February 21, 200917 yr Hey all. I uploaded a short video of me forgewelding at the Blacksmith's shop in Fort Gibraltar during the Festival du Voyageur. It's a privately owned historical fort here in Winnipeg. It's open for 10 days during the festival (that ends Sunday Feb 22) and then again in the summer. It's fully staffed by re-enactors in typical garb of 19th century employees of the North West Company during the height of the fur trade era.YouTube - Forgewelding at the Festival du Voyageur. This isn't my normal shop, this is just something I do every winter. It's fun and we open the fort to school groups during the weekdays. This year I spoke to approximately 11 thousand students over 5 days. My voice is just about gone...
February 21, 200917 yr That's cool. It's great that things like this are done to get word out about smithing. I like the idea of re-enacting, I'd like to do some old style demo's eventually.
February 21, 200917 yr Author It is fun but if we stuck to what was done in period, we'd be making nails. That's pretty much it. Oh, they did other things to be certain, but that shop in that fort was primarily a nail making enterprise. Probably get's dull after a while. We tell them that and say we're making other things because we have "guests" like them and we like to show off our skills.
February 21, 200917 yr Nice weld you got there! Is that a hand hewn, mortar chinked shop ? Looks awesome i would like to see the outside sometimes, even the whole village if thats possible. Great setup also.
February 21, 200917 yr neat looking shop .. working bellows are always nice! looks like its cold there tho....as far as nail makeing its a good demo item .. peoples attention span isnt much longer than it takes to make a nail ... and they dont take the attention to details that a forge weld does. what were you welding there ? the video didnt really show...
February 21, 200917 yr Author Nice weld you got there! Is that a hand hewn, mortar chinked shop ? Looks awesome i would like to see the outside sometimes, even the whole village if thats possible. Great setup also. I'll try and get a decent photo and put it in my gallery. It's rough cut timbers and hand chinked (by us). About 10 years ago someone broke into the fort and set the blacksmith's shop on fire using a 5 gallon can of gasoline (we found the can inside). They re-built the roof completely and used an industrial sandblaster to blast away the 2" of soot and expose the unburnt wood underneath. The next year they burned the South Tower. Since then, there is much better security including well hidden cameras.
February 21, 200917 yr Author neat looking shop .. working bellows are always nice! looks like its cold there tho....as far as nail makeing its a good demo item .. peoples attention span isnt much longer than it takes to make a nail ... and they dont take the attention to details that a forge weld does. what were you welding there ? the video didnt really show... I was welding a billet for a damascus blade. I won't keep going on it until the weather improves though (besides, I should have a good working shop this spring) And yeah, they don't have much of an attention span but we do have people that will keep popping back in to check on our progress.
February 21, 200917 yr I may be wrong, but in your video it says that your Peter Wright was cast.... Are Peter Wrights not forged? The 2 I have a forged. - Jk
February 22, 200917 yr Author Jeremy, The anvil is marked with "pure wrought cast" on the side. That's why we refer to it as cast. Not 100% sure why though since they were clearly forged in two pieces. Hmmm, have to look into that.
February 22, 200917 yr It may have a cast steel face. The cast steel refers to the process of making the steel, not how they made the anvil. They took the cast steel, shaped it to match the wrought iron body, and forge welded it on. That is my guess as to what "pure wrought cast" is referring to. Anybody know if what I just said is right?
February 22, 200917 yr Author I'll do my best but now that the festival is over, it'll be a bit more difficult to get into the fort. But I still have to get in there and pick up my tools in the next few days, I'll try then.
February 23, 200917 yr I guess that's what you call a teaser?! I guess you guys need to find something to do in Canada in February. Who would have thought that would be it? Well done!
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