|
Ambrose Burnside posted:I produced a commemorative plaque for the Olympics, unveiled to friends and family just as the opening ceremony was beginning. That owns and reflects my feelings about these stupid bread and circuses exactly. Nicely done. What did the family say about it?
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2012 18:00
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 25, 2024 22:00 |
|
|
Ranged from confused to irritated. That's okay though, this is a vanity project for me. I'm adding in brass trim I made by laboriously hammering and folding wire, gonna really make it pop, you know? e: In other news, I'm in love with high-temperature dynamics for some bizarre reason. Been playing around a lot with my two-brick microforge, I think. The way the torch-flame becomes a sort of weird catalyzing reaction once the forge chamber's above a certain temperature, or the way flux's causticness changes with the heat. Ambrose Burnside fucked around with this message at 00:23 on Aug 6, 2012 |
|
#
?
Aug 5, 2012 18:46
|
|
|
Ambrose Burnside posted:Maybe join the two parts with JB-Weld? It's an insulator IIRC and tough as hell. Might be tough to guarantee that the parts are not, in fact, touching through the big lump of JB, maybe you could use a thin non-conductive washer-ey thingy in-between the two to guarantee it. Yeah I think I'm going to spray both sets of threads with permalac (ridiculous sealer that I use on patined pieces to preserve the finish) and then use a bunch of teflon tape. Here's hoping the relative lack of humidity means it won't be a problem.
|
|
#
?
Aug 6, 2012 03:37
|
|
|
At this point I'd be worried you fail to create a good gas-impermeable join. No idea if that permalac stuff is non-reactive to propane, but it's definitely the case that if you use too much teflon tape you can prevent the threads on a gas-rated fitting from joining properly. Personally I think getting a good safe fit is more important than worrying about galvanic corrosion. Replace the fittings every ten years and you're in good shape - they're not that expensive.
|
|
#
?
Aug 6, 2012 21:55
|
|
|
Holy gently caress I was actually outside hammering poo poo the last two days. gently caress yeah long weekends. Not done this project yet, but I made enough progress that I can share it now. I've been in my house two years. For two loving years I have been using a rapidly fading rectangle of plywood with my house numbers spraypainted on it. That changes now. The numbers. Need a little filing and dressing up.  The post, 1" solid iron with a 3/4" arm. I punched a hole through the 1" and drifted it out to accept a tenon from the arm. I laid a bead of weld on the join just in case, also to make it easier to hammer the head into place. Also put a point on the end of the post so I can jam it into the ground.  I'm pretty happy with that rivet head. Getting it that even in a single heat is a huge pain in the dick. I will of course clean this up before I do anything else later.  And a little foot to weld onto the post later.  Lots of work left, but a good amount of forging on a 30'C weekend. I need to make a scroll to complete the triangle of the post and arm, dress it up a little. That shouldn't take too long. I'm thinking of painting gloss black, but maybe matte black would be better, I'm not sure. Also I need to add some hooks to hang it all, I might use cable or something, haven't quite decided yet. Also working on another project, but I'm hoping to have that done next weekend during the big show at the pioneer village I go to every so often.
|
|
#
?
Aug 7, 2012 05:14
|
|
|
Leperflesh posted:At this point I'd be worried you fail to create a good gas-impermeable join. No idea if that permalac stuff is non-reactive to propane, but it's definitely the case that if you use too much teflon tape you can prevent the threads on a gas-rated fitting from joining properly. Yeah good call. It stands up to gasoline but who knows about propane. I'll just be sure to check it often.
|
|
#
?
Aug 7, 2012 08:02
|
|
|
Wear your safety glasses properly kiddies! In the heat mine slipped down my nose a bit. While roughing out some jaws on the manual lathe a big(.100"x.009") aluminum chip bounced up under the right frame and stuck on my lower eyelid. In the second or so before I could dislodge it it burned my eyelid bad enough to blister and took off my eyelashes on that side. 1/8" higher and I'd be blind or at least seriously injured. 
|
|
#
?
