Chimaera, that’s a good looking knife 

started on my winter challenge entry and got further on a knife project for a friend

 

Thanks les! Hopefully the handle is even better (though I’m not confident in that haha). Looking good MJL!

Tonight I made a pair of EZ Tongs using the blueprint on this site. These are for 1/4" and smaller. Just a rounded chisel groove so that even if I taper a 1/8th rod, it should still hold. 

Took me much longer to finish than they should have, as usual. I still want to take a flap disc to the ends of the handles and a touch around the jaws. 

The rivets are ugly. It was dark, the shop light I had wasn't bright enough to see and I'm just not that good at it anyway. But they open and close and don't wiggle so rivets must be good enough. I tested them by holding a 4ft length of 1/8" and it didn't even wiggle so I think they'll work great next time I work on a brooch. 

 

They look great! I think your rivet is fine.

Shainaru, that is how i did my very first tongs as well. The jaws on mine were a bit longer and i heated and reshaped them so many times they finally just got wore out. Even after i became efficient at making tongs and had a few sets i would still use them a lot. Easy to make but most important work very well. 

 

  I agree, rivet looks good to me.

I didn't realize the pic wasn't in focus until I saw everyone's comments this morning. I guess the shape looks decent but what you can't see in the pics is all the cracking on the edges from hammering too cold and how it's thinner on one side and thicker on the other. No biggie, they work just fine, lol

I do prefer the rounded handles to the flat ones though so my next set I will do that. I have enough bar for two more pair at this length but I could shorten them to 16" instead of 20" and get three more pair out of the bars. 

If you draw out the handles (which is good forging practice anyway), you could probably get at four pairs, maybe even more.

More of yesterday than today but forgewelding yesterday. All went well, my folded over strips hold togheter nice and where blended in good. 

Next project is learning the prepwork (welding bevel, can't remember the propper english word), welding those up with droptong methode and than welded tongs.

My year long practice of (just not) burning the steel in the fire was giving me an advantice. 

Also made a different design for my forks. Not from round 8mm, but out of strip 30x6. No more wrap, but i split the strip and fold over to make the heart. No picture because, i fergot to take one.

MJ: If you haven't cut out your Christmas tree ornaments yet, move them down on the stock as seen in the picture and you'll double the number if ornaments for the same # of cuts. 

Moving them down so the trunks are on the edge of the stock will allow you to move them all to the left and clear the notch which will give you room for the 4th on the right end. It will give you room for the point down one on the far left and four mirror trees on top.

Make sense? 

Frosty The Lucky.

Shaina, The first of anything, tongs included, are a practice piece, so you know how to improve the next one.

The wife asked to make a lamp, such that the light would not hit the eyes and that it would turn. Do makeup in the morning.

Nice looking lamps. So, tell me Alex, have you figured out how to make a lamp shine on a lady's face and not in her eyes?

Frosty The Lucky.

5 hours ago, JHCC said:

draw out the handles

Good point. I was going to do that anyway and hadn't been considering the extra length that would add! 

25 minutes ago, Frosty said:

Nice looking lamps. So, tell me Alex, have you figured out how to make a lamp shine on a lady's face and not in her eyes?

Frosty The Lucky.

Jer! 

When I do, I'll show you.  You will understand.

 

Here's some simple blacksmith math: If you take a piece of square or rectangular bar and draw it out to a point in both thickness and width, the tapered section will triple in length. If you draw it out to a chisel point (that is, taper either the thickness or the width but not both), the tapered section will double in length.

These are the theoretical ideals, and since we rarely draw tong reins out to a sharp point, you should allow some extra. For example, if you have a piece of 1/4" x 3/4" bar and you want to draw out a section that's 16" long and tapers to a 1/4" x 1/4" at the end, then you'll need about 11" of stock. If you're drawing that same size bar out to 20" long, you'll need a bit more than 13" of stock.

Thanks. Nice tip

Just to back up JHCC with a couple of hard facts-

The volume of a cone can be modeled via the formula V=1/3B*H where B is the area of the base (cross sectional area of the original bar) and H is the height (length of the original bar). In this case, B can be modeled as either pi r^2 for round bar or L*W for bars with a rectangular cross section. Of course square bar is L^2. If we look at this again for a piece of square bar of side length L, we find that our cone (the taper) can be written as V=1/3L^2*H. With some simple algebra we can rewrite this into H=3V/L^2. Therefore, our final H (bar length) is equal to three times the original, if brought to a perfect cone and ignoring material loss due to scale formation etc. 

His chisel argument relies on similar facts of geometry, but I’ll let you figure those ones out.

On 11/9/2022 at 3:24 AM, BillyBones said:

I have an old set of mig pliers that i ground the ends round on i use. They work pretty well. 

Mig pliers are great. I really like spring open pliers. 

Chimaera, I am a bit slow here but wouldn't angle play a role in the length of the cone? 

The volume and the angle are both determined by the height and the dimensions of the base, the former by the formula given above, and the latter by some fairly straightforward trigonometry.

I looked up a bunch of volume calculations in the machinery handbook. The used those in an excel file I shared to my phone. Set them up to calculate the volume of cones, truncated cones, hex rod, octagon rod, spheres, hemispheres, etc. Then, solved the equations for length (or other dimensions) and enter those Calculations in the file. Now, on the fly, I can pick up my phone and calculate the length of a given bar for a give shape. Also put mass calculations in it, so I can figure up the weights of tools, hatchets and what ever else. The trick is understanding the limits of estimating scale loss and blocky sketches.

Keep it fun,

David

JHCC has it correct. You could also determine the volume via the angle, but that is far more work. 
 

Got my first handle of 5 this week rough shaped and glued. Amazed by how much I’ve improved in getting my tang and wood flush.

Started prototyping a coke bottle hidden tang handle. Definitely still a lot of design work to go, but certainly better than the first one. Wishing I had a contact wheel to sand the radius, but apparently they don’t make those for 1x30s.

Those are nice to know, I often take too much material and cut of the excess, or only cut the bar when forging is mostly done. This is not always the best way, thanks!

I'm back in a woodworking mood lately, so I want to make a small cabinet for my room with a bit of space for books above it, so kind of a small bookcase with a door below it. It's quite ambitious for my skill level but I will probably start on it soon.

I did need a vise though, I was getting tired of the viseless workholding I've been using, so I made one using a screw I found at the thriftshop!

It includes a bench dog hole, guide rails, and below the work bench a simple alignment thingy. It works quite well, the guide bars can freely move in and out of the last guide hole. if you extend it too far out you can run into problems with the guide bars exiting the last guide hole. The bars are 12mm round and the guide holes are drilled 12.5 mm round. I won't need the vise to extend out a lot, since all the big stock can be worked with the bench dogs, holdfasts, or the planing stop I already have. Excited to use it!

~Jobtiel