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I Forge Iron

Learning without a teacher. trial and error


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Just getting started in this as a hobby, built a brake drum forge got a couple hammers and chisels, and an anvil of course. thoughts of making knives and tomahawks got me interested now i am hooked.    i have made a couple wall hooks and attempted a couple sets of tongs.  youtube has been my only source of education.  I am in east tennesse and do not know of much blacksmithing that goes on around my area.    was wondering about good places to learn or pick up info other than trial and error or maybe a book that is really useful.  thanks for any help or suggestions. 

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There are lots of self taught blacksmiths. 

Some have turned out to be highly skilled and have eventually learned to also work safely.

But that route is not for everyone.

I suggest that you read the following if you find the time!

http://www.iforgeiron.com/topic/31268-welcome-new-blacksmiths-here-are-a-few-suggestions/

My very best to you!

Ted Throckmorton 

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Keep up the trial and error as well.   We all learn by mistakes.   Sometimes we have the benefit of a teacher beside us to point them out to us as we make them.  They can instruct us on the finer points and the why real time.    Other times we need to make them and then reflect and critigue ourselves as well as look to others and ask questions in order to improve.   BUt I think blacksmithing requires trial and error (Mistakes) in order to learn regardless.     Personally I enjoy the journey of learning.   These days when I try something that does not work I log it as learning and just add it to the file in my head.

 

Yesterday I was making some feet for a boot scraper.   These feet needed holes in them to screw to a wood deck.   I punched one of the holes in one of the feet into a section of foot that was not quite wide enough and my final punch done too cold.   It split the edge of the hole and made a crack.     On another I did not get the slug out fully and was not wanting to make another crack so I reheated.    I tried to drive the slug out too hot and ended up with a raggedy push through (not sure how to explain, no shear on the plug).  

 

Anyway this was all fine.   I learned two more things NOT TO DO!  Mistakes are great as long as you learn from them!    They also allow you to ask better questions when you do get with someone whos knows stuff as well as what to watch for.   I sometimes go back to videos to specifically see how they handle a very specific strike, heat, set-up etc....

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Strikers, nah.  It is very helpful to find someone who knows the ins and outs.  I had nobody to teach me and wasted a lot of fuel, steel and sweat trying to learn.  Even now I only know a couple of smiths and only one makes knives.  This site is a great help, there's a lot of knowlege and experience floating around in the eitherworld of ifi, but having someone to show you is priceless.

Never tell yourself you can't do something.  A little will and some enginuity and you will be surprised at what you acomplish.  You don't need a bunch of expensive equipment either, it helps to speed up the process but one can get by.  Good luck and give us picks of your progress.

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There is an enormous amount of information available to you on the internet, nowhere better than this site though. Some of the demonstrations on youtube are good, some are frighteningly dangerous, but then so are some smiths!

 

I don't think anything will be better than face to face instruction but... there is a very good book, and accompanying DVD, by Peter Parkinson. The book  is called 'The Artist Blacksmith' and the DVD is 'Artist Blacksmithing'. Everything is well illustrated / filmed and explained in simple terms, progressing from first principals upwards.

 

Don't take too much notice of the word 'Artist'. Both book and DVD are all about conveying the information necessary to a beginner and cover the tools used, how to use them and then the building-block techniques of the craft: upsetting; drawing down; cutting; punching; twisting; bending; joining (rivets, welds, tenons etc.).

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One valuable tool if you are having to learn on your own is the video camera, just set it up let it roll while you do your work, then sit down and look at it objectively.

 

You will see how you stand, how you have planned your work, how you work, your hammer control, your working heats, how you waste time and effort by doing unnecessary or repeat actions, how ergonomic your workspace layout is, where things start to go wrong so you can correct it the next time, and many other useful tips that will improve your abilities.

 

Good luck and enjoy

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Welcome aboard, glad to have you. If you'll put your general location in your header it'll make it a lot easier for folk within visiting distance to get in touch.

 

I'm mostly self taught till a few years ago, say 15 or so. There's things to be said for learning on your own as well as for hooking up with someone who knows the craft. One day with a knowledgeable smith can and often will save you months of winkling it out yourself. On the other hand, learning to figure tings out on your own will teach you how to analyze mistakes and much of what we do is failure analysis. Being self taught I find myself learning every time I watch someone else wield a hammer, even first timers.

 

The one true secret to blacksmithing is Knowledge and Practice. Keep in touch here, we love helping folk out almost as much as we love pictures. Pics of failures can tell you more than successes, sometimes lots more. Also, never round file the mistake(s) that lead to a failure, what doesn't work on one thing may be just the ticket for something else. I couldn't count how many times exactly that has happened to me.

 

Frosty The Lucky.

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