How did you get started in blacksmithing?

[hdwarner]

i am a machinist by trade and my neighbor is Peter Renzetti , although i wasn't directly
inspired by mr. Renzetti ,my mentor and probally by far the best metal worker and
woodworker i have ever seen . Steven C. {don't know if he would appreciate his name in print} was very attracted to mr Renzetti's skill and ability then i started to recognize
the beauty in forging in an artistic form.
to be short and sweet so used to making from a drawing that an engineer generated.
i thought i would like to see if i had any artistic ability.
what a huge transition from machining to forging . it is tough to let go of
my disipline of machining to forging , i see everything symetrical and in decimal form.
that my work as a novice blacksmith is always polluted by this .
i am addicted to blacksmithing now .
been a machinist now going on 28 years {only about twenty as a journyman}
and i would love to semi retire and whittle out a couple bucks here and there behind
anvil
chuck

[Frosty]

Chuck:

I know exactly what you mean by transitioning from a machinist to a blacksmith. Father was a metalspinner and machinist and I grew up in his shop. He didn't understand why I wanted to eyeball a design and mash it out of hot steel when I could machine one to a couple ten thousandths.

Dad did everything like it was going on a moon shot. Dad has parts he made on the moon and in deep space, some have officially left the solar system. Still, there's no good reason to build a garage or kitchen cabinet that way eh? :cool:

I've been away from home for more than 35 years and still tend to build to ridiculously tight tolerances.

Frosty

[Mende]

Skinned, with an anvil?

I guess that after the anvil is hot enough just rubbing one's skin against it would make the skin stick ..and thus .. with time and a lot of sadism . .a sick person could skin a whole man alive.:D

[Frosty]

I guess that after the anvil is hot enough just rubbing one's skin against it would make the skin stick ..and thus .. with time and a lot of sadism . .a sick person could skin a whole man alive.

I suppose you could do it that way but hot enough to get skin to stick properly comes awful close to damaging the heat treat on the anvil. I don't think a responsible smith would do something that evil!

I believe the proper method is to poke the horn under the customer's skin, then slide it along under the skin to remove it. Small areas like fingers, toes and such are simply tapped a couple times with the anvil and the skin will slip right off.

But. . . Even THINKING of heating an anvil that hot! Talk about a sick person!

Frosty

[Jim-Iowa]

WEll, I have to admit I'm just getting started. There is that charcoal forge in the corner of the garage I need to get finished ( the catlitter and Silica Sand refactory clay cracked but I can patch that).
But I blame it all on my daddy! He grew up on a farm during the depression and if you can't do it yourself it don't get done. He's one of those agravating people who can do anything well. Seemd like anything my 6 brothers and I wanted to do he had one pat answer " Theres the torch and the welder and a pile of scrap,MAKE IT WORK!". There was the Hemi in a 5 7 Merc, A 59 plymoth motor in a 51 Desoto Club Coupe, A 17 ft backhoe on a Massy 55(if you put enough steel on the front it will hold the front wheels down and if you put a Caterpillar hydralic pump on it will run the hoe That was one ugly beast that did a lot of work, Did I mention I was alergic to shovels and spades?) There were some failures along the way, but that was just a lesson in what did not work so we were smarter the next time. So while Traditional Blacksmithing is new, I'm gonna make it work.

[hdwarner]

hey frosty
not only is a person sick for heating an anvil that hot i am pretty sure it is against the
law ,
if you check the legislation in around circa 1825 to 1840 it was a law that was put into place. {article 159 section b } i think it reads" no one shall in any way misuse or abuse
a metalworking anvil in any way to sacrifice it's usefullness as a tool for the betterment of the united states of america." etc etc.
on record it has only been enforced twice .
have no reservation though as long as you skin someone with the anvil cold you should not breach the letter of the law
word of advise make incition behind neck and roll the head UNDER the horn so as not to damage the anvil face with the rock head you are skinning
c.

[Mende]

You know .. I'm considered to be a real sick puppy by my friends. .. but I see I've been outdone. ..

