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I Forge Iron

Why weld on reins?


brianbrazealblacksmith

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Hi Brian   , its not just modern smiths that weld on tong reins , there is an example of welded on reins in "Elementary forge work " this was first published in 1917 , not a kick in the ass of one hundred years ago .

 

I am sure I have older published examples of welded on reins , I will see what I can dig up.

 

It also looks like in the good old days they used two types of steel to make there tongs. 

 

Rob  

I don't believe there is any a question whether they did it before modern times. The op asked why they continue now in modern times and I would agree with Thomas, that would include the early 1900 being post industrial revolution. Furthermore, we should clarify what the "modern times" are. Are we speaking of post enlightenment as many historical texts separate it or post industrial revolution? According to my college text "modern times" began as a result of "the Enlightenment" i. e. the end of the dark ages. 

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From what I have heard, a common apprentice job was to forge weld all the scrap WI together to make a usable bar again. In the case of tongs, it would have been far more simple and productive to take a 4" drop, forge the bit, scarf, then weld to the reins instead of forge welding a bunch of small drops together and then forming the bit and drawing the reins. However I am not as well read or experienced as many of the other smiths commenting on this thread so this may be inaccurate. Just a thought it might contribute to the discussion.

-Crazy Ivan

 

Edit: Just realized this was about modern smiths doing this, slightly irrelevant but maybe useful info as to a historical reasoning...

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Yes sit, and in this case size matters as the 3/8-1/2 bar was pretty standard from at least the early Middle Ages forward. As to get it had to he fairly refined, secondly the standard shipping container of the day was the barrel.
And as peaple are old men are lithe to change, the masters would have expected "quality" iron to come ex's fly the way their master got got it.

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Ok, I think we can agree that today's metals are different from a few years back, so why are associations teaching to weld mild steel to mild steel to make tongs?
The easier faster idea does not make sense to me.
It seems that some think it is a goal to strive for to make the drop tong weld, and they choose tongs. Branches or any other application where you are welding the same material to another piece would seem to be a better approach to teaching people to do the drop tong weld.

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I think the most compelling reason to forge weld reins was the variables in the quality of WI. The jaws were forge from higher grade (more expensive) iron. The reins welded on were of lower ( cheaper ) grade.

 

When all you had was lower grade iron you would weld on smaller stock not to deal with the problems of it delaminating  while drawing out.

 

Why is it still done? Old ideas sometimes die a slow death and some people due to skill level or lack of power equipment still find it faster. There are many old techniques that are still used that don't make sense, just as there are new techniques that aren't practical if you don't no the old.

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As I recall the standard size bar used in making blister steel was 1" sq and a dozen feet long---I'll check when I get a chance to go though "Steelmaking before Bessemer; vol 1 Blister steel" (sitting on my shelf but my wife's in town and I'm not going to waste time looking it up!"

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It seems that some think it is a goal to strive for to make the drop tong weld, and they choose tongs. Branches or any other application where you are welding the same material to another piece would seem to be a better approach to teaching people to do the drop tong weld.


Brian - I believe this to be - so as for a student in a beginners class - to learn some forge welding skills along with forging to be able to go away from the day with a pare of usable tongs so they can forge more things - hence the learning steps to forge more as in the blacksmith makes their own tools deal. Welding the reins on is just one way to teach some welding skills for a usable item vs. purely decorative. I believe people walk away with more confidence after the class "AND" have another "TOOL" for their tool box.

I'm not saying that this is the "correct" method, but to me it makes sense as a confidence builder and so people get past the stigma of not being able to make their own tools, and not being hung up on not being able to forge weld. Yes - even though tongs can me made by forging only.
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Very simply, the reason for welding on reigns is that it is quicker to weld the bulkier stock of the bit to the long, relatively thin stock of the reins than to draw it out.

It is not that hard to understand. Or it shouldn't be, any way.

 

And it has nothing to do with wrought iron.

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Dan ,

                     Not trying to argue but.........".And it has nothing to do with wrought iron." I think it does. Maybe you have a better quality of WI generally available on your side of the pond. The quality here can and did very from stuff that forged like steel but much softer to the stuff that even at a snowball heat delaminated into a paint brush. The time required to draw reins out of material that would constantly becoming apart thus requiring welding over and over would be much more than the single weld required to jump on the reins.

