what do you think

[EWCTool]

What do you think that the blacksmiths of yesteryear would think of how we blacksmith today. Would they be envious of all the power equipment that we possess? What would they think of all the new techniques that we have developed, gas forges, power hammers, ect? Would they think that we have gone soft, or would they see all the new technology that we have and be proud that we have found more than one way to put hammer to anvil.

What do you think?

[BIGGUNDOCTOR]

With any group you would find the "the old way is better " folks. Personally I have felt that if they had the tchnology we have now then they would have used it. They were businessmen time=money as always. As a machinist there are operations that I would not want to do the old school way due to time. The results are the same, or even better in some cases, so why not use new technology?

[HWooldridge]

Probably depends on whether they made a living at it or not. Most people didn't have hobbies in years past that involved hard manual work. Because they already worked all day long, they played music or read or conversed or did whatever was available before television or the internet. In other words, I doubt many professional blacksmiths went out after supper and played in the forge - although they may well have fixed tools or gotten ready for the next workday. Subsequently, I think they would have welcomed any of the modern tool conveniences we have because they save labor.

[Mainely,Bob]

If you had to plow a field which would you rather have;a mule and a single point plow or a tractor and a gang plow?
Be nice to know how to work with a mule but give me the tractor and fuel any day if I`m doing it for a living or just to keep living.

[John B]

What do you think that the blacksmiths of yesteryear would think of how we blacksmith today. .

What do you think?

Honest opinion? No offence meant, but, what a Silly question !

Would they be envious of all the power equipment that we possess?

Envious, of course, but not in a biblical sense, but in the fact it makes the job easier.

"What would they think of all the new techniques that we have developed, gas forges, power hammers, ect? "

These advances are over thousands of years, and a natural development due to innovative blacksmiths (and others) advancing and embracing new technologies as they are developing and being introduced. eg When Noah made the ark, he would probably envied the modern shipbuilders and carpenters techniques and tools, but they would not have been much good to him in his circumstances, (shortage of an electric socket would have him handicapped somewhat) They were forging meteorite steels/iron even well before the iron age started. (Would they have been blacksmiths ?)

Powerhammers were in use before Christopher Columbus sailed the pond and all the implications and ramifications that developed from his little trip, I suppose he was responsible for bringing and introducing blacksmithing to the New World.

Quote "Would they think that we have gone soft"

Where is the advantage of doing it the "hard" way (meaning physically difficult) if you are making something, Knowledge and using it to the best of your ability is not being "soft". It is hard to make a nail until you improve your technique by learning, Why use a 16lb sledge when you can use a tilt hammer ?

Or would they see all the new technology that we have and be proud that we have found more than one way to put hammer to anvil

First of all they would be amazed, secondly eager to try them and third they have always been proud of what they do, and I think they would be able to show us a thing or two about putting a hammer to an anvil.

After all smithing is easy, you just got it hot and hit it. Thats what they did, and thats what we are still doing today,

The longer I am involved with this craft, the more I am getting to feel like a metalworker than a blacksmith, we have diversified and embrace such a broad spectrum of knowledge and how we work metals,

Rant over now, Just my opinion, and apologies if anyone is offended, (As if I am bothered, heck I am a blacksmith, we are supposed to be outside the norm) Just joking !!!

[brianbrazealblacksmith]

John B, I don't think it is easy but it is, simple. Like I think you were trying to say. Heat, hold, and hit, you can do that by yourself, or you can use computers and robot and dies and hammmers and do it bigger and better than man has ever done before with modern technology.

[John B]

John B, I don't think it is easy but it is, simple. Like I think you were trying to say. Heat, hold, and hit, you can do that by yourself, or you can use computers and robot and dies and hammmers and do it bigger and better than man has ever done before with modern technology.

You are probably right there Brian, I don't like the word simple, it reminds me of me when I failed the job interview for the village idiot, and ended up the village blacksmith.

They said then it was simple, you can only usually get about 6" of metal hot at one time, you only do one thing at a time, if it goes worng, you either rescue it, or leave it in the fire a little too long and destroy any evidence you didn't get it right.

I thought Brilliant, thats for me ! (Well thats my story and I'm sticking to it)

[brianbrazealblacksmith]

I see what you are saying, John B. I just looked it up in the dictionary, and what I was meaning was in the beginning of the definition, and what you are saying is in there also.