( what about it you use a wrought iron or ASO for the job? would that be ok? )

[FredlyFX]

I spent all my school years in mostly shop classes. Wood shop, metal shop, welding and small engine repair. This gave me a great background. About 10 years ago a friend got me into doing medieval re-creation stuff. We were doing live steel fighting. I couldn't afford armor, so I started making my own from leather and steel. I also had to repair the cheap swords which is all I could afford. I ended up being the group blacksmith, and ended up being more into the smithing than the fighting. I have sold all my armor to buy blacksmithing equipment over the years, and hardly ever do faire any more. I just want to be in my forge tinkering & creating.

[Frosty]

You know .. I'm considered to be a real sick puppy by my friends. .. but I see I've been outdone. ..

( what about it you use a wrought iron or ASO for the job? would that be ok? )

Does the wrought iron anvil have a steel face? Hmmmm? I certainly couldn't endorse it's use as a hot skinner if it had a steel face.

ASO? (Adequate as a Skinner Only?)

Sick puppy? I think your friends need to get out more.

Frosty

[Blacksmith Jim]

I got started blacksmithing after working on a project I decided I wanted to do. I had been to Burning Man a few times, and saw how well the large geodesic domes work out in the desert. So I decided I would build one. I bought a about 200$ of thin wall conduit and started cutting it to length. However I wasn't sure the best way to flatten the ends, and I didn't have a drill press to drill the holes. I know a friend of mine worked as a professional blacksmith, so I called him up. He said he hosts an open shop every week for his friends / acquiescences / etc., so just bring my project on by. He and some of the other regulars really helped me out. They got me set up smashing the ends of my conduit in an arbor press, and helped me weld up a jig for getting the holes aligned right under the drill press. It was great. I spent about a winter working on it. In the end I ended up with a 16' tall geodesic dome. It worked great. While I was working on the project, everyone else was forging. He has about 3 or 4 anvils and several forges, so there was usually a crowd working. When I finished my dome, I just kept showing up Now its been over a year (maybe going on two years now?) and I'm surely hooked...

[KevinD]

In the end I ended up with a 16' tall geodesic dome.

Got pics? :)

[pete46]

It is worse than any drug.

AND IT'S STILL LEGAL ;FOR NOW.:)

[Johannes]

Well guys to be honest I consider myself to be a novice smith,..
My grandfather was a son of a 3th generation farrier and all around black smith, he learned the trade helping his father, but after the war he went to study electro mechanics, and never worked as a blacksmith professionally, but he did do allot of things for himself and family, just using a railroad track and a blow torch and an arch welder. When i (his only grandson was young he taught me allot of thing about electronics, metal working, masonry, would working and a bit of general life's lessons, I had always had an interest in blacksmithing, and he promised me to teach me once he he retired, so we could build or own little shop together, the year before his retirement he got cancer, and was gone withing 6 months.. I grew up living a fair part of my youth with my grandparents (man and dad where still building their house, which took way to long, because grandpa did almost everything his self and on his own), not a day passes that I don't think about him and miss him like xxxx...
When I was 17 I caught interest in blacksmithing again, I did allot of reading on the net, bought a bunch of books and make me a small fire with a piece of plate and some fire bricks I had laying around. I wanted to take classes in it but my parents didn't approve of it because it would hold no financial future for me, I insisted, an did some workshop's here and there. Soon after I went to university, I chose to study Product design, because I would tech me allot about design, shaping, materials, techniques, industry, and commerce.. I wanted to be the best smith I could.
I studied 5 years and got my masters, and did an extra year in presentation techniques and got a teaching degree. But blacksmithing kind of got to the back ground (no time no money and to much hot girls and design party's). After a graduated I got back into it, read more and stared to do some simple thing on my piece of railroad, now 2 years later, I'm build my own smithy with a big masonry forge and I'm looking to by a big anvil. I'm also taking a 2 year part time class for a degree a a farrier, and taking lessons in artistic smithing, I have made a little bit of a name for my self as a wood subculture, and now want to try to combine sculpturing and blacksmithing... where it goes.. I plan to make smithing (a lot of farrier work, because it pays better, and we don not have enough of them around here) my full time profession within 6 years, so I can quit my day jobs as art history teacher and as product designer.
I hope smithing will be a part of the rest of my life, and I hope I meet allot of people to learn from, because I need to learn allot!, and that's a never ending process.