Aug 7, 2012 08:37
|
|
|
I've just been offered a table/area at a local festival and they've cleared me to forge stuff on site- but not with a forge or heat. What the hell can I still do? I was gonna prep a bunch of pewter lumps to be hammered into long bars that I make into rings because it's laborious but pretty straightforward, but I cant even finish 'em because I need to weld the seam. Alternately, I've got some aluminium flats that I can anneal beforehand and work, but I won't get a second anneal, so that's also pretty limited I think.
|
|
#
?
Aug 7, 2012 23:14
|
|
|
Slung Blade posted:
 Here's the lathe cutting through a 2 inch bar of Pyrex - right now I'm using the precise flame, which is a few thousand degrees of oxy-propane goodness, but the flame itself is about the size of a oxy-acetylene torch flame.  The torch has a second burner, which is a huge 3 wide flame. Never seen a torch bigger than this thing. Pyrex, which is way stiffer than soft furnace glass, is able to be shaped at around 3000 degrees, while in comparison furnace glass is pretty molten at 2140. Basically, this is a big, nasty torch heating a huge piece of borosilicate.  The finished rolling pin. It basically starts out as a 2 inch bar, then is tapered down smaller for the handles. With the lathe, it turns the glass for you and keeps it moving and on center, and you use the huge torch to heat parts of it (it takes nearly 4 minutes of this monster torch heating the glass to get it to move). Then you can move the chucks away / towards each other to stretch and compress the glass, and tools made out of solid graphite to shape it. It's pretty neat. It's how most scientific glassware is made. I happened to be making Pyrex microphones and stands for some artist's installation, but I took the scrap and made a rolling pin. I guess I could make more if there was more interest! Of course, the really cool thing about a solid pyrex rolling pin is that you can put it in the freezer and it stays cold as hell forever, which makes it great for serious pastry chefs. Gotta have that flaky crust!
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2012 00:12
|
|
|
You and Ambrose Burnside should, umm, go into some sort of business together. 
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2012 00:16
|
|
|
What wouldya charge for one? Color me way interested.
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2012 01:36
|
|
|
Bad Munki posted:You and Ambrose Burnside should, umm, go into some sort of business together. This ain't bad advice, at least for you modifying that design ever-so-slightly. Pyrex dildos go for Real Good Money.
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2012 03:17
|
|
|
Modify? It's a bicycle built for two.
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2012 03:50
|
|
|
I love making pastry, for real. What do you charge?
|
|
#
?
Aug 8, 2012 06:44
|
|
|
Oh thread of metal, I have questions! I'm looking to get out of my dead-end IT support career and get into something more rewarding: CNC MACHINING! ... OK, yeah, may not be the best thing in the world, but hey I can get my current employer to foot the bill for this and engineering classes and I figured I might be able to get some slightly better pay (or just plain better) than I am currently getting if I get training in multiaxis CNC machining. Mostly though, I'm tired of support, don't see a future in it for me anymore and want a change of pace. At worst, I get to learn CNC and not have it apply for any way, shape and/or form to my work ever (I am OK with this). At best, I get an amazing CNC job that makes me enough money to pay for my next level of education. In the middle, it will be useful after I get an engineering degree and oh hey, it will help me have a better handle on the manufacturing process. ANYWAY. I've been looking at the program list for my local community college and I am wondering if the school's Advanced Manufacturing program (PDF file) is worth it. And if so... should I go for the associates degree or are the certificates good enough (IE: does it really matter if it's a certification and not a degree)? Or am I just an idiot for even thinking about doing this? Schooling background if anyone cares: I have a bachelors in programming from a crappy on-line college that allowed me to CLEP test out of most of the prerequisite classes, aside from the English and Math classes that I had taken at another community college. The engineering bachelors I'll be going for later needs about a year's worth of pre-reqs (mostly science and more math) that I'll take at this community college before transferring to (probably) Lawrence Tech's engineering program, so at best that's a 3 year plan.
|
|
#
?