[EWCTool]

I agree with what everyone is saying. But my point is that even though we have all these advancements of technology, we are still putting hammer to anvil, just as it has been done for centuries now.

[fat pete]

Its obvious ..look at the advancement of bellows...they went from blowin in a tube to crankin to variable speed motors... what came first a power hammer or a big helv hammer or oliver hammer or a rock...If you r a buisness guy it is imperative to stay up with the advancement...time is money...i watched a factory go from vertical boring machines to cnc ,,,the only complaint was it eliminated jobs so there was animosity but it had to be...
Most hobbiests have a choice to pick a period to smith in,,,you find guys that love the press...the hammer has its distinctions tho..hammer marks are cool today but a real smith leaves no marks....but the places a lotta smiths worked were ugly dirty ruff places and they were on piece work bustin hump...not under a spreading chestnut tree...lol...there were and are artist smiths then as now ... i would bet the first smith ever was some sort of experimenter...and what did he make??? a nail? did he make a hammer? knife? boogie picker??

[edge9001]

If i have to guess the FIRST smith made a pair of tongs or some sort. he had materials obviously. with a rock to beat with, and a rock to beat on, a fire to heat in, only he would have needed to find an easy way to hold hot metal. as for air flow, to first smith would have probably used an open fire.

[Bryce Masuk]

Maybe we should ask them about what it was like without a washing machine and microwave?

Life was different back then

sometimes I think that people that were blacksmiths and other professions had alot less distractions no internet television and so on


but then I rember that back then people worked all the time just to prepare meals and have cleanish clothes and they walked to work and to get anything unless you were rich.

just as much as life was worse in the old days it was also better in others,

people in 3rd world country's usually are very tight family's it takes everyone working together to make it, here people fight over not being able to watch what they want on television and children scream over not getting toys and things like that and none of us are above it in north america.

reality is we live with our own perspective and that is it if you have little you make due,
if you have too much your bound to waste it

how many people have too much junk piled up in the garage and need to take trips to the dump a couple times every year just to be rid of it?

it seems like Skill of the hand has been diluted if you look at old things you would think that they used machines to make many things but it was all done by hand to perfection.

I dont know how some people became so skilled but they did and I dont think that many alive today can compare to the masters of the past.

[evfreek]

Read the Foxfire book with the section on blacksmithing, and see what the old timers have to say about forge welding.

[ThomasPowers]

Well they'd ask "where are the helpers"? And be amazed at how cheap steel is nowadays.

Of course the earliest powerhammer I saw documentation for was pre-norman conquest (actually pre 1000 A.D.)

I believe a lot of our viewpoints on smithing in America come from two major factors: being a "frontier culture" where the smith might be the only one around and so *had* to do a bit of everything (compared to Europe when just making a sword might involve 4 separate guilds back in renaissance times!) And the gradual "dying" of the craft where many of us have met and talked with solitary smiths who were gradually riding the job down into the dirt as they aged. (younger smiths converted to auto repair, welding, etc)


It's up to us to help change peoples ingrained ideas about smithing! My stock answer to "It's a dying craft isn't it?" is "Well all my friends do it!" and "There are probably more smiths in Santa Fe NM, USA, now than there was 100 years ago!"

[Francis Trez Cole]

I myself like to go back to basics once and a while. When I first started blackamithing I had very few tools and I grew. When I took my welding cert. the kmowledge of working metal and forge welding helped me be more effective. As we grow and so did blacksmithing look at the vicking chest and the tools found. then look at the time period of maximillian you can see the advancement in 400 years and just in the bellows hammers and tongs. I think they would be amazed the we still forge weld with the technoligy we have.

[double_edge2]

when i first got into metal, i got to know an old blacksmith/engineer. retired and in his eighties he looked over his back fence into my yard to see what the hammering was. making tongs, i said, or trying to...his reply was, why dont you mig some reins on a big set of pliers?.

i like the forge for its basics, no electricity, no problem. people like the results from the forge. i think alot of the old blokes, as said by someone here earlier, would wonder why we still forge, when technology today with all its wonder, can reproduce some of what comes off a forge.

and for about $50 to $100 you can make a forge, and the right bloke can make what comes off a forge, look like it was produced my a million dollar machine.

me, I dont know why there are not more forges in back yard sheds. i think the advance in technology and the dependance on it, has put alot of us backward.