[GNJC]

I wanted some tools for green-woodworking and also some old-style fireside cooking equipment; the availability of these things was not good and the prices for them, if they could be found, were crazy. I'd worked with precious metals as a hobby before, so had a feeling for metal. I'm now far more interested in ironwork than anything else.

[TASMITH]

I am one of the Lucky few who actually got a Blacksmith apprenticeship. I had gotten a Job at Algoma Steel (now Essar) in Sault Ste Marie Ont.,Canada. I was working in the steel mill as a Millwright Helper when the opportunity came up for the apprenticeship. There were several offered and after writing a mechanical aptitude test I was offered my choice. As Blacksmith was one of them and I had an opportunity to see the shop in operation before hand I decided to take that one. It was a perfect fit for me as I have an insatiable appetite for learning new and different things.

After 7.280 hrs of work, three years of night school, taking courses in Math, Metrics,Mechanics (math form), Blueprint reading, Fabrication, Welding and Burning, Layout and Metallurgy,and a furthter 2,500 hrs experience I got my Ticket. I was fortunate to be able to work with 5 other Blacksmiths and learn a variety of different techniques from men with years of experience. We had four hammers in the shop for forging. One was a self-contained 200# air hammer and the other three were Steam hammers run by men called Hammer Drivers. The steam hammers were 1,000 ,1500 and 3,000 pound hammers.

Each Blacksmith had a helper and the one on the biggest hammer had 2 helpers. We used large gas furnaces (forges) for most of the work but we also had two coke fired forges that we used for welding. We used to make hooks and chain links and used to weld the chain links after assembly with the hooks and chain using the coke fires. we made an endless variety of tools and things that were used all over ythe steel plant. Many of the items we made would have someone scrathing their heads in trying to figure out what the heck it was and what it was used for if it was found outside the plant. a lot of what we did there would be stories in themselves so I won't go into detail here.

Due to some economic problems I was laid off for an extended period and left the Sault to work at another plant in Gananoque Ont. This plant was a drop forging operation that produced auto parts on several drop forge hammers using closed dies and two large forging presses. i was hired as a Blacksmith for this operation and one of my primary jobs was to forge the tongs used by the operators on the hammers and presses.Each of the hammers had a four man crew. Three that did the forging and hot trimming and one who fed the hot billets to the operators from the furnaces. It was my responsibility to make all the tongs (heating, forging, and trimming) for the operation.Each hammer man(as the forgers were called) kept a pair of tongs that they used themselves. There were Six hammers and two forging presses. These were run on a three shift operation and there was always at least two hammers and on press in operation at all times and up to four hammers and two presses going at one time, and also overtime when extras may be run. Because I only worked the day shift I had to ensure that there were always spare tongs available for the back shifts. Needless to say this involved a great many pairs of tongs in circulation at all times.

I would make an average of thirty to forty pair of new tongs per week, plus repairs to tongs that would be pinched in between the dies during the week as well. This could amount to another 15 to 20 repairs a week as well or more. I also made a lot of the hand hammers. copper hammers, punches, pry bars and numerous other tools used by the maintenance, tool room, and set-up men. In addition I did all the heat treating fo the hot trimmers and cold trimmers, coining dies and other tooling for the operation as well as any tools I made. Because I was the only Blacksmith it was also up to me to design and figure out how to make special tools to do different jobs and set-ups. Quite challenging at times and always interesting.

After 22 years at this plant (and about40,000+) pairs of tongs the plant closed down. I am now retired and work out of my little Smithy here at home. Even though I worked for almost thirty years at the trade I am still as enthusiastic as ever with it. I now thoroughly enjoy reading this forum and offering my own little tidbits of information and I will continue to work at it until this old body of mine finally says enough already!

Terry

[unkle spike]

I think I started 6 years ago after finding out that 4 generations had proceeded me as blacksmith/metal workers. I built a brake drum forge propped on cinder blocks and mad a pair of tongs, now I have altered a shed at the house for a shop, and am in the process of building an Appalachian style hammer. I remember my first guild meeting where I was taught to make a nail or drive hook for hammer control and experience. They thought I had made them before because I already had hammer control, I guess I inherited it. Smithing is a hobby that is easy to get hooked on, and I have spent countless hours in my shop, in extreme heat in the summer, enjoying every minute of it. Last year I started volunteering at a local museum, and really love showing the craft to others, if only 10 minutes at a time. I came to Iforge somewhat later in my blacksmithing, and only wish I had found it sooner, to guide me in my start up.

