it's great seeing everybody's work and skill set progressing so quickly.. Inspirational it is.. I'm feeling like such a slacker.. You guys are rockin it.. 

Nice Aus. Those little brass brushes I found are cheaper to replace but needed a handle. 

Also I find upsetting bar ( especially rebar) easier then trying to forge weld for mass. 

1 hour ago, Daswulf said:

Those little brass brushes I found are cheaper to replace but needed a handle. 

Das, where do you get your brass brushes? (PM information if you don’t want to post a commercial link.)

Pm sent. 

Tried to make a guitar bottle opener today. Bit rough, bit out of dimension, but at least I have a better idea for the next attempt. 

On 11/27/2017 at 11:59 PM, Ranchmanben said:

Finally got around to forging a pair rounding hammers. A buddy of mine struck for me so he gets to keep one of the inaugural pair. They’re a far cry from Mark’s Damascus cross pein but hey, he’s better than I am. 

Very nice hammers! remind me of a farrier pattern I like it with the narrower fuller than most, gives it a nice look. How'd the tongs work?

JAB- nicely done, I knew exactly what it was when  looked at it! I may have also punched halfway through for the hole in the guitar (I know, ya'll who pick are gonna be ashamed of my terminology...) and also would have used a chisel and put some strings in. good job for a first go at the idea.

                                                                                                                                        Littleblacksmith 

3 hours ago, Daswulf said:

Pm sent. 

Can you PM me too, Das? As you can see from the picture, that brush came from the U.S. I have found the cheap Chinese ones are inferior brass and it's really difficult to find anything in Australia, other than the rough brushes from Bunnings. My next ones are coming from Racewax in U.S. but they are not here yet so I don't know how they will work.

And JAB, that's a nice little opener. I'll have to try one of those guitars. What was your starting stock?? I'm thinking about 3/8 square, but that's a bit light on for the loop.

JAB---consider that idea loose and free in the wild!  I have the perfect person to give one of those too for Christmas; luckily he doesn't play a 12 string...I may cant the tuners back a tad too as well as having a through hole and "strings"...

Many thanks for the feedback! Much appreciated. I'm looking forward to seeing one done properly, please do share.
Slowly getting there one heat at a time... Very addicting stuff!!!

 

This is the stock I started with (used to mm, so hopefully you can read the fractions of inches yourselves )

 

I tried to give it some frets, but my current hot cut/punch tools are quite limited as i'm only starting out.... but I do have a lump of coil spring; so trying to split my time between making more tools and practicing general forging techniques/projects at the same time.

This is kinda it to date (and a small chisel I need to re-harden... but it's too short to use properly near hot metal as i'm quickly discovering)

 

I could really do with making some hardy tools, but the hole is about 1 1/4", so I need to go hunting for thicker stock to start with..... or a lot of upsetting practice

1 hour ago, JustAnotherBiker said:

but the hole is about 1 1/4", so I need to go hunting for thicker stock to start with..... or a lot of upsetting practice

You could always sleeve your hardy hole making it smaller or even weld square tubing to the bottom of your forged hardy tools if you can. The sleeve route might be the easier one. 

Greetings Biker.. 

      Your Hardy tool problem with 1/4 x1 stock .. You can flatten you stock to 1-1/4 and form a loop 1- 1/4 wide to fit your hardy than weld it to the base of your tool.   To work with short chisels and punches  with hot metal wrap a chunk of leather around the chisel and pinch it with a pair of vise grips .. ( instant holder)   I have done this for years and it works quite well. 

Forge on and make beautiful things 

Jim

 

All I got done was a leather stitching tool. Second one actually. I burned the first one trying to get fancy with it. Ugh will I ever learn? 

Other then that I have been testing the potassium permanganate to attack the chrome so muriatic acid will remove it. So far with the test piece no luck. A couple days in the pp solution and then in the ma, no luck. Any other clues on this? 

6 hours ago, littleblacksmith said:

Very nice hammers! remind me of a farrier pattern I like it with the narrower fuller than most, gives it a nice look. How'd the tongs work?

Thanks Mark. The farrier style rounding hammer was my goal, glad you picked up on that. The tongs worked like a dream but I wish someone had told me that there’s a learning curve to using them. After a while I got the hang of it and things started going more smoothly. 

 

Das, I’m guessing you’re getting ready to buck stitch something?

 

I built one set of half inch bolt tongs today and I’m hoping I’ll get a chance tomorrow to build the other set in need to make. Felt pretty good to use a hammer I made myself. 

Beautiful pair of tongs you made there! Very stylish and functional - I like it very much.

Bests:

Gergely

Thanks Gergely, now if I can only make another pair exactly like those I’ll be getting somewhere. 

4 hours ago, Daswulf said:

Other then that I have been testing the potassium permanganate to attack the chrome so muriatic acid will remove it. So far with the test piece no luck. A couple days in the pp solution and then in the ma, no luck. Any other clues on this? 

Would 'roughing up' the chrome using an 80 grit sanding wheel or something work, then try the acid?

I have no experience in this, but would have thought that roughing up the surface in the same manner as you would key something before applying paint may break the surface enough for the acid to get under the top layer?

8 hours ago, Ranchmanben said:

Thanks Mark. The farrier style rounding hammer was my goal, glad you picked up on that. The tongs worked like a dream but I wish someone had told me that there’s a learning curve to using them. After a while I got the hang of it and things started going more smoothly. 

Yes, they take some time to get used to. I found also that it helps if you hold them about an inch or so behind the boss, don't try holding them at the end of the reins, you wont have enough control.

Very nice tongs!! you have progressed very quickly.

                                                                                                                                                        Littleblacksmith 

Ranchmanben, I have s sheath to make. Think I'm going to make a 2 or 3 point as well. Very nice tongs. 

JABiker, it might help. I'll be looking further into this. 

 

 

A bit more experimenting again today and you'll never guess what I made.... 

 

... Another bottle opener. I don't have a drinking problem, honestly  (except the problem that I'm currently out of beer to take this latest one out for a test spin) 

I really need to get more stock and work on something different!  Just using the small pieces of offcuts I have in hand at the minute trying to practice the basics. No bad thing I suppose just experimenting with moving metal and trying to make shapes somewhat like I see in my head. 

 

An untested bottle opener?!  just mail it to me, I'll test it out for ya. 

Don't worry, you can rest easy.. It has now been tested. 

I'll just have to try again another one or six times just to be sure the first wasn't a fluke 

Oh good . Yeah once could be a fluke. Best to thoroughly test after working while relaxing and admiring your work or thinking up the next project. 

Here is the latest round in the shop. Made some candy cane rebar ornaments to be festive, some rebar bottle openers, copper bangles, and a brass coated steel pipe pendant.

Got the other pair of tongs done today. Managed to get them to match fairly closely. 

Very nice! 

I seriously need to get a decent pair of tongs made. I just about got my first pair put together but the reigns were far too thin. It only took about 8 attempts to get two pieces I could rivet together after disasters such as stress cracks, burning in half, setting down on the wrong side... Pretty much anything that could go wrong did. 

Grip too tightly and they just bend. Oh well, practice and all that.

 

Anyway.... After a weekend of thoroughly testing out bottle openers for quality control purposes, I decided to do something different this morning.