jlpservicesinc Posted April 30, 2018 Share Posted April 30, 2018 There is a CT group and a RI group.. both groups do dinners hammer ins and such.. There is information in the neb news group and news letter.. Where in CT are you? General location is fine if you are shy.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Judson Yaggy Posted May 11, 2018 Author Share Posted May 11, 2018 Online registration for the spring meet is now available. http://www.newenglandblacksmiths.org/2018/03/2018-spring-meet/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seldom (dick renker) Posted May 13, 2018 Share Posted May 13, 2018 Scoot, Thanks for the kind words. It was the first one we have had but not the last. Conversations already working around for next year. JPL, Was listed in up coming events on IFI. Also had it list on this site as well but didn't last long. Apparently cant double list. Oh well. We will give plenty of notice for the next one Seldom (Dick Renker) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted May 13, 2018 Share Posted May 13, 2018 Reason double listings are edited is so folks can follow all information in ONE place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlpservicesinc Posted May 13, 2018 Share Posted May 13, 2018 24 minutes ago, seldom (dick renker) said: JPL, Was listed in up coming events on IFI. Also had it list on this site as well but didn't last long. Apparently cant double list. Oh well. We will give plenty of notice for the next one Hello Dick, Yup got it. Thanks.. I'll be one of the forge masters this meet with the task or making shovels and side pokers (side rakes).. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mberghorn Posted May 20, 2018 Share Posted May 20, 2018 On 4/30/2018 at 3:23 PM, JHCC said: Where in CT? Your profile still says MD. I'm working in Stratford at the Sikorsky factory but I don't have a home up here yet. I'm still trying to sell my house in MD so I don't have an address up here to change it to. On 4/30/2018 at 4:04 PM, jlpservicesinc said: There is a CT group and a RI group.. both groups do dinners hammer ins and such.. There is information in the neb news group and news letter.. Where in CT are you? General location is fine if you are shy.. I went on the NEB website and I'm going through all the great stuff on there now. I had two large medical expenses for my two youngest kids recently so I'm not sure if I'll be able to make the meet but I'm definitely going to try. In the meantime I brought my gas forge (much more portable than my coal forge), my anvil and a few hammers up here and I'm storing it at a co-workers house right now. His girlfriend recently had a baby so he's been busy with that and I don't have ready access to my stuff any more. Congrats and all that and I'm happy for them but it sucks having so much spare time and not being able to get any smithing done. On that note, anyone know of any covered shop space I can use or better yet someone that I can learn from? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glenn Posted May 20, 2018 Share Posted May 20, 2018 Put the basic forge kit into the trunk of your car, anvil, blower, a bit of fuel, hammer, tongs, etc. A 5 gallon bucket should hold most of the tools you will need. Your not building massive projects, just playing in the fire. Think mobile. You do not have to carry around a 500 pound anvil when a 75-100 pound will do. You may get some ideas from the make do anvils and forges threads, or look into a mobile Calvary forge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlpservicesinc Posted May 20, 2018 Share Posted May 20, 2018 On 5/20/2018 at 4:15 AM, Mberghorn said: In the meantime I brought my gas forge (much more portable than my coal forge), my anvil and a few hammers up here and I'm storing it at a co-workers house right now. His girlfriend recently had a baby so he's been busy with that and I don't have ready access to my stuff any more. Congrats and all that and I'm happy for them but it sucks having so much spare time and not being able to get any smithing done. On that note, anyone know of any covered shop space I can use or better yet someone that I can learn from? Well as pointed out there are both RI, CT group's and both have regular get togethers.. Im planning on getting the teaching facility up this summer but whos to say when the doors will open as im coming into my busy season and who knows how far ill get with building the forges and such.. What is your experience level? What is it you need/want to learn.. i might be able to offer some assistance.. Im about 2hrs from you.