for the jaws, and make a bracket. Next time i come by i will be happy to swing the sledge for you! You have alot of neat stuff in your shop, i look forward to stopping by in the future when we can spend some time forging.

ya i shut down the forge after you left had to finish in the morning
ya wish i could have given you a full tour but next time you come over we will get to all that have fun with that vise the spring is an easy fix

I am running windos xp on that computer and when you open the folder with the pictures you right click on the pic and it gives you an option to resize I have been using the med i think its 600 x 800 my other computer windos vista does not work that way thanks for the input brian d

Thanks for the info Clinton,
I too am using XP and will have to give that a try next time I post with a pic.