Aug 9, 2012 04:16
|
|
|
Hey I just did something kinda similar. I was stuck in a dead-end job, did a year worth of a two year program at a community college, then got a job as a machinist. It is infinitely frustrating, highly stressful at times, and the most rewarding and enjoyable job I've ever had. Talk to the instructors for that program and see how much time is spent in the shop. Are you running the programs as you write them or just learning how to program? How many actual, real world parts will you be making? Learning to program without learning to machine is a recipe for being an unemployed programmer. CNC programming is literally just you telling the machine what to do. If you don't know what to do then you're kinda hosed. Mastercam can generate tool paths for you, but you've got to know what tools to use, which order to use them in, how to clamp onto the part, etc. It's like learning CAD without learning engineering. You can make a really pretty part, and solidworks might tell you it'll work, but nobody would hire you as an engineer. If you're looking for a solid manufacturing background that will help you later as an engineer, look for programs that will give you more time running manual machines. That way you can guarantee that you're learning every step of the process. Things like work holding difficulty, tolerance expectations, and ease of manufacturing are things you won't learn in mastercam. Learning CAD/CAM is the easy/boring part and you'll be doing that anyway as an engineer. Also, I make more as an apprentice than their median salary for a programmer. 
|
|
#
?
Aug 9, 2012 09:28
|
|
|
Slung Blade, that is a beautiful tenon. I am looking through this thread page by page. I got to page 11 and saw your class work. It looked like a very good class. May I ask who or where you were taught?
|
|
#
?
Aug 9, 2012 16:31
|
|
|
Fire Storm posted:Oh thread of metal, I have questions! Honestly, that program looks kind of lovely. There's only a handful of classes that actually relate to the machining and they're only 3 hours, I don't know how much real hands-on experience you can expect to get. By comparison, this is what I'm doing: http://www.netc.edu/documents/pathways_pdfs/machine%20Tool_degree.pdf If you're serious about machining then you want to find a tool & die apprenticeship with a company that'll send you through a thorough, comprehensive tech school program while bringing into their shop for a few hours each day after classes so you can apply what you've learned immediately and pick up the little shortcuts and institutional knowledge from guys that have been there for 30 years. However, since you've already got a bachelors and your company seems to be willing to pay for more school, my advice would be to forget about it and leap straight into engineering. There's a great thread in A/T here that can help you get started down the track: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3209369&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=1 shame on an IGA fucked around with this message at 17:48 on Aug 9, 2012 |
|
#
?
Aug 9, 2012 17:46
|
|
|
BLACKSMITHING QUESTION MEGA POST AHEAD!  I'm hooked. I see all of the cool poo poo you guys do in this thread and I've decided to make it a reality. I'm trying to come up with a list of things I need for startup, and was hoping you guys could help me figure things out. Question 1: The Forge I have an idea of how I want to build the forge, namely using the tutorial found here. I've managed to track down a place where I might be able to get a brake drum for free, and the plumbing fittings are no problem, but I'm wondering how he put that all together. Namely, where he is welding the steel plate and then how he fits the flange (where the rest of the plumbing can be screwed in) to the drum itself. Has anyone built a drum forge like that before? Is there a better way to do it? I've saved up a couple hundred dollars for tools/anvil/forge, so I'm hoping to stay within that budget. Question 2: Fuel For a forge like the one I want to build, most people use coal, but they mean special coal, right? I can't go to the store and pick up 50lbs of briquettes, right? Is there a common supplier for that kind of thing? Is there a better fuel alternative for a neophyte? Question 3: Tools I've been looking at various pictures of people and reading different forums, and everybody seems to have the same basic tool set, but I'm sure I'm missing some things. Hammers (1lb and 3lbs) Tongs (I have no idea what kind or shape or whatever) Punches Chisel (what is the chisel used for normally?) hacksaw Files (is there a good type/brand? Is this something I can pick up at Home Depot, or do I need specialty stuff?) Angle Grinder? I'm not sure what this is used for. Magnet (type/power? holy poo poo I don't know what I'm doing  ) Is this a good startup list (minus the anvil, of course)? Should I be looking for used stuff, or is it better to buy new? Question 4: The Anvil I found a guy on Craigslist selling an anvil for $85. This seems like a good deal. Should I go for it? What should I be looking for in terms of quality? Question 5: Crafting Materials Where do you guys get stuff to hammer on? Do I just go to a junkyard and grab some random stuff? How can I identify which metal something is made out of? Question 6: Holy poo poo, how do I turn this chunk of metal into something cool? Basically, is there a place where I can download blacksmith lessons? I mean, I have an idea of the kind of things I want to make (hatchet, pickaxe, shovels, things I can use around the house, maybe knives?) but I don't even know where to start looking for information on HOW to make those things. In closing, this thread is awesome and an inspiration. I hope to have pictures to share soon! Thanks!
|
|
#
?
