Bigred1o1 Posted June 22, 2012 Share Posted June 22, 2012 for the past few weekends i have been helping out with making some large door hinge hardware for a new post and beam barn that has been recently constructed/raised still mostly just have the beams up and they are now working on the roof at the old stone house museum in Vermont the cool part about this is getting to work with wrought iron not something i am used to doing and i have been really enjoying it partly this has been a chance to work with some fairly large stock of wrought iron around 1 3/4 inches down to one inch in diameter i was quite surprised to find out how quite it is to work with as far as keeping the anvil from ringing (has anyone ells had this noticed this when working with it?) long story short i had a scrap let over and thought i would cut it in half and give it a etch to see what it looked like inside the photo is of a 1inch piece of "triple" refined wrought iron i cant remember the providence of it but i know i was told but at that point i was not thinking much past the head of my hammer on a side note this was some hard stuff and was used for the pivot points in the pintle hinge as well the upper end in the photo was hot cut and the bottom end was cut with a saw this was done primarily bc i wanted to be able to show the differences in how the grain moved with the hot cut vs the saw cut some what large image so i hope this uploadeds Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted June 22, 2012 Share Posted June 22, 2012 It's odd stuff indeed; but was the norm for about 2000 yeqrs before the besemer/kelly process came to the fore after the 1850's. When worked at almost a welding heat it is dead soft and VERY malleable in the true sense of the word; almost a splat rather than a ting when hit. Most modern smiths have trouble heating it as hot as it wants to be worked at as that small voice in the back of our heads keeps yelling "You're going to burn it!" (OK that *other* small voice) as A36 will burn at a good forging temp for real WI triply refined seems a bit high grade for a set of barn hinges; but like always we use what we have! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bigred1o1 Posted June 22, 2012 Author Share Posted June 22, 2012 yeah that was why we went with it on the plus side i sure got a kick out of working with it and as you said the hole no no your going to burn it feeling when working it and it was nice to be able to hold up the finished hardware side by side with some samples from the museum and besides from the lack of rust on the new ones they looked the same (a very nice demo moment) while forging in 85*+ weather is not my favorite thing to do this was still quite a lot of fun and etching the scrap at least for me was a treat from the point of view of getting a good look inside the material Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted June 22, 2012 Share Posted June 22, 2012 "Looks just like the original" is *high* *praise* when you are doing historical replication! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bigred1o1 Posted June 22, 2012 Author Share Posted June 22, 2012 yup its been a good experience i started very early this spring making log dogs for the timber framers then moved on to spuds and then from there we would fix what ever they broke/bent and besides from how long things have taken to make it has been a eye opening experience as far as being able to some small extent track some of the real day to day uses of a blacksmith over all i can say is i far prefer going to the hardware store for my nuts and bolts than hot punching and tapping/threading them in my day to day life Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted June 22, 2012 Share Posted June 22, 2012 One reason old stuff tends to have such a diverse selection of nuts and bolts---they didn't like it either and would save and reuse any they came across. Are you keeping a "daybook" like the old smiths did? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bigred1o1 Posted June 22, 2012 Author Share Posted June 22, 2012 honestly i am not on days where i work on the farm shop time is hit or miss depending on what needs fixing and when working down at the museum things can be so fragmented with having to stop and explain that its hard to keep track of what was made through out the day though it is part of what makes it fun when you get someone that is truly interested in what you are doing over all we have found it works best with 1.5 smiths and .5 of a press agent so we tend to trade off and do striking work for who ever is driving the project and then try and field questions between heats its odd though i have burned far more steel while demoing than i ever destroyed glass while demoing glass blowing all i can think is that you dont have the same feed back on how hot/soft things are becoming in the forge Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted June 22, 2012 Share Posted June 22, 2012 I have found that it helps to have a smiter and an explainer at demos (they need to work together well, as you might surmise I sometimes correct the explainer if they get to spreading some old urban legend, though I try to keep my yap shut...) What I have learned over the decades is: "If the mouth is moving the blower/bellows/hand crank bellows is *NOT*) One might think that would slow things down but after starting over a couple of times you realize that it's actually MUCH faster... Just get a blank book and tie a pencil to a string and glue the string in the book and start putting in the date and what you made under it every time you finish a piece. Any other explanation if you get the urge. "Made Mouth Pear, Customer Request, Don't ask..." "Made axe for clumsy obnoxious volunteer, betting pool started" "Made nails, made more nails, made even more nails, ENOUGH WITH THE NAILS ALREADY!" sort of thing. By the time you have several decades in and a shelf of grimy books you will be glad you did---I sure wish I had! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bigred1o1 Posted June 22, 2012 Author Share Posted June 22, 2012 very good idea as well i know we are looking into getting a touch mark for the for the forge at the old stone house partly to be able to track what was made on sight and partly sins our goal is to replicate parts it would be nice to keep the new from getting mixed in with the old as far as the forge goes i am always fighting with out of sight is out of mind and i have been spoiled working with gas of late Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted June 22, 2012 Share Posted June 22, 2012 For accurate historical replication you might want to consider stamping the year on the back or in some concealed area of a piece. I did a knife once to a high standard and on the inside of one of the handle slabs I carved the year and imbedded solder into the carvings so any X-Ray will show it up bright and clear. (Xrays of historical items are often done where there is a question of their being real...) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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