Here's an example of some of my experimenting. I took a 2" schedule 80 pipe and necked it down on a power hammer, teaching a student to make a candlestick holder. The result looked like the end of a scorpions tail...so I just kept going. With the remainder of the pipe I made the spider and Mig'ed on some hair. I mounted the two on a piece of Black Walnut about 50" long. I haven't finished yet. I want to forge a cactus with a copper flower on top to put in between the two. (I love insects and arachnids as sculptural forms...they're like little aliens all around us!!)

So what do some of my fellow smiths think?

Nice job, you really nailed the gesture of the scorpion.

Looks really good! Could you give some measurements so I size it up in my mind better.

Nice diorama you got going there. That scorpion is really nice looking.

The OA dimensions of the black walnut: 54" X 18" (depth approx. 4")

The Scorpion: 16"L X 14"W X 13"H (31" from tip of tail to claws). I added rebar to the body of the scorpion to give it more heft after flattening the body.

The spider: 12"L X 14.5"W X 7" H (The spiders abdomen is the original size of the parent stock)

Below is my "interpretation of a" preying mantis (17"L X 13"W X 10"H)

I'd call it "A Twilight Walk" as that is when we see them things here in NM!

Thanks for the measurements. Would you be willing to show some pictures of your tooling for your power hammer that you used on these?

The power hammer tooling was nothing special. I used a radiused die set to neck down the pipe. I continued hammering with the radiused dies until I pinched off the tail. (That was when it began to look like a scorpions stinger.) When I got to the body I used flat dies to flatten it out. Then I used 1/4" round stock to indent the segments on the body.

Sweet!

great work

NICE! How'd you get the ant and the scorpion to hold still while you modelled them in iron?