Aug 9, 2012 19:41
|
|
|
ArtistCeleste posted:Slung Blade, that is a beautiful tenon. I am looking through this thread page by page. I got to page 11 and saw your class work. It looked like a very good class. May I ask who or where you were taught? Hey, thank you. I took a course from this fella. http://www.mysticforge.ca/ Dude was a blacksmith and rugby player in England, the Calgary Stampeders (Canadian football team) recruited him, and when he retired, he stuck around town and picked up his craft here. Great guy, he taught me a ton in two weekend courses about a year apart. I wish I had a millionth of his skill. areyoucontagious posted:BLACKSMITHING QUESTION MEGA POST AHEAD! This is kinda tricky. You see, with coal forges, you need some special parts. Generally you want a nice cast iron firepot with a duck's nest and all that stuff. Reason being, if you burn coal, that poo poo leaves clinker. Clinker is NASTY poo poo, it's sand, heavy metals, and all kinds of garbage that kind of melt and amalgamate at the lowest point in your forge, IE, right where the air comes in at the bottom. So you need all this gear to literally break that poo poo up so you can keep working. For your first homebuilt forge, I REALLY recommend that you use charcoal lump. It's basically 100% pure carbon (there will be a little ash here and there, but you can just blow it away with a puff of air) not super expensive, easy to get, and theoretically it's a renewable resource depending on who's making it. Since charcoal is so "clean", you do not need all that heavy duty clinker breaking poo poo, my old charcoal forge is just a pipe with holes in it hooked up to a fan and surrounded with a high-heat refractory cement in a big rear end stainless bowl. very simple, cheap, and it only took me a couple days to make (most of that was waiting for the cement to cure and dry). Do not use briquettes. They are full of sulphur and additives that will contaminate the hell out of your workpiece. areyoucontagious posted:Question 3: Tools You need different kinds of hammers for different jobs. Ball pien, straight pien, cross pien. I have a lovely ball pien that I use for all my chiseling and punching jobs, and I only use the ball side when I want to texture something. Cross piens are easy to find, they usually call them engineer's hammers at the hardware store. Straight piens are drat near impossible to find, you can make your own later, and they're not necessary, they're just nice to have. When I say pein, I'm talking about the "back" side of the hammer and what it looks like. Straight means the "line" is parallel to the handle, cross means perpendicular, ball means really rounded, etc. Chisels are used for all kinds of poo poo. Hot cutting, cold cutting, texturing, taking a couple millimeters off something because you hosed up when you cut it, marking things for necking down. Again, different kinds for different jobs. Cold chisels are stubby and tough, meant to be used when the steel is cold, very rough work. Hot chisels are really fine and sharp, use em when the steel is hot for precise work, but they'll break and deform like crazy if you try to do it too cold (or if you hold your hot piece on it too long and it heats up the chisel). Hot chisels are hard to find, make your own from a steel that maintains hardness in high heat conditions, HSS is decent for this but pricy. I just use cheap tool steel and redress them as necessary, treating them as semi-disposable. Punches, likewise, different kinds for different jobs. I just buy cheap chisels from canada's version of harbour freight and re-shape them as necessary. 5 bucks and 20 minutes of forge time for a rectangular punch instead of 90 dollars from an online supplier? sounds good to me! Files, difficult question. If you're going to spend a lot of time dressing things up, yeah, spend the money on good ones from specialty tool stores. If you're just gonna take rough edges off things, cheap metalworking files from HF or home depot will be fine, get a multipack one with a round file, triangle, bastard, half-round, etc. It'll serve you well enough. Buy a file card to pull the filings out of the teeth with, they're like a dollar or something. Angle grinder you will want several of, they're like really fast files. I have four and I could use more. Regular grinder disk, flap disk (like sandpaper squares glued to the disk) great for removing scale quickly on a flat surface, a braided wire brush cup for de-scaling in hard to access angles, and a handheld cutting disk for small cuts. Get a magnet that you can hold with welding gloves on and manipulate easily, you're going to be holding it up to something that is glowing hot. I bought a medium powered one with