ryancrowe92 Posted October 31, 2017 Author Share Posted October 31, 2017 Shooing horses and a part time job maybe Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JHCC Posted October 31, 2017 Share Posted October 31, 2017 5 minutes ago, ryancrowe92 said: Shooing horses and a part time job maybe You do know that shoeing horses requires getting formal training, right? It's not just something you can learn from YouTube videos or Wikipedia. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryancrowe92 Posted October 31, 2017 Author Share Posted October 31, 2017 what does this prevent you from making the shoes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryancrowe92 Posted October 31, 2017 Author Share Posted October 31, 2017 anyway that was partially a joke really I'm just trying to make a living this place I live is full of people who have farms and who need help when the hay needs baling and stuff like that and I can make money off of blacksmithing. really its just making money. really I would love to just sit at home an blacksmith all day because I like working with hot metal but I cant well I could if I had enough business then I would consider opening up a shop. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charcold Posted October 31, 2017 Share Posted October 31, 2017 I wish you success, but i'd feel irresponsible if i didn't say your plan seems unformed and short sighted. If you're just blowing off teenage steam and not going to do some of these things I get that. But if you think dropping out of school to hopefully bail enough hay and find people who need blacksmithing work done is a good life plan you may be in for a very rude awakening. At the very least draw up some kind of business plan, research how to price items and figure out what items are demanded in your area. My guess is horseshoes are NOT one of them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JHCC Posted October 31, 2017 Share Posted October 31, 2017 What @Charcold said. 1 hour ago, ryancrowe92 said: does this prevent you from making the shoes Yes, it does. I'm no farrier, but nowadays most shoes are mass-produced and adjusted to fit by the farrier who actually shoes the horse. Anything that isn't a standard shoe (that is, that has to be custom made) is made by the farrier who puts it on, not by some third-party custom shop. If being a farrier is something that interests you, there are a number of threads on IFI that can point you in the right direction. We also have a number of members who are or have been professional farriers and have a LOT of information about the training, the work, etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charcold Posted October 31, 2017 Share Posted October 31, 2017 To add to that, I've researched farrier schools in my area and they seem both affordable and incredibly worth it. They not only cover basic smithing and farrier techniques but more importantly teach you the business side of it all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles R. Stevens Posted October 31, 2017 Share Posted October 31, 2017 First, learn to handle horses and how to train them to pick up there feet. Then learn about the anatomy of their legs and how to properly trim difrent hoof and body conformations... if working with steel as a living is your goal, learn to weld and/or be a machinist. Those are the dead dents of blacksmithing. They will keep you feed untile your clientele as a smith grows. Many smiths spot weld and use machine tools to work more effencently. And smithing can certainly make fabrication more effecent as well. You will get more mileage smithing learning to make spurs, bits and barn/gate hardware. The horse/country decor items that are horse shoes (use new, sorceing and cleaning used in a simi commercial scale is a PITA) Many "horse shoe" items only need to have a fullerd grove and punched nail holes. Horse shoe nailes are rectangular and don't hold unless clinched, so punch square and hand forge nails did such things as horse shoe gate hinges Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted October 31, 2017 Share Posted October 31, 2017 Subsistence; can work very well (A Country Boy Can Survive!)---until there is a problem---you have an auto accident, a tree falls on the house, etc. The average length of a career as a farrier is quite short due mainly to injuries---a messed up back will interfere with a LOT of your possible jobs. My family fought tooth and nail for several generations not to be subsistence farmers and both my Dad and I have needed the insurance provided by good jobs due to unexpected health issues, me in my 40's and he in his 50's. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryancrowe92 Posted November 1, 2017 Author Share Posted November 1, 2017 16 hours ago, ThomasPowers said: Subsistence; can work very well (A Country Boy Can Survive!) Yes we can survive we can fid a way but to all of you like my dad said if you get a job shoveling manure do a good job on it. Any way back to black smithing I didn't get the pics cause I was helping my uncle in law get a generator in the shop. So pics will be up today meanwhile I am going to research diebeties for anatomy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HammerMonkey Posted November 1, 2017 Share Posted November 1, 2017 I dropped out of HS and eventually got my GED. Then later in life, after my military service was complete, I worked my butt off to battle back and make up for the mistake of dropping out. I eventually saved enough to go to college and get my Bachelors degree (going to school with a full credit load for 4 + years while working full time was not easy). I graduated from college with a 4.0 GPA, so clearly, I am not stupid, but I now know that dropping out was the most stupid thing I could have done... Now I have a great job where I've worked for nearly 30 years, and plan to retire next spring at age 58. But the truth is, life would have been so much easier if I had just gritted it out and finished HS. Like someone else said in an earlier post. Employers don't care if you had bad teachers, or bad school experiences. They only place value the yes or no answer on the job application. "Did you graduate?". When it comes to finding a good job, a GED is not the equivalent to graduating. I know you think you've got it all figured out, but you would do well to listen to the voices of experience here. Good luck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryancrowe92 Posted November 2, 2017 Author Share Posted November 2, 2017 Ok off the school topic. Here is a rundown of what I am doing tomorrow Go to school Go to the welding shop. Go pick my brother up. Go to tractor supply. Go to Lowe's Go to harbor freight. Do some work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryancrowe92 Posted November 3, 2017 Author Share Posted November 3, 2017 anybody still here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tubalcain2 Posted November 3, 2017 Share Posted November 3, 2017 Is that a question? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jeremy k Posted November 3, 2017 Share Posted November 3, 2017 It is not necessary to post your daily schedule, and keep in mind not everyone on this forum checks or has access to their/a computer frequently. Sometimes threads go a few days without a reply, depending on ppls own schedules. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted November 3, 2017 Share Posted November 3, 2017 No, "To be or not to be, that is the question!" Back when I was getting my CIS degree I was working a 60 hour week, going to college classes, doing Comp Sci homework, maintaining a 100 year old house, raising two young kids and keeping a marriage alive. Work was 20 miles away, school 25 miles, luckily I could wait with the kids for the school bus on my way to work... When I was working in the oil patch, I had a 3 hour commute to the well and would work a 12 hour tour and 3 hours back 7 days a week---why I bought an old phone company van and rigged it up to camp out near work... Lots of us here have had/have overloaded schedules; welcome to the club! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
