They look great.  Glad to see you sharing. 

Nice Job Mark.  Love to see the clean forgings..  I love the fact that you are forging that cleanly..  As it should be, if you ask me.. But no body asks.. 

Mark, it's great to hear from you again! Beatiful tools and great pictures also. You have always been good but man, you really know your stuff. Do you travel to give classes or do you do them in your hometown? 

Thanks everybody. 

I do them in my hometown, college station Texas. Though beginning to plan some in other states. 

Some more stuff... that little cross pein I made, was inspired by the old one sitting next to it in the picture. 

Lots of great work Mark.  Should try making some horse wall hooks from horseshoe halves. Might be interesting. 

Happy to see you posting again Mark. Do you have any pictures of your classes?

I haven't done much forging lately but today, I made a towing/lifting hook to weld on to the front loader of the new to me tractor. Made out of 3/4 inch diameter coil spring.

Nice looking hook Irondragon. Any heat treat, or just normalized? 

More work on the octopus for me. Really hope to get this cleaned up and get the tentacles bent into a jewelry holder tomorrow maybe.

 

 

I just normalized it, made one for the old tractor and it worked well without any hardening or tempering.

LittleBlacksmith, good to see you posting again and good to see more of your stellar work!

I finally got to fire up the forge for the very first time today! Knew i would only get a few heats before the other half came home and we had dinner but i'm past my nervous disposition towards getting the gas wrong, lighting the place up in a fireball or melting the roof and I had a blast in the 20-30 minutes i had. I'd like to get my xxx in gear and make my partner a barrette hair clip for Xmas. I also had contact from an old friend who's back in the area and can supply mild steel from construction sites and a garage has said they leave the bins open at night so i'm free to salvage any springs i like and another said they will collect them and call me every few weeks, happy days! 

Looks like you are off and running. The forge looks plenty hot to me. It's great to have sources for steel like that.

Yeah for sure, didn't realise the extent of my friends offer until i got there, They had 2 oil barrels full of 2-20mm mild and another full of old files and rasps and other tools, constantly being used and re-filled from there work and its an open offer.. Just got this as its all i could carry the distance home

Quick, make them something to keep the pump primed!  (Perhaps a bottle opener from that wrench...)

 

No joke. You struck a goldmine

That's the plan as soon as i've made the barrette. Though that would be a big bottle opener! It looks small but the green clipper is 3" for comparison.
Definitely did CGL, went from phoning around places for a week and nothing to 3 regular supplies today, happy man for sure! Im deciding what to do with the tools as they are rusty but maybe to useful to hammer; The bigger one is a Heller farriers rasp.

 

That's awesome. Rusty or not, that rasp looks in good shape to use in your smithing work. Not only did you score great material, but who knows what  tools you may get. Nice score 

Few more things. Small belt axe that was forged in a class in between heats of forging a hammer, and then a large hatchet I made and a smaller sized framing hammer. 

Used rasps in decent shape make great tools for hot rasping steel, a much faster way to remove metal than cold filing. I use golf balls for handles on rasps, drill a hole and pound it on---hopefully you drill the hole small enough the tang doesn't protrude.

Mark love the work.. Seeing clean forgings is a sign of maturity as a professional..  Great to see for sure. 

Greetings LBS, 

       Great work . Over the top professional . How in the world did you make the textured end of your framing hammer.   Glad your back on IFI. Keep on doing what your doing indeed professional. 
 

     Forge on and make beautiful things    
    Jim

Angle grinder with a cut off wheel same way Brent Bailey does it. There’s a video of him showing how he does it, though it’s pretty self explanatory. 

The tools came out looking real nice! 

 

I made a calla lilly for the Lady of the Manor. Had issues with excess scale during the last of the folding and the stem broke when cutting to length. Happy with the shape though.

 

After being sick for the past week and a half i am finally about 70%. Fever broke Thursday. It was nice just to get outside much less in the shop. Feel pretty good just sitting on the couch but after about an hour working my batteries are dead. So first my anvil after that much time not getting worked on. Got a little rust some WD-40 cleaned up pretty quick.

Finished some openers for the guys i work with. Made 2 waxed all 5. They are made from the same thing as that little piece of strap. When we get reman trannies they are used to hold the torque converters in the bell housing with a carriage bolt, hence the square hole. I take everyone i can get my hands on, very handy to have around the shop when you need a small piece of strap for something or just a small piece of flat stock. Have to watch out though some are plated but some are stainless. I also of course take the bolts, 5/16" - 18 x 3 1/2" carriage bolts can become useful also. 

Had my first real time with the forge today and made this. Wanted to make it for my partner for Xmas but as we both have big hair its definitely to small; Will try again tomorrow and hopefully get it a little more symmetrical but a lot of fun and a good but of experience!