Have more hammers than all the blacksmiths in your county could use at one time...with both hands!

You might be addicted to blacksmithing you wake up to a bunch of coal smoke, not to coffee!
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You might also be addicted to blacksmithing if you are a member of this site!:rolleyes:

It's 110* in the shade at 8AM and you can't wait to build a fire.

Edited January 29, 200917 yr by markb

If you plan your vacation around visits to old blacksmith shops and hammer-ins.

Think the smell of steel is perfume.

That historical site your visitin has a blacksmiths shop , you say you smith too , they invite you in & you say hang on , i'll just get " my hammer's " outta the car .

( All good smith's carry am emergancy kit in there car / truck don't they ? )


Dale Russell

Yes of course, I just don't think of it as an "emergency kit" they're my driving around tools.

I've done almost exactly what you describe many times, unfortunately I've usually flown and don't pack many tools in my luggage. A couple hammers of course but not many.

Frosty

It has become apparent that some of you have progressed in your addiction far beyond that which I have so far obtained. But the idea of keeping some tools in the truck just in case.... hmmm, never really thought about that one, now let me see.. the old railroad hammer would work, and as for tongs... well now you've gone and done it, I won't be able to sleep tonight.

You guys are highly addicted Im getting there myself and i see no point of return. My shop is starting to look like a smiths shop because i moved

my forge to its final location two days ago and i havent slept since.

...your wife thinks your cologne is "Eau de Coal Smoke".

You might be addicted to blacksmithing if you...

......find yourself going into DT's when the weather is bad, and you can't forge (I work outside).

......find yourself with the DT's again, when every used tool you have bought lately is rehandled or rehab-ed, having done the work in the family room because of the weather.

.....once again find yourself going into the DT's, when you have exhausted all options to do inside that are blacksmith related, and IFI is offline for maintenance. Ugh.

Addiction? My friends know I'm just a social smith occasionally forging at big events... what they don't know is that I hide away and forge alone as often as I can...

I do my best work under the influence of the smell of burning coal...

Or you might be an addict if like Glenn you go out and build a fire just to melt the snow out of your forge.

Frosty

see how clean your hands are, and think something is terribly wrong...

Edited February 1, 200917 yr by divermike
sleepy post

A few years ago when on vacation, we visited a ren fair. While the family was walking around, I saw a smith having trouble gettting his forge fire going so I stopped and offered to help.

Well a few hours later my son came back to bring me lunch, because I was still in that forge giving the fill-in-smith lessons. My wife didn't understand why I spent a day of our 2 week vacation teaching a beginner smithing basics.

But I was in the middle of a 2 week vacation and I saw this guy needing help. Blacksmithing is not a problem for me, I can quit any time.... I am sure I can quit any time, I think I can quit anytime, well maybe I can.....

.....you encourage the wife to go to rummage sales, yard and estate sales, and call you if she finds any hammers or smithing tools. With this approach, she gets to go "shopping" and you get to forge, unless she calls, I need to get mine the ability to send good pictures to me. so I can check things out before heading to the estate sales.

Mine bought me a small RR track type anvil for $12 without even calling me, she figured it was only 12 bucks and had to be worth that....

If while visiting the wife's friend in a distant city, you drive them to the mall, split up, and agree meet 5 hours later for dinner. At dinner they ask how the day went and your son says after about half an hour, you remembered a blacksmith that lived about 50 miles to the west in another city and we spent the afternoon with him blacksmithing, had a great time, and want to go back tomorrow. Dinner was good but the conversation at dinner was rather cold.

I<snipped> Dinner was good but the conversation at dinner was rather cold.

I suppose that it help's if you have a wife like JackFrost has, as a fellow smith is sure to understand.

if you start on your shop building before finishing the place you will be living in.

Divermike that sounds familiar, Did you have the same problems im having right now? What advice do you have for me? Although my cabin is not meant to be my house it could be as its fully insulated but it needs alot of interior finish as it looks like a post n beam chicken barn. Il have to limit myself to the shop to one or 2 days a week if that makes sense;)

The first time my forge was functionnal i swear i didnt sleep for 5 days, I am ok now and back on the regular sleep mode thank god.

I suggest you watch your mate closely, the signs of danger will be obvious, usually after an extended stay in the new shop, when shelving was supposed to be hung, curtains etc.. this can lead to what I call, the "Smithing Disassociative Process" and is highly detrimental to romantic relations in the home. I usally deal with these situations by doing my inside the home chores with tools brought from the forge, in my leather apron, this way the smell and feel stay with me, and the significant other gets done what is needed. Sometimes it helps to rub a little coal dust on your upper lip. Just make sure you get some sleep on a regular basis, as lack of sleep is a detrimental factor to good hammer control!!

HA so far I feel lucky, the house we're looking at buying needs to be prettied up, but has a nice detached garage which I have big plans for... my lady is big into interior design, and has said I cant do anything in the house except the demo work grunt work and shop work... woe is me!
as far as addiction goes I have gone back to the house that we havent bought yet, just to look in the garage... with the realtor (no one lives there) if we dont get this place I will be a sad little person. because the waiting game is the worst!

do not let yurself get attached to the shop area until you sign on the dotted line, otherwise you will have already designed the shop layout, shelving and where the forge goes. Careful!

oh dont worry, I know. lucky for me, it's a square shop. so the plans carry over to most other square shops. see? addiction i need to start going to meetings. lol

we are here for ya bud. I find posting a lot of pictures really helps, and taking in all this site has to offer, but if ever you decide to get the monkey off your back, one of our members, Frosty, is providing a home for displaced blackmith tools. He gives his word they will be well cared for, and I believe him!