Hello all. Just a brief introduction.

[Firemedic]

Hello. I’m new here and to blacksmithing. I’m a 20+ year career firefighter in Ohio. I’m getting close to retirement but nowhere near ready to slow down. I’ve always been a “tinkerer” and I love learning new skills. Blacksmithing seems to be an amazing new hobby/ addiction for me. I have taken some blacksmithing classes at a local living history site and fell in love with it. So now begins the search for tools and equipment. I have plans to build a small shop in the spring. I am a bit old fashioned in most things that I do so I expect that my smithy will follow suit. I have been spending hours upon hours on this site. The knowledge, information and experience compiled here is outstanding. Thank you to all of you. You will be hearing from me in the future. 

[ThomasPowers]

Did you get a chance to attend Quad-State, the largest annual Blacksmithing Conference in the USA, held in Troy Ohio each fall?  There are several active ABANA affiliates in Ohio, attending their meetings is usually the best way to meet other smiths local to yourself and find folks doing the stuff you want to do. (and where to buy things locally!)

By "Old Fashioned" do you mean pre 1900 or pre 1000?  Blacksmithing has over 3000 years of history so what is old fashioned to some folk may be "modern" to others.  (I consider anything after the introduction of the Bessemer/Kelly process to be modern for instance.)

I used to live in Columbus and had a drafty 100+ year old house so during the really cold winter days I built a "one soft firebrick forge" run off a cheap propane torch and forged small items in my basement. (Nails for my Mastermyr Chest, Viking era hack silver jewelry, small tools, etc).

[Firemedic]

ThomasPowers, good point about “old fashioned”. I guess I meant old fashioned in regards to United States timeline. 18th and 19th century. Coal forge, bellows, no power hammer. Although I’m not so diehard that an occasional wire wheel or a mig welder for fabrication of jigs and such would be out of the question. 
As for QuadState, I didn’t find out about it until the week of. It was too short of notice for me to make work and family arrangements. It’s about 3 hours drive for me.  I’m pretty bummed about missing it.  

[ThomasPowers]

Lots of charcoal forges in the USA; until that later part transportation of coal was a pain and charcoal can be made on the location.

[Charles R. Stevens]

If you don’t have some kind of mechanical hammer, you need a strapping young apprentice...

 

[ThomasPowers]

Or 3!  One thing that amazes me is the number of people wanting to do "traditional smithing" with only 1 person in the shop. Traditional would be 3-5 people or more!

[Firemedic]

I guess I don’t really have anything absolute at this point. I have the sum of a few hours of heating and pounding out some hooks to base my plans on. I literally have 10 fold the hours in reading and research than I do in experience and application. I have a strong affinity to old things and traditions. I love history and I love attempting to keep alive the quickly fading skills that our society has passed over for a modern disposable lifestyle. 
And of course, there is something absolutely amazing about taking a hard piece of steel and bending and twisting it into something beautiful and useful. 

I have 2 strapping young sons that essentially work for food and housing. They will certainly get their share of time swinging a sledge. Lol

[ThomasPowers]

One way to explore is to take on a project like making down hearth cooking implements for  a historic kitchen for a specific era.  You can start with simple things like S hooks and go on the trammels, spiders, ladles, grid irons, toasting forks, even knives!  You might ILL a copy of "Early American Wrought Iron" from your local library to get some ideas.

Some folks and groups have done projects like recreating the Mastermyr chest and contents; but that is way earlier than your period of interest...

[Firemedic]

Excellent. Thank you for the advice. That is exactly what I want to do. I want to try my hand at reproducing some fireplace pieces. I have a mid 1800’s summer kitchen that is missing some pieces. I have found several examples to strive for. I am very excited about this new adventure. 
Also, I just posted a thread about an anvil. I would appreciate your feedback on that as well. 
 

[Frosty]

Welcome aboard Firemedic, glad to have you. I try not to gush but I'm alive because the fire station 61 ems were fast and good when I got hit by a tree in '09. I'm a TBI survivor with attendant issues. I find I can't meet or talk to an EMT without saying THANK YOU. 

I haven't gotten by  your question in the Anvil section so I'll comment then. A lot depends on the time period you settle on. Personally I play whatever time period a group wants of me though the tools may not be quite period. For instance on one occasion I used a plastic bag and piece of steel pipe for the air blast rather than a sheep or goat stomach. A paper bag, cardboard box (two nested works a gold plated treat) ABS pipe, stick and straw or feathers, etc. make fine bellows.  I used to hide them behind tools, stock, etc. to make period.

You already have a skill set most beginners don't, you know fire and how to manage it. All you need to learn is how to manage a small very HOT fire. That'll come quick. Fire management and temperature control of the material are essential but that's part of the attraction of the craft, playing with fire and hitting things with hammers is so much fun there should be a law. 

The tools and appliances Thomas mentions are excellent projects to begin with. Long even tapers are a basic process found in many advanced projects, making hooks the perfect beginning. S hooks involve bending the hook from a drawn taper, It's not as easy as it looks to turn a nice uniform hook in a taper, resistance changes from tip to shank. Hmmm?  Drive hooks involve that and either a sharp 90* bend or a fold and bending the 90 to make a good striking dynamics in the hook. Another bit to add to the skills learned from the S.

Fire tools are maybe better start, they can be less uniform and still work a treat. I like starting folks with their fire tools, it's good to keep examples of your work as it progresses and you'll hold your fire tools in your hand every time you light your forge or fireplace. 

It's probably enough Frosty ramble for now, I get going and. . . 

Frosty The Lucky.

[Firemedic]

Frosty, I’m sorry to hear about your accident. You seem to be doing quite well. I do a lot of felling by myself and that is always in the back of my mind. There is a massive amount of weight towering overhead and once it starts moving, you don’t have any control over it. I would bet that those guys at 61’s would love to hear from you. We almost always lose track of people and their outcome once the call is over. The HIPAA laws make it nearly impossible for us to follow up with someone. In today’s social climate the people with complaints are far more vocal than those with compliments. It’s always a good feeling to have someone say thank you. 
As for the first projects on my list, I will be making my basic tools. The idea that a blacksmith can make his own tools is possibly the most appealing part of this for me. My wife sometimes gives me grief for the amount of time that I spend in the wood shop making jigs to make things or the amount of time I spend tinkering with the tools. I foresee this hobby to be very much the same. 

[Charles R. Stevens]

Despite getting it’s licks in, I think the tree ended up geting the worse

of the encounter.  

But like Jerry, I thank you for your service.

[Les L]

Firemedic, welcome aboard and thank you for your service. Frosty, I have to disagree when you said he " knows fire and how to manage it", every fireman I've been around manages fire by putting water on it until it's not hot anymore, I think he may have to start over on his fire control methods .

[Charles R. Stevens]

“No thy enemy as one knows thy self and you are sure to prevail. No neither your self or your enemy and you are sure to fail.” 

Nor something like that. Actually the stanza is much longer.  

 

[pnut]

9 hours ago, Firemedic said:

The idea that a blacksmith can make his own tools is possibly the most appealing part of this for me.

I really dig the idea of making a tool to make a tool. Roy Underhill in an episode of The Woodwrights Shop said to the Peter Ross a blacksmith , " You have the most exciting job in woodworking, making the tools for woodworkers."  so I understand that completely. 

Pnut

[JHCC]

I'm a bit late to the party, but Hello! Whereabouts are you in Ohio?