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mberghorn Posted May 21, 2018 Share Posted May 21, 2018 Do I get in touch with those groups through the neb page or through here? I'm just starting out. I've done about three and a half years of research, built three forges (two gas and one solid fuel), and I've only made a hand full of small things but nothing major. I've been experimenting with different ways of making tongs lately but I only get to fire up the forge once a month at best. I would like to learn anything that someone is willing to teach me. Experience is better than book-smarts and I'm a hands on learner anyways. If you'd be willing I could venture your way on the weekends that we don't work :-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mberghorn Posted May 21, 2018 Share Posted May 21, 2018 17 hours ago, Glenn said: Put the basic forge kit into the trunk of your car, anvil, blower, a bit of fuel, hammer, tongs, etc. A 5 gallon bucket should hold most of the tools you will need. Your not building massive projects, just playing in the fire. Think mobile. You do not have to carry around a 500 pound anvil when a 75-100 pound will do. You may get some ideas from the make do anvils and forges threads, or look into a mobile Calvary forge. I've got the tools that I need but I don't have a place to smith. I built a camper in the back of my truck and I park at Walmart so I think they might get upset if I started hammering away by the loading dock, lol. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlpservicesinc Posted May 21, 2018 Share Posted May 21, 2018 On 5/21/2018 at 2:36 AM, Mberghorn said: Do I get in touch with those groups through the neb page or through here? there are archives on the NEB page with contact info.. There is also ABANA with a groups listing.. I"m not involved with either group but they do go on the NEB online group and post content.. There is a list group on yahoo i think.. I'm not an expert with the group as I'm pretty new myself.. You might want to post a thread looking for contact information for both groups on this IFI NEB section.. or look for the group on the NEB site.. Weekends are out.. as I am already engaged and once June hits, I'm doing demos every weekend and also going to the ABANA conference.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mberghorn Posted May 22, 2018 Share Posted May 22, 2018 On 5/21/2018 at 5:19 AM, jlpservicesinc said: there are archives on the NEB page with contact info.. Awesome, thanks for the info!! Two hours each way is a little far for me to drive during the week. Still, I really appreciate the offer just the same! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlpservicesinc Posted May 23, 2018 Share Posted May 23, 2018 neblist@yahoogroups.com Is the yahoo group.. i believe its a closed group.. but there is information on it for ct and ri.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lou L Posted May 23, 2018 Share Posted May 23, 2018 On 5/22/2018 at 3:31 AM, Mberghorn said: Awesome, thanks for the info!! Two hours each way is a little far for me to drive during the week. Still, I really appreciate the offer just the same! The CT Blacksmiths Guild is back alive. The president is Mace Vitale whom teaches classes at the Guilford Arts Center. We have meets every two months. The next one is in the second week of June at the Guilford Arts Center...IIRC. To get connected email ctblacksmithsguild@gmail.com and ask to be added to the email list and to join. I’m in West Hartford and willing to help out if you can travel. Lou Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lou L Posted May 24, 2018 Share Posted May 24, 2018 “Whom”....that was autocorrect I swear. I meant “who”. Had to fix it in case JHCC sees it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mberghorn Posted May 24, 2018 Share Posted May 24, 2018 14 hours ago, Lou L said: The CT Blacksmiths Guild is back alive. The president is Mace Vitale whom teaches classes at the Guilford Arts Center. We have meets every two months. The next one is in the second week of June at the Guilford Arts Center...IIRC. To get connected email ctblacksmithsguild@gmail.com and ask to be added to the email list and to join. I’m in West Hartford and willing to help out if you can travel. Lou I went on the ABANA site to find the contact info for the CT Blacksmiths Guild and there was two names and numbers buy Mace Vitale was not listed as the President. I guess it's a good thing I didn't call them yet, lol!! Thanks for the info! I'm sending the email now. I can travel that far on weekends that we don't work but unfortunately I don't know if we're working the weekend until Thursday or Friday. Super inconvenient, I know..... 19 hours ago, jlpservicesinc said: neblist@yahoogroups.com Is the yahoo group.. i believe its a closed group.. but there is information on it for ct and ri.. Awesome, thanks jlp!