Finished my tongs tonight. I didn't like the way the reins angled, so I curved them a little so that they would be parallel to each other when grabbing stock (next time I will do that before rivetting them). Adjusted them for 3/8" bars. Wire brushed then coated in beeswax.

 

 

Yeah, your top tool handles should be a LITTLE tighter than that D. 

Nice looking tongs Arthur. I don't know about bending them to lay parallel when closed, I've never tried a pair like that. I might have to do a little bending on a pair and see.

Frosty The Lucky.

Worked on refinishing the fire pot i got in a bundle with a buffalo 300 blower. Next up I just need to refinish the blower then build a more permanent forge in the shed to replace my rivet forge I've been using. REALLY looking forward to the increased air flow and work space with a more permanent forge and bigger blower

Finished making a box cutter for the wife. 

Good Morning,

I let some of the stick, poke through the Tool Head. I drill a couple holes and take a cut piece of Coat Hanger wire and bend it in a "U" shape. Poke the legs of the "U" through the two holes and bend them so it can't fall out. The stick now won't let the head fall off, but you can still control it. K.I.S.S.

Neil

Tried out making a banana holder, or i guess you could also hang grapes, tomatoes or what ever. Had this idea kicking around in my head for a couple weeks. So i had yesterday off work, not much else to do so i gave it a whirl. Some things i am not happy with but over all a few design tweeks and i may be on to something.

Looks cool. How's the balance?

Balances good. The back leg is a little higher than the front so it leans towards the back some.  One of the tweaks i want, to get the hook to be more directly over the rivet, center of gravity and all that. 

My big problem now is getting the whole thing hot enough to wax. I am thinking the oven on 500* for an hour or so should do it. 

I'd just go over it with a torch, one section at a time. You don't need it any hotter than a hot cup of coffee for the wax to melt; hotter than that, and it tends to burn.

welded reins, used some old pitted half inch round so I had to hit them with a flap disk.  snapped one of my signature acorn tong ends off while adjusting.  just needed something quick for 1 inch stock. 

All you need to do is rig it so it'll play "Day-O" when bananas are hung from in. Doing a little hula would probably be a bit much but not too much too much. 

I like it a lot, it has a natural flow and motion I find very attractive.

Frosty The Lucky.

On 3/16/2022 at 1:13 PM, Arthur210 said:

It is indeed a firepot I welded together, because I got tired of reworking the fire zone of my jabod.

Here's a picture I posted a while ago when I replaced the back plate with a thicker one:

It is about 9" by 5" on top, with the bottom about 2" square. The tuyere is still the same as for a jabod, a 1" black pipe surrounded by a mix of sand and clay.

Is it too deep i made firepot but i find they are wasting fuel if they are deep like 2 inches or more.

That's wich feeling i got.

 

It works just fine for me, with about 3" between the top of the tuyere and the stock lying flat from one side of the firepot to the other. Any closer and I get a lot of scale on the steel.

I burn about 1 kg of charcoal per hour with this setup, with a piece of wood (mostly maple) added on top of the charcoal once in a while.

On 3/16/2022 at 5:30 PM, Frosty said:

I got my hammer handle stock from a cabinet supply that closed a few years ago. He used to keep a couple 5/4" x 4" pieces of clear straight grained hickory for those of us who made our hammer handles. I don't know what I'll do when my last few feet is gone. <sigh> 

Yeah, hockey sticks make perfect top tool handles, I use a whittled wood wedge to keep them from just falling off. 

You can "tie" the top tool to the handle in a pinch, I recommend baling wire.

Frosty The Lucky.

Well one can drill hole trough hammer head and trough haft and rivet it.

1 minute ago, Arthur210 said:

It works just fine for me, with about 3" between the top of the tuyere and the stock lying flat from one side of the firepot to the other. Any closer and I get a lot of scale on the steel.

I burn about 1 kg of charcoal per hour with this setup, with a piece of wood (mostly maple) added on top of the charcoal once in a while.

I used bottom blast forge with charcoal and iam  not satisfied with it.

I've read several times (and from wise ones) that charcoal works better with a side blast. Which is why I used a JABOD at first. It helped be gauge how much depth worked best for my purposes. When I got tired of repairing the burn area I welded up that side blast firepot. My first version was a bit too deep, using more charcoal, which is why I lowered the sides a bit.

The fire bricks are useful when I need a deeper fire.

My problem is i sometimes use charcoal sometimes coal so i have to make some forge that ise "addoptable" to side blast and bottom blast.

 

Had something in mind to make it work both way addjustable.

 

I must admit that with bottom blast forge i got more longer heat along stock.
It was glowing like 4 inches with bottom blast, could be becaseu of tuyere diameter is larger in bottom blast.

Problem i had with charcoal that my charcoal will sink trough tuyere more often (talking about bottom blast forge).

 

21 hours ago, ChiefLittleBair said:

Worked on refinishing the fire pot i got in a bundle with a buffalo 300 blower. Next up I just need to refinish the blower then build a more permanent forge in the shed to replace my rivet forge I've been using. REALLY looking forward to the increased air flow and work space with a more permanent forge and bigger blower

 

I have a Buffalo railroad fire pot that I have been using for over 40 years and it is still in great shape

I'm cleaning/moving stuff in the shop so I can get my belt grinder online.  My "friend" the packrat had another couple of 5 gallon buckets of mesquite beans stored away when I got the last of the wood moved out.  Hopefully tomorrow I'll mount the dedicated light for the grinder and move the workbench over and plug in the bader and give it a spin. (As well as hit the flea market and scrapyard...)

Frosty, 

I too need to repair a couple of handles, axes, hammers, etc. Today I was looking for some Hickory stock and noticed that there are blanks of hickory on-sale now through a vendor who's name rhymes with w***w******'s horse. 12 inch for $4.50. I hope this post of mine doesnt violate a rule, Mr Moderator. If it does please delete with my apologies.

Today was shop cleanup too.

I slotted and drifted the handle, then rasped the face and struck end. Heated the face to bright red/low orange and quenched in oil. The thin cross section of the face hardened up enough to actually skate a file. Heated the struck end and let the heat seep in to the face until it was a nice golden purple color to temper. I've not been able to heat treat 4140 hammer heads this way before, I've considered quenching my 4140 hammers in water before to achieve file skating hardness. Just glad I achieved it with the thin faveof the flatter in oil. 

Looks good, CLB.  

Moved forward with a bunch of projects. In addition to cutting up a propane tank for a project and doing some cleanup on my Honest Bob swage block, I worked on the pieces for a cooking tripod:

And finished the forging and grinding of my new anvil cone:

 

Looking forward to seeing how it works with my next bottle opener. 

JHCC I got a hardy cone mandrel from my I laws for Christmas. I honestly don't know what I used to do without it. It comes in handy for sure making rings and such. Yours looks great!

Apple Duck, as I understand the terms of service you can mention a vendor or company by name but you cannot post a direct link.  You can say, "X sells Y."  You cannot say "X sells Y at X.com."

"By hammer and hand all arts do stand."

That is correct. 

Guys, great work on the flatter and the mandrel.