olfart Posted November 3, 2017 Share Posted November 3, 2017 Like many kids, I suffered from the "get outa school" syndrome (we had a saying; "In God we trust, in school we rust"). After 3 years of high school ROTC, I was convinced the Army could teach me whatever they needed me to know. My dad suggested going to a newfangled computer school (in 1959, that was a radical suggestion). If I had listened to him I might have been where Bill Gates is now. But no, my mind was made up. US Army was going to teach me to fly helicopters, no college required. I had that in writing after taking the entry tests. Then in basic training they told me helicopter flight school was closed until further notice, so I needed to make another choice. I chose radio communications. That was my first introduction to "No battle plan survives first contact". There I sat in a 3 year enlistment with no flight school, learning to operate radioteletype. Two good things came of that; I had to learn typing and International Morse Code in the process. I still use them to this day. As for the rest of my career, I worked my way through a few dead-end jobs doing what I had to rather than what I wanted to do. College or computer school would have opened many more doors for me. The decisions I made in high school were flawed, and they impacted the rest of my life. Think about that before you jump off the deep end. Now to round this out and bring blacksmithing into it, I was 74 years old before I started blacksmithing. Now it is my primary hobby. I'm not good enough at it to make a living, but I enjoy making things for friends and family. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryancrowe92 Posted November 6, 2017 Author Share Posted November 6, 2017 Ok Bad News everybody this thread is going to stay open a little longer. Ok so here's what went down this weekend. Well I didn't get the coal this week it will be around this Friday or Saturday when it will be in. well I went to pick my brother up Friday afterschool I had to go to the welding shop I bought a special wrench for welding, a few hose fittings and the tank of oxygen so the torch is now back in action. After that I picked my brother up and we stop by Lowe's for some wire and then I headed to harbor freight and I bought another welding helmet for my brother to use when he's over, I got a reciprocating saw and it was a good $20 well spent I bought a new heat gun that I'm gonna take back and replace because I melted it again I need a good air source that isn't overpowered and I got some vise grips. now for the big bad news The forge needs work to be done the pipe I got, got red hot from being in the fire before melting the heat gun does anybody have a way to keep things from going back thru the pipe If I make it a vertical shaft because the pipe is a little to big. but there is good news I got one good heat on the rebar and was able to shape it a little more but it still bends but I think I can fix that In the vise or on the horn of the anvil when I go to shape the thing. so with that out of the way I'm gonna say I got to do some work outside today and clean out the forge and find a new air source that wont melt. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
olfart Posted November 6, 2017 Share Posted November 6, 2017 If you use a heat gun as an air source, you're wasting electricity. A plain, cheap hair dryer will put out plenty of air, and you can bypass the heating element to run even cheaper. Feeding the fire with 1,000 degree air from a heat gun may be part of the problem with your air inlet pipe getting hot. Also, the pipe should not be exposed to the fire, it should be surrounded by the dirt /clay to shield it from the heat. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles R. Stevens Posted November 7, 2017 Share Posted November 7, 2017 Ditto, ditch the heat gun, infact the hair drier will be to much air (and noisy) honestly it's hard to beat that $10 double action bed/raft inflator. Some newer microwave ovens have squilfans that are quiet, pancake fans from computers (some squirrel cages exist) quest bathroom fans work very well... little brother some times... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jasent Posted November 7, 2017 Share Posted November 7, 2017 This is my set up for the char coal forge Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Cochran Posted November 8, 2017 Share Posted November 8, 2017 I like that idea, Jasent. Never seen anything quite like it but it looks like it could be a very good use of a couple dollars worth of parts. I might have to try that one on my next solid fuel forge build. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jasent Posted November 8, 2017 Share Posted November 8, 2017 I had to cut half the brim off the lid so it could be swung open but it works very well for me Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryancrowe92 Posted November 9, 2017 Author Share Posted November 9, 2017 ok question my metal pipe is also getting hot, now its hot enough to melt the gun and I'm going to bypass the heating element in the thing and I cant use my grandma's hair dryer that's why I bought the heat gun and I have another one that I'm reverse engineering to take out the heat element. now hopefully I can pick up my coal this week by Saturday at the latest I still don't know yet, I got to check my cash too. now some time I promise to put up pictures but I just keep forgetting. so have a good Thursday Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryancrowe92 Posted November 13, 2017 Author Share Posted November 13, 2017 Good Monday morning everyone well I finally found out when the coal is coming about Tuesday or Wednesday but I won't be able to pick it up until Friday. Spent a little too much money on harbor freight and Lowes but not too much I'm out about $20 But I'm going to build the brake rotor forge because I think I can do it for free just need the rotor and some pipe which I can find. Giving the other one to my brother I think I know what was wrong with the forge I built it's a side shaft and i think it's not getting heat because the pipe is directly in the fire heating up and melting the gun. With that out of the way I found out where to get the metal at for making stuff and welding at tsc but they don't have an assortment of steel like o1 or 1045. Well have a good day Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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