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lou L Posted May 24, 2018 Share Posted May 24, 2018 The other names listed may be the other officers. The guys at dragon’s breath forge are highly,involved and it may be their names you got. Reality it, the Guild was just recently reconstituted and the names Abana has may be old. Lou Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seldom (dick renker) Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 mberghorn, there is historical museum in kent conn. that has a blacksmith shop. I know that they do some activities there. I cant recall the name of it, the train left the station and forgot to leave it. I have been there once but was a few years ago, maybe 8/9. I believe they are open most weekends dick renker (seldom) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlpservicesinc Posted June 3, 2018 Share Posted June 3, 2018 Just a little update.. My first time to Brentwood teaching center , very nice.. There was a great turn out and this years meet was a working meet :making tongs, and forge fire tools ( shovels and side pokes).. for the ABANA conference for tools which will then be brought back to the NEB group after the conference.. I ended up being in charge of the shovels and side pokers with instruction/teaching for all helping out, and since it was my design choice i chose my traditional design.. we had 20 each to make and me being me.. I chose handles with 1 forge weld on the shovel and 2 forge welds on the side rake.. the powers at be decide the ring handle stuck up over the forge bed to much and might get hot from the fire ( ) , so in an executive decison wanted to have just a hook so it would hang of the edge of the forges instead of upwards.. so in a redesign I went with a looped handle with only a single weld with no ring.. The group of apprentices consisted of about 20 or so people with a core group of about 15 with people rotating in or out (2 or 3 people per forge )or so people on the forges and after instructions and a bunch of demos everybody at the forges had the forge welding down in short order with just a few hiccups that go along with learning any new skill set.. There were a few die hards that just hung, doing production work, one after the other forged out the single loop handles as I gave them the option if they wanted to take on the challenges associated with the double weld handle.. Some of the people took up the challenges of the extra welding with the 2X weld handle and all to good merit.. By the time I left Saturday the handles for the shovels were nearly done with only final fitting before riveting and 90% of the side rakes were finished.. There were forging groups, assembly groups. We started with the shovel blanks, then shovel handles, shovel assembly then side poker forging.. I love it when you teach a new skill like forge welding to a person and all of a sudden they really get it.. The only real consistent problem I had seen with the group was fire mis-management.. I wish there was an easy way to address this in video form.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlpservicesinc Posted June 3, 2018 Share Posted June 3, 2018 2X weld side rake.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Judson Yaggy Posted June 4, 2018 Author Share Posted June 4, 2018 Wish I had time to check out what you folks were doing down there in the teaching center, 60 pair of bolt tongs just kept our team WAY too busy for socializing! Nice to have lunch with you Jenifer, and I got to meet Dick (Seldom here on IFI) at least. Add drive time, set-up and tear down and running the forging competition to 14 hours of production forging and I'm looking forward to work tomorrow as a nice relaxing change from the weekend! If they work following is a quick video of the upper forging area during the only 5 minutes of rain we had all weekend, one of the entries into the forging comp. and some of my loot from tailgaiting. See you all in September! IMG_2671.mp 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlpservicesinc Posted June 4, 2018 Share Posted June 4, 2018 Judson, always great to see and Alex.. I too didn't get around to see anybody or anything and was bummed not to get up and give a hand.. 60 pairs of tongs for really 1 full day of working time is a tough one in it's own right.. I was lucky enough to have a few gents that were willing to get a little bit of a start on Friday so we had a little bit of a head start with shovel blanks so were ready for handles Saturday morning.. They were still fitting shovels when I rolled out saturday.. And to end it all just before dinner I asked if there was anything someone would want to see made before I left and one guy wanted to see how a hardie was forged.. 70 So, I found a 1" sq of mild steel and we forged a straight cut hardie in about 40minutes... We also found a section of leaf spring.. Supper was ready so we called it quits.. I told him to hand onto it and the next time we get together I'll weld the cutting face on.. I should have taken pictures of all the shovels and side rakes... Everyone did such a great job with the forge welding and the age group was from I'd guess 12 to 70.. I youngster was their first meet and he hadn't done much forging.. He had a double welded side rake handle done by the time we all called it quits.. Oh. looky what you got.. LOL.. My cars back seat is still full of this.. I don't even know why I bought it as I all ready have a No5 and 10E.. It was just to sexy to leave behind.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Please sign in to comment
You will be able to leave a comment after signing in
Sign In Now