Beco Posted July 8, 2015 Share Posted July 8, 2015 Good evening everyone my name is Tom and I am starting to learn blacksmithing. I am ex Army heavy wheeled mechanic turned computer tech I live in the Northern Virginia area with my loving wife who supports me learning this great trade. I have so much to learn I have been reading much and watching videos on so much stuff I guess a little overload because I want to learn. I have always been a tinkerer got in trouble a lot when I was a kid took too many things apart but was unsuccessful in putting back together, but I have come a long way from that little kid braking stuff. So that is a little about me if anyone is in my area and would like to let me pick your brain for info please feel free to let me know. Anything anyone has to point me in the right direction please feel free I am getting my first STAR anvil this weekend thanks to the people on here I now know what the anvil was from posting pics and got some good info.So hope to chat more I have so many questions and I am not good at spelling or grammar so sorry ahead of time. Tom Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles R. Stevens Posted July 8, 2015 Share Posted July 8, 2015 Welcome abord, Tom. Wore a pickle suit in the mid 80's. Thanks for serving. As to spelling and grammer? You cann't be worse than I. And you will find that some of the old guys around here are "herd bits" as Thomas Powers put it. So bashing hot steel must be good theropy. Myself it is a mater of resisting the temptation of sticking the dang thing in the forge, bringing it to heat and making somthing I can use out of it (computers that is) rather fix trucks, beter yet shoe horses! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beco Posted July 9, 2015 Author Share Posted July 9, 2015 Thank you Charles for the warm welcome I love working on cars and trucks or just about anything to be honest. So I know how you feel and I did some shoeing of horses when I was stations in OK in Fort Sill I worked on a cattle ranch on the weekends and learned some stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted July 9, 2015 Share Posted July 9, 2015 Welcome aboard Tom, glad to have you. Thanks for serving.We're blacksmiths not English Majors! . . . Uh . . . No, not British officers that is. You have a couple semesters worth of reading here if you skim the topics that interest you. Do you have a type of blacksmithing in mind? I'm pretty sure most of us were in the dog house for taking things apart no man can repair as youngsters. Dad once told me he kept all the things I'd destroyed and was going to make me take them with when I moved out. . . So I stayed a couple more years till I could sneak out. Welcome to the addiction.Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beco Posted July 9, 2015 Author Share Posted July 9, 2015 Thanks frosty I think I want to make good knives. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted July 9, 2015 Share Posted July 9, 2015 Thanks frosty I think I want to make good knives.I think that's better than wanting to make bad ones. It's a good target but I'd like to recommend you learn blacksmithing before you spend the time effort and material money learning to forge knives. The blacksmith's craft is a series of basic skills, the most complex projects are built up of pieces made with these skills in the correct sequence.The forging in bladesmithing isn't much different than forging long leaves from material a little harder to move and finickier until you get to heat treatment. A guy can invest a lot of time and effort in a blade and have it fail in the last stages. If that's how a person is trying to learn forging then it becomes a long hard road.One of the good parts about learning blacksmithing first is you soon discover all the people around you who really need one gizmo for their knick knack shelf or the wife's birthday, etc. garden tools, arbors, brackets, hinges, etc. etc. You not only learn the craft but people WANT to give you money to practice! Once you have a handle on smithing making knives is just applying the craft to different material and learning one or two more things.Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted July 9, 2015 Share Posted July 9, 2015 Last time I was in Manassas they were bulldozing an old farm for another subdivision and there was a whole fence row of high carbon and real wrought iron stock getting destroyed and scrapped---old farm implements and some of them definitely over 100 years. Been too long to still be there though. I don't get out to visit my sister often as she comes down here to visit our parents and my family. Her husband is an ex Army Captain and now a bit herder.Good to have another Tom around if if you do cut it short!Thomas Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted July 9, 2015 Share Posted July 9, 2015 (edited) Beco, Buy Steve Sells knifemaking book, Introduction to Knifemaking, in hardcover or paperback available in the IForgeIron store."Introduction to Knifemaking" A 6 x 9 inch format soft bound book, with 209 pages and over 100 black and white illustrations and photo's. Pack a lunch and a cold drink and read what interests you on the site. Lots of information on many subjects. Edited July 9, 2015 by Glenn Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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