I've been thinking about this for a while.  Most of my hand forging work gets done on my post anvil, and I wanted to free up some floor space for other projects (like forging classes).  The post has been mounted on a piece of 3' x 4', 3/4" plate.  The post is in a piece of square tube welded to the plate and held in place (as much as 260# of steel needs to be held in place  ) with some wooden wedges.  Since there was no place to hold tools, I have another post laid on it's side with a couple of receivers welded to it.  The 200# Fisher got used as a holder for the cutoff hardy and very little else  .

 

So what I've done is to move the tooling anvil onto the plate, along with a 200# ish swedge block.  The swedge block will now hold my hardy tools and some bending forks and such, the tooling anvil holds the guillotine tools and makes for a dandy place to straighten long stuff.

 

I also squeezed in a rack for most of my hammers and cleared out a rolling rack for my tongs.  Those have a new home on the wall between the powerhammer and the forge.  A small side table now has a single stake holder and a rack for the less used hammers and handled tools.

 

This has cleared out enough space for me to bolt my post vice to floor (it's been floating here and there) and to have two more forging stations for students, as needed.

 

 

 

 

 

I was going to build a single hardy holder out some heavy steel block on a piece of pipe, but then I realized that the swedge block would do the same thing, and I could use the block to forge on too!  The only thing I couldn't fit on the plate is a vice, and I didn't want stuff hanging off that I could trip over or get hung up on, so the vice goes stand alone.

 

Thanks for looking

 

Geoff

Looks great Geoff , what a fantastic work area !!

That is a phenomenal idea!

Thanks, guys.  I'm just trying to make my work area fit me better. 

 

 

Geoff

Geoff, now I am R E A L L Y wanting to see your shop!

Seems like as I do more types of things in the shop I need to redo the layout. Think I am on Version8, rev3 over the past 10 years :)

I like the 'clump' working areas that concentrate tools instead of all the free standing stuff.

You did a great job with your layout, looks very workable.

Just cut my welding table in half to make room for an induction forge.

Seems like it never ends...

Great work!

What kind of classes are you offering?

Dave

Looks good Geoff. How's it work for you? Getting a good work area is usually a process and can take a long time. Some were lucky enough to learn in someone else's shop and learned their ways. Not that it's necessarily better to use a "master's" methods but like so much else it can really shorten the learning curve.

 

Thanks for sharing.

 

Frosty The Lucky.

So far, so good.  I forged a dress saber, about 24 inches and 12" curved side knife, plus finished up forging on two demo pieces from the Kelso show.  The tough thing for me will be keeping the top of the swedge block clear of stuff.  Any flat space seems to attract spare tools and chunks of stock.  I'm looking forward to having a real space for the forming stakes, and adding to that collection.

 

Dave, I teach everything from basic forging skills, blade forging, grinding, finishing, handles and guards, heat treating.  If it's part of making a blade, I will teach a class in it.  I prefer one on one classes, but I've got enough space for 3 students in the hot shop.  I try to keep the cost down, because the folks who are the most interested, often have the fewest resources.  It's my way of thanking the folks who were my teachers when I was just starting out.

 

Geoff

So far, so good.  I forged a dress saber, about 24 inches and 12" curved side knife, plus finished up forging on two demo pieces from the Kelso show.  The tough thing for me will be keeping the top of the swedge block clear of stuff.  Any flat space seems to attract spare tools and chunks of stock.  I'm looking forward to having a real space for the forming stakes, and adding to that collection.

 

Dave, I teach everything from basic forging skills, blade forging, grinding, finishing, handles and guards, heat treating.  If it's part of making a blade, I will teach a class in it.  I prefer one on one classes, but I've got enough space for 3 students in the hot shop.  I try to keep the cost down, because the folks who are the most interested, often have the fewest resources.  It's my way of thanking the folks who were my teachers when I was just starting out.

 

Geoff

If your open to it Geoff , I may look you up for a saturday shop class day next time I travel to my sisters in Snoqualmie Falls............

Just so long as it's not this coming Saturday.  We can go Months without leaving the house on the weekend, and then everything plies up on one day.

 

Geoff