[Woody]

I fell and hit my head, when I woke up 30 years later I was the Safety Manager for a trucking company. That ceased to be fun so I took the same hammer I had been using to hit myself on the head and started making knives with it. ;)

[yesteryearforge]

Im still waiting to get started
One day I will get fired up and do something about this blacksmithing affliction that ive aquired.
There are a few of us still around that got started before the internet and PCs were readily available.
Was much harder to aquire information and or misinformation back then.

Mike Tanner

[Dodge]

I am one of the Lucky few who actually got a Blacksmith apprenticeship. I had gotten a Job at Algoma Steel (now Essar) in Sault Ste Marie Ont.,Canada.......

Terry

Dang! Sounds like quite an exciting and satisfying career, Terry. I worked in a steel power transmission and light pole manufacturing plant for 20+ years. I wasn't a blacksmith but even as a welder I understand the need for specialized tooling. Good to have your expertise aboard!

Scott

[IronPuppet]

my dad took a job in Barkerville Historic Park. That was 1963, I was 5 years old. We went there every summer for the next 18 years. By the time I was 7 I use to hang around the black smith shop on the main street. The smith was an older gentleman called George. he had such a thick German accent you could hardly understand him. He made amazing things out of iron. What springs to mind and I never have trouble thinking of, is a mushroom about 10 inches high with a butterfly lighting on it. He was an artist. He use to let me hang around and help in small ways and ask questions.

When I was 21 I built my own forge out of a wheel rim. My friend was rebuilding a model A Ford and I knew how to set up a forge and we heated up the axles to set the caster and camber. Plus we did some riveting with red hot rivets on the frame. I was fooling around with lost wax casting at the time as well. Learning learning.

Then I didn't smith again untill about three years ago when I found this site and got all enthused again.

So that's my story.

Christopher

[myloh67]

14 years back on holiday in west coast of ireland. Realized short courses in smithing at a heritage centre in Mayo, advertise in a national paper. The teacher was Gerald Muller a german smith who had been living in Ireland at that point for a quarter century. A Very inspiring man and passionate about the craft. He later co founded a school for smithing in the county at Bellmullet. I liked that guy, he moved back to germany since. I hope to meet him again down the line.

[Fe-Wood]

I got suckered into smithing while I was in art school. I was in the Sculpture department casting bronze and aluminum. One day while talking to the tech. in his office (more like the tool room) I noticed a full set of hardies and matching swages. ??what are those for?? Oh, blacksmithing he said... really!!
Ya, we have a few anvils and a forge too... and nobody knows how to use them, so nobody does! Can I try? Sure, help yourself. Its amazing how fast a smoking forge can draw a crowd!!!
That was in 1992. I worked at it real hard for about 3 years, started to make a living at it too, then life threw me a curve ball. Now, 2009 I've finally come back to it in earnest. Not sure were it or the other trades I practice will take me but I sure have enjoyed the ride so far...

[divermike]

In high school in Sonora Ca. you had a choice of auto or metal shop. I took metal shop and had a chance to do some smithing, this was in 1977. The instructor said I had a knack and I should pursue it. Well 28 years of life got in the way, and one day in 2004 I was reading a book by Gordon Dickson called "Wolf and Iron". Got me to thinking of Blacksmithing, then by coincidence (sic) I read "The Skystone" by Jack Whyte, another interesting book with blacksmithing as a core element. Shortly after that I moved to western NY, took a year and a half off, and just played a lot. Set up a forge and just experimented. After finding the New York State Designer Blacksmith group, well the rest is history, until I stumbled across this site, exponential leap of abilities, thanks to all of you guys.

Edited March 13, 2009 by divermike
spelling error

[brianbrazealblacksmith]

I got started my first day of horseshoeing school making shoes back in 1982. I've been forging ever since.

[double_edge2]

i did a basic stick weld course and then asked someone about heat for bending some rod to make a candle holder......he said make a forge....then the internet, practice, and just "having a go" did the rest.