What did you do in the shop today?

[Don Shears]

Well, like many I've been pretty much doing the isolation thing. And like so many with the warming weather spending more time in my (currently unheated) shop.

I've put in time working on several projects. Handle for salvaged brass shovel head; matching poker for the shovel; flux spoon with attempt at brass inflow; repair of a fire poker; wedge for a post vise mount; fire steel; handle for a brush; hanger for bird feeders; and a sample 'S' hook for my wife to approve for her flower baskets. For scale the plywood sheet is about 28 inches wide.

The repair of the poker was needed after making it during a demo, I missed seeing a hacksaw cut about mid length. That was last fall so I got over zealous filing the rust out of the cut making it too big to just fill with brazing rod. Solution was to slightly dovetail the notch and make a fill piece from a salvaged square nail for brazing into place. Makes an interesting piece to examine after cleaning up with a file.

In early April I picked up as BS roadkill a new, but broken file. By it's condition it was brand new with no signs of use or rusting, but the tang and an inch or two of the teeth had snapped off. This is my first attempt at this style of fire steel, it's roughly 5 inches end to end. Flint, chert, and quartz all draw sparks easily. Even tried a golf ball size clinker and that drew sparks as well!

I've several other WIP that I will post pictures of later.

Don

[tjdaggett]

I like the idea of giving your wife an example to approve. Seems like a wise idea. I might copy it.

[Helena]

I know I haven't been around much, I'm a professional lurker after all. But I finally (after dozens of failures and years of trying) made my first pair of tongs. They're ugly, but they work! And I made the rivet myself, the rivet tool myself and drew the reins out. There's definitely room for improvement, but I got them together and they work. Pretty happy right now. Oh, and they're like 4140 or something...

[ThomasPowers]

Clean the crud off the top bearing caps for my 25# LG, I'm going to make covers for the oilers to help keep the dust our. (The swordmaker I once worked for made nickel silver caps for his, I'm just going to do copper ones.)

I also sawed enough of the hefty piece of scrap that I was able to break off the end and find out that it unfortunately was only steel.  Waiting on cooler weather to fire up the forge and test the broken off pieces by forging them out and trying a heat-quench-break test on them. Something ANY scrap should have done to it before using.

All this was after spending the workday locked in my office at work.

Now to study the manuals for my new insulin pump...

[tjdaggett]

TP, where can I find more information on the heat-quench-break test? 

[ThomasPowers]

I  like to forge it fairly thin to see how it works under the hammer at various temps.  Then heat it up above critical---a bit above where it turns non-magnetic, and quench in water moving it around briskly. Then wearing PPE, (leather apron and faceshield), place it in the postvise or across the step of the anvil, (bridging the face and the step). and tap it with a hammer if it goes SNAP and falls into several fine grained pieces then it's a HC steel and probably suitable for blades.  If nothing happens and you hit it harder and it breaks, then probably medium carbon steel, if you can hammer it over in a 90 deg bend then definitely low carbon steel. (I exclude WI by sawing and breaking prior to forging).

As I don't have power to the shop the spark test requires me to haul a grinder to the house. Otherwise I might start with that.

I've learned the hard way to do this as I've run into some pretty weird substitutions in the scrapyard---eg: a piece of farm equipment with a brace on either side: one was wrought iron, the other HC steel. (Especially from the 30's where using whatever you had was done a lot.)

[HojPoj]

On 5/5/2020 at 9:17 AM, Helena said:

 They're ugly, but they work! 

Aesthetics aside, that last part's the most important.  The second question is "Do they work well enough for your needs?"  If yes, then Bravo!

Heck all that work you've done is more than I've accomplished in my attempts at making tongs.  I've yet to do some from scratch that have been worth finishing.

[CrazyGoatLady]

Helena, good for you! Persistence pays off. Keep up the good work

[jlpservicesinc]

Helena way to go.. Nice job.  I always make my tongs out of mild steel, that way I can abuse them really well and they don't break.  

As An addition to Thomas's method I go one step further. 

I forge out a section about 1/8"X 1/2 -1" about 6" or so long,  and then every 1/2" to 1" I notch the bar with a hot cut about 1/2way threw the bar from one side. 

I then heat the bar up with the far end being about 1900F and graduate the temperature down to about 1200F I keep note of where the temps were and quench in water swirling the bar around.. 

I then file test the bar. 

I then put it in the vise at the first notch and snap it off. I then check the grain structure for grain growth..   I do this for each notch noting the temperature that offered the hardness and a very fine pearl like grain (very fine) that is still hard. 

Now I know nearly exactly which temperature that steel liked to be hardened at for that given fine grain size when hardened.  One can do this with any metal and figure out the golden hardening temp and it's fast. 

[ThomasPowers]

Well my testing is a rough go/no go test.  If it's a go then I may test to get best HT specs from it. Not worth the extra effort if it turns out to be 1018...

[jlpservicesinc]

True that. Again, I addition to..  vs indifference to.. 