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If you are worried about delaminating wrought iron, take a welding heat on the tip of your stock, and butt it against the side of your anvil. That should fuse the raggedy bits. I was taught that by a man who has forged more wrought iron than the two of us have had hot dinners combined.

Welding on reins is just a matter of efficiency.

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Ha! That's funny! I would be the very first to call "bulldust" to wrought iron being easier to weld.

I've heard it so many times. In my experience it's "old boy" bluster. Like you have to get W/I to a sparkling heat to weld it. Nonsense!

Laugh all you want, I watch it done every single day. 

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Well, I think this has probably been gone over before, and probably to death, but I think whether or not we can produce smiths who claim to have done a "formal apprenticeship", what I really want to see is the formal framework in which they did it. There is none.

 

If one does an "apprenticeship" in anything it just means training. The formal hoo-ey that had in Europe, the guilds, the "Wanderjahr" or "Tour de France" they did not have here. To be a "journeyman" in this country was to follow the work, not some kind of ritual observation.

I consider the 3 years I spent working for a working blacksmith from when I was 19-21 to be an apprenticeship and that I am still at it more than 30 years later tells me it was successful. 

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I consider the 3 years I spent working for a working blacksmith from when I was 19-21 to be an apprenticeship and that I am still at it more than 30 years later tells me it was successful. 

 

But not that it was formal, which is what was being discussed.

 

Laugh all you want, I watch it done every single day. 

 

You watch what done every single day? People talking "XXXXXXX

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If you want to see how common iron was in Colonial America you need only look at there trash. Archeologist have excavated all around James town, Williamsburg, York town and most other colonial towns up and down the coast. The trash from all these places it very easy to find becouse a huge amount was tossed in ditches close to homes, used up wells, and body's of water close by. The time of the trash can be dated very well becouse of the items and styles. Things like clothes that would only have a short life span then tossed away. And what do archeologist find in most every trash pit? Iron, lots and lots of iron. Broken iron items of all kinds, pad locks, door locks, window casements, saws, knives, full suits of armor ( yes armor, lots of it tossed down wells that became brackish, there was a great amount of the stuff from first colonization that was no longer used just 50 years later ), weapons, hinges with barrels snapped off, and lots more things. I am sure some people would take old items to be repaired, or sold as scrap iron. But a large number of people simply tossed broken iron items in the trash.

If iron was so highly valuable people would not be tossing so many iron objects in the trash.

And who do you think all these people were torching buildings all the time? You think a man pays a carpenter to build him a home lives there a year then burns down the home so he can build another home on the same spot? Makes a lot of sence. Any building that was still in usable shape could be sold along with the land if the person was moving away for a much higher price than a few burned up nails found in the ashes. Most building were maintained much better than American do today. If one fell in to terrible disrepair all the cut lumber that was still usable would be salvaged first. And the rest cleared away.

Talk with a fire fighter about how hot building fires get. The majority of things in them are burned up. Tiny nails would oxidize and flake apart. The little iron that could be collected would need to be bundled up and re welded into a billet then drawn down into bar and forged in to nails again. But the amount of iron collected would be hugely less than was first in a building.

No, I think a man makes ten thousand nails by hand, builds a house himself out of wood he hews from his own woodlot and when he abandons the property he burns down the house and takes the nails with him, since there will be NO iron where he is headed, and he worked very hard making all those nails. Your claim that hand forged nails disappear in a fire is simply not true. 

 

This is where I am from; Colonial Williamsburg is NOT the only authority on early american iron. 

 

http://www.nps.gov/sair/index.htm

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But not that it was formal, which is what was being discussed.

 

 

You watch what done every single day? People talking "XXXXXXXX

No, I work full time for a blacksmith that though 10 years younger than me, has more experience in certain areas of metalworking than I do, and vice versa.  He makes lots of things from mild steel, but thing which are very intricate or involved or difficult he makes exclusively from wrought iron. He has a good stock of salvaged wrought iron. He says it saves a lot of time on harder jobs. 

 

I can't say much more, without giving away his anonymity or my own, or his trade secrets, but I will say that I have known Thomas Powers for many many years and seldom seen him proven wrong, that when Doc makes a comment it is best to listen and learn, and the well known master I work for wouldn't waste his time were it not to his great benefit. 

