Hey Guys,

during my autumn holly days I paid Julien Puy a visit in his shop near Dijon in France. I stayed with his family for four days. I helped him out in the shop, therefore he showed me some cool new stuff. He used to be a blacksmithing instructor for four years and did a lot of traveling around the world especially USA, the Netherlands, Germany and the Czech Republic.

On the first day we made this clothes hanger:




The second day we made two Brazeal style rounding hammers. One was for a customer of Julien, he was forging and I was striking. Here you can see a video of it:

After that we made a second one for me. I forged and he striked. Unfortunately there is no video of it... Toolsteel with a carbon content of 0,48% was used, pretty similar to 1045 or C45 steel. The handle I made myself from African hardwood. The hammer head ways somewhat around 3lbs. It is hardened and partially tempered at the cheeks. The all-in-all price for that one was 150€ (~200$).




The next day we made inter alia this axe blank from pure iron I will weld in a cutting edge and finish it soon:

On Saturday Alec Steele from Great Britain was visiting his grandparents in the near of Dijon and his uncle was kind enough to drive him buy so we three could work together a little bit. Unfortunately we had only three hours or so because I had to leave for traveling back to Germany early midday already.
First Alec showed me a pretty cool technique on forging a one-heat-horsehead he learned from Brian Brazeal, which can be easily applied on a lot of items for decorative purposes. Here is a video of it:

Then we where forging a gigantic nail to practice striking in a triad. The bar first was drawn out on the power hammer and then we upset the head in the swage blog by hand. Here you can see a video of that process:

The front one in serpentine shape is the one we made that day:




All in all I had a great time during these days and I really enjoyed my trip. There was some really great craftsmanship with Julien and Alec and I am keen to repeat this someday. Thanks again also to Julien´s wife who kept me fed well and drove me to the train station(s).




Soo this was my little travel diary. I hope you enjoyed it!


You all take it easy guys!
- Daniel

Boy, that looks like it was a lot of fun! Good for you!

Boy, that looks like it was a lot of fun! Good for you!

Sure was mate! :)

Boy, that looks like it was a lot of fun! Good for you!

A lot of fun actually! :D

I know I am guilty sometimes, but why isn't the youngest guy in your triumpherate wearing safety glasses? I know that I should practice what I preach, and in my shop, I do wear safety glasses. I am now wearing goggles during my reenactments and demos, One must set a good example for young smiths learning this craft!

Dunno Stewart. It is Julien´s shop and Alec definatelly is able to decide for himself, this was and is not my beer. I wear glasses all the time, I don´t want to take any risk, but what others do in forign shops is not my business.

Very awesome stuff, thanks for sharing.

Nice video. Thanks for sharing!

I know I am guilty sometimes, but why isn't the youngest guy in your triumpherate wearing safety glasses? I know that I should practice what I preach, and in my shop, I do wear safety glasses. I am now wearing goggles during my reenactments and demos, One must set a good example for young smiths learning this craft!

nobody are "perfect" but you are right !!!! if you see on the other video and picture , normaly Alec have glasses .....but i don't now why he don't have on this video.....for me "safety" , it's very important !!! i forge with left glove , glasses ....

Daniel !!! thanks !! B) very nice video !!!! (i like specialy the video about making a hammer !!!! ) i have a "beautiful" french accent in my language ...... :D :D hahaha!!!!!

Fun times, I can tell! Thanks for the videos.

Amazing experience, for sure. Thanks for sharing it with us!

Back when I was learning blacksmithing at HCT's Rural Crafts Center with Holme Lacy a fellow student had a final project that involved making part of a tree trunk. They set this thick slab of plate on the ground, then heated a very large bit of metal on the forge (that sure took a while). Finally, they had 3 or 4 people striking it on the floor... hammerhead way up, then all the way down. Absolutely amazing to watch! It sure takes a pounding to move that much metal. The wonderful nail you guys did greatly reminded me of that :)

now that is very Cool thank you for the show

Sam

Loved the forging of the hammer video, looks like you had a blast. Thank you!

Just because some people weren´t sure who I am in the footage above... I am the blonde guy in the blue jacket and gray-black trousers. Julien is the man of middle age with the French accent and the beard. Alec is the smaller boy with the IFI shirt and beige trousers who always switches from British-English to French in the Video.

... just to make that clear ;)

Thanks for posting these pic and videos.
There are some subtle bits of good information that many viewers may not be aware of. One is shown as the hammer is being rotated after each hit, with the flatter on top and the rounding cup on the bottom. Go back and look at it. That rotation helps keep the rounding ball from going lopsided because we each hit a bit differently with each stroke. That rotation averages out those errant strikes.
Another subtle picture is going from the striking phase of the cheeks and then back to the cupping die. Why? When the metal is drawn down by fullering it also seizes the drifting action. So to release the drift from the hammer metal a smart hit or two on hte ends pushes the metal to loosen itself from the drift. this is an action to not be taken lightly. Should you be is this phase and slow down the hot swelled hammer material will cool and seize the drift. Then you have to beat the heck out of the drift to remove it...sometimes unsuccessfully.
And what a very neat shop. Many of us are envious in this area for sure. But there was one situation that makes a strong example. Striking height is very high. If the striking height was lowered quite a bit then the hammer would be hitting the top tools at about the same level as the anvil is now.

Great videos

Carry on

Thanks for posting these pic and videos.
There are some subtle bits of good information that many viewers may not be aware of. One is shown as the hammer is being rotated after each hit, with the flatter on top and the rounding cup on the bottom. Go back and look at it. That rotation helps keep the rounding ball from going lopsided because we each hit a bit differently with each stroke. That rotation averages out those errant strikes.
Another subtle picture is going from the striking phase of the cheeks and then back to the cupping die. Why? When the metal is drawn down by fullering it also seizes the drifting action. So to release the drift from the hammer metal a smart hit or two on hte ends pushes the metal to loosen itself from the drift. this is an action to not be taken lightly. Should you be is this phase and slow down the hot swelled hammer material will cool and seize the drift. Then you have to beat the heck out of the drift to remove it...sometimes unsuccessfully.
And what a very neat shop. Many of us are envious in this area for sure. But there was one situation that makes a strong example. Striking height is very high. If the striking height was lowered quite a bit then the hammer would be hitting the top tools at about the same level as the anvil is now.

Great videos

Carry on

You are very right with what you said. Julien is very precise about what he is doing. That he taught me: "If you think clean, if you have clean tools and you forge clean you will end up with clean product." While you are taking the heat think about the steps you are going through when the work piece comes out of the fire, because then you don´t have time to think long. Then forge this steps and make sure you work equal on both sides. Rotating the work piece when upsetting or punching is very important to keep stuff straight. And yes the thing with the flatter was to make the drift loose. Same with tapering: "When you make a bad square you will get a horrible octagon and then you will get a screwed up round. If you make a beautiful square you get a beautiful octagon and in the end a beautiful round. For me those little smart steps are what differentiates a really good "pro" smith from a fairly good armature.

Thanks for those videos mate I really enjoyed watching them. You are a lucky man.