hello

[mlinn77]

Hi my name is Mark, just wanted to introduce myself. My brother and myself are both smithing rookies we are in the process of setting up a shop while I'm recovering from carpel tunnel surgery and we are gathering as much information as possible I also like to carve and want to make my own tools my brother wants to make everything, we recently just picked up a few anvils, I have a collector bug as well, we got a 145 and 200 lbs Wright and 125 hay budden, anvils seem to be in demand in Charlotte NC so I jumped on the ones we found. 

[Frosty]

Welcome aboard Mark, glad to have you. Nice spread of anvils you have there, they all look to have a few generations of good use in them. Nice scores.

 Don't get caught up in trying to accumulate or learn everything, lighting a fire and starting the process is how you learn the craft. A lot of what you read won't really make sense at the gut level till you have some experience to explain it to your gut. The most complex demanding project is nothing but basic processes applied in the right order. Learning how to sequence projects will come after you learn the basics.

Frosty

[ThomasPowers]

"The Complete Modern Blacksmith" Weygers has a section on making carving chisels to his design---he was a noted carver himself! (as well as Smith, Inventor, Author,...polymath)

[mlinn77]

Nice, I just got that book on Google play,  the Smith I bought my anvils from was really nicenice and gave me a crash course of blacksmithing 101 helped me a lot. I have about a month till my wrist are healed them I can start banging away, till then I'll be reading and collecting free stuff to practice on, hammers, files leaf springs etc...