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No, I work full time for a blacksmith that though 10 years younger than me, has more experience in certain areas of metalworking than I do, and vice versa.  He makes lots of things from mild steel, but thing which are very intricate or involved or difficult he makes exclusively from wrought iron. He has a good stock of salvaged wrought iron. He says it saves a lot of time on harder jobs. 

 

I can't say much more, without giving away his anonymity or my own, or his trade secrets, but I will say that I have known Thomas Powers for many many years and seldom seen him proven wrong, that when Doc makes a comment it is best to listen and learn, and the well known master I work for wouldn't waste his time were it not to his great benefit. 

 

 

I would imagine Thomas Powers and Doc can both speak for themselves.

As for your anonymous master and his trade secrets, if you can't say anything about them, why mention them?

 

Wrought iron is a peculiar beast, with it's own peculiar behaviours. There is nothing it can do, however, that wrought iron can't, except delaminate, and apart from the very, very worst quality wrought iron, delamination can be dealt with with a little care and know-how, and is not the reason for welding on the reins of tongs.

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Some people are much faster at forge welding others are faster at drawing out.  As long as they are done well I think both methods are valid.    When welding on reins I have skipped upsetting by just leaving extra material on the bits piece.  If you are careful  you can avoid thinning on the rein end .  

 

I recently did some tongs that after I finished I wondered if I would have been better off welding on the reins.  They did not want the reins any heavier than 7/16 apart from the first 8-10" which was rectangular  but no lighter than 3/8".   They were 68" long.  keeping them straight while so light was tricky.  I should have used a trick read on here I think form Neil Gustafson of having a pipe rest on the back side.   As it was I made the tongs 60" long and when I took the samples to the drop forge they wanted them 8" longer so I had to weld on rein extensions to the tongs I had already made but not yet assembled.  That flux I bought from you Brian made those welds easy. 

 

Now round or rectangular reins?

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I would imagine Thomas Powers and Doc can both speak for themselves.

As for your anonymous master and his trade secrets, if you can't say anything about them, why mention them?

 

Wrought iron is a peculiar beast, with it's own peculiar behaviours. There is nothing it can do, however, that wrought iron can't, except delaminate, and apart from the very, very worst quality wrought iron, delamination can be dealt with with a little care and know-how, and is not the reason for welding on the reins of tongs.

 

They did. They both agreed with me. 

 

I did say enough about my present master, he welds wrought iron every day and says it is easier to weld and to work than mild steel. 

 

I didn't say it was. I said it was easier for old time smiths to weld when when mild steel first became popular. 

 

Have a pleasant evening, I am retiring for the night. 

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I would still like an answer to what is the technique Brian uses to move metal as efficiently as he doe. On page 3 I posted"

The key seemed to be that a small section of the iron is pinched on anvils edge to get efficient movement of metal versus full flat hammer blows on the anvil flat face. I guess the rounding hammer is also key because it concentrates the force in a smaller area than traditional flat hammer.

Do I have it right?

Is this a correct description of the method?  As for tong reins, it is a free country.

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I would still like an answer to what is the technique Brian uses to move metal as efficiently as he doe. On page 3 I posted"

The key seemed to be that a small section of the iron is pinched on anvils edge to get efficient movement of metal versus full flat hammer blows on the anvil flat face. I guess the rounding hammer is also key because it concentrates the force in a smaller area than traditional flat hammer.

Do I have it right?

Is this a correct description of the method?  As for tong reins, it is a free country.

 

The technique that Brian, like all experienced smiths including myself and many others on this forum, uses to do initial drawing out is to use a radiused edge to draw out the workpiece. Sometimes the edge, sometimes the bick.

 

So yes, you have it right. There is no trick to it other than practice, though having seen Brian's video on youtube, I would suggest working the material at at least an orange heat, rather than work it through to a black heat. A black heat can be used for finishing.

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They did. They both agreed with me. 
 
I did say enough about my present master, he welds wrought iron every day and says it is easier to weld and to work than mild steel. 
 
I didn't say it was. I said it was easier for old time smiths to weld when when mild steel first became popular. 
 
Have a pleasant evening, I am retiring for the night.

 
I think you have gone from speaking for them, to putting words in their mouths. 
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