But I find that if I'm going to go that route for me it's just faster to do it once.  I mean if I am forging a bar to be a certain size to start out with then it only takes 30 seconds longer to put the notches in.. and then another 30 seconds to bring up to temps for quenching. 

Again, I'd rather just use the heat I'm all ready doing vs having to take the time to heat it up again. 

 

[Frosty]

Your tongs look just fine Helena, well done.

Frosty The Lucky. 

[JHCC]

Installed the new motor in The Pressciousss, but discovered that the switch I got doesn’t accommodate 8 ga. wire. I did plug it in and run it on a piece of 2x4, which it crushed with ease. 

Also took the new gasser out of its high-humidity curing environment and removed the forms. The inside of the burner port was a bit ragged, so I rasped it smooth and widened the inside a bit. 

Next step: cast the inside faces of the doors. 

[DSW HandCraft]

On 5/5/2020 at 9:17 AM, Helena said:

There's definitely room for improvement, but I got them together and they work. Pretty happy right now.

As someone already mentioned, the main thing is that they work for you, and your needs.
I strongly believe that the most important thing in blacksmithing is to learn by observing how metal responds to your input (hammering) and build a database of that in your head whenever you are doing a project. Learn right away, not after the project is done. Getting the job done, comes second. In that manner, you will instantly see where you need to improve. Finally, you take the knowledge you've gained and give your best to make a perfect pair of thongs next time, a pair you would be very proud of. My philosophy is to aim for perfection but to be satisfied with reality, especially in blacksmithing. If you give your best next time, you'll be one step closer to perfection. And it goes on and on and on... Soon, you'll be making beautiful things with much less effort.
I really do believe that anything worth doing is worth overdoing.
I hope all I've said makes sense 
Keep up the good work!

[alexandr]

Today decorated the entrance to the workshop. If the frost returns, I hope to have time to take it to the room.

[tjdaggett]

Alexandr, looks like you're in a similar hardiness zone to Minnesota; I feel for you. May your plants be lucky.

[alexandr]

Thank! Let's hope.

[SLAG]

Mr. Alexandr,

Said,

"If the frost returns, I hope to have time to take it to the room."

If you cannot get all the plants inside.

I suggest that you put a towel or sheet over them, for the night and early morning.

Regards,

SLAG. 

[Hans Richter]

Almost done, the new pedestal for the Columbian anvil. Assembled the construction and provided it with tack welding. This morning, fully weld, deburr, degrease and apply a coat of paint as it should be. As known, the tripod and the racks for the tools. Glad the hardys also fit well.

[Chris C]

Nice!!!

[Welshj]

Well, not in the shop exactly... yet.

Started digging a trench to bury a line out to the shed to run power out from the house. 2" pvc pipe, run power and air from the compressor in the garage.

[Shabumi]

Sorry I haven't been able to do much more than lurk for a while. Wow, everyone has been doing some great stuff. The weather's been nice so I've been too busy to do much in the shop, but with a few spare minutes a day for the last few weeks I've managed to put together a paper template, cut out the pieces from some older scrap steel siding. No galvy that I've seen, and it was rusting through in places, but I put it through a burn pile just to be safe. BLO blackened a piece to see if I liked the contrast from the black and brass, which I do, and am nearing a dry run to be sure it will all fit together. So far the holes line up *fingers crossed*. Next on the list is to make the tip of the beak out of some spare brass sheet I had from a class last year and to make the ~100 brass rivets out of a bunch of 1/4 inch long pieces of 16 gauge brass wire to put it together. I also need to get some "cooling" herbs to stuff in the beak to protect me from the miasma.

Oh and I found out with a bit of web-fu on sizing rivets that the diameter of the rivet shank should be somewhere between the thickness of the thickest piece in the grip and 3x the grip (grip= total thickness of the pieces being riveted together) I hadn't seen it mentioned yet on IFI so I figured I'd throw it out there.

 

Hmm, I'll post a picture when I figure out how, I reduced the size to 278kb and it still won't load. 

Edited May 8, 2020 by Shabumi
Tried to post picture and clarified terminology

[Shabumi]

Got it figured out. Here's the picture

[JHCC]

Fired up the new gasser to cure the Kastolite. One thing that became immediately obvious was that there was a significant bulge in the ceiling of the burner inlet that was impinging on the flame. Because I hadn't yet fully flame-cured the Kastolite, I was able to stop and grind that off with a die grinder. Very dusty, but worth investing the time.

Ultimately got it hot enough to forge a bowl from 16 ga sheet. 

The doors worked very well. 

I still need to put the Kastolite on the insides of the doors, but they worked fine with just the rigidized ceramic wool. I'm looking forward to trying it at full power.

[Hans Richter]

Welding lock down –running out of gas, running out of wire. Finished the new anvil stand with stick welding -much more intensive and requires more grinding and finishing. Glad with the second mobile anvil configuration. The many for the UAT 140lbs anvil prepared ¾” hardy’s and springer fullers fit also very well in to the ¾” hardy hole of the new 120lbs Columbian anvil. So I’m prepared for the hopefully upcoming events up road .