a little knob on it for a handle, works great. Don't get anything expensive, heat will eventually "kill" a magnet if it gets too hot. Tongs, ehn, you can make your own (and you don't need tongs to make tongs, thankfully). Vice grips kinda suck for this, but they'll work in a pinch. Get some soapstone markers, centre punches, a couple measuring tapes, 90' squares, rulers, and tough needlenose pliers. You will want an abrasive saw, hacksawing poo poo sucks. Get a good one with a cast iron base if you can afford it, they're so much better it's not even funny. areyoucontagious posted:Question 4: The Anvil That thing looks like a cheap, piece of poo poo, cast iron anvil. Cast iron is useless for forging. You would be better off buying some heavy plate cut to size from a fabrication yard or something. You want a cast *steel* anvil, or one made from some kind of tool steel if you're going to buy a proper anvil. There are plenty of things that will work fine for hobbyist use though. areyoucontagious posted:Question 5: Crafting Materials I just buy stuff from a local steel yard. You can usually get them to deliver if you don't have a truck to haul it on (usually comes in 20' lengths). Sometimes in bigger cities you'll have smaller metal shops like Metal Supermarkets that will sell you exotic alloys cut to any size and charge by the pound. Entire libraries have been written on your second question there, but generally it's easy to tell steel from aluminium and copper and brass. I keep my tool steel separate from my regular mild steel, and I try to label it with a marker or something so I don't forget what it is. You can use a grinder to check roughly how much carbon is in steel (lazy sparks = mild, bright wild sparks = high carbon). areyoucontagious posted:Question 6: Holy poo poo, how do I turn this chunk of metal into something cool? I bought some books, I have several listed in the OP (which I keep saying I am going to update but I always forget to find time for it). Plenty of good videos listed in this thread too. Youtube for blacksmithing, you'll find a couple decent lesson-y type videos. Amazon has a pretty great ironworking selection. areyoucontagious posted:In closing, this thread is awesome and an inspiration. I hope to have pictures to share soon! Thanks! Awesome, thanks for coming, and I will try to add more to my answers here when I'm not at work.
|
|
#
?
Aug 9, 2012 20:36
|
|
|
Hey areyoucontagious, how the hell have you been, long time since we last chatted. I think Slung Blade has given you a ton of great info but I want to add a few things. First, I think you won't get far with your $200 budget. I mean you can just barely manage, but if you can push it to $300 it will open you up to a much better starting toolkit. Here is what I would consider the absolute bare minimum, if you want to get started making some simple blacksmith projects. You can expand from here but this is the minimum. -Forge. You can actually make do with almost anything that will hold your nuggets of charcoal, but you will want a method for forcing air into it. You could rig up some kind of craptacular thing using pipes and a blow dryer, it won't last but for your first dozen times trying this out it might work. -Anvil. You need a piece of flat steel. A cast iron anvil actually will work fine, but only if it's been "faced" with a hardened steel face. Actually I take that back. You can actually forge on a rock (they do that in africa!), and you can definitely pound on hot metal on a cast iron anvil. The reason you shouldn't get that one on craigslist is because you shouldn't spend $70 on something you're going to want to replace in a month. Instead, I recommend: -A vice. Get yourself a big heavy vice, with a 4" or 5" jaw, and bolt it down to something extremely substantial. (Don't get a clamping vice: you want something firmly bolted to a big hunk of weight like a very heavy duty workbench at waist height.) Most large vices of this type actually have a square "anvil" surface on the back, and for your first few times forging, you can use that! Plus a vice is super-useful anyway, so it's a multi-use tool and even if you wind up giving up on blacksmithing, it's a great multi-purpose tool to own anyway. Given your budget I'm thinking a big beefy quality vice is a better option than a lovely anvil plus a cheapo vice. e. Something like this is good: note the replaceable jaws, which is very nice if you want to put something soft there to grab delicate work at some point. -Two hammers. A beefy ball pein hammer and a beefer straight or cross pein hammer. Eventually you will expand out to another two or three hammers (including a sledge) but for starters this will do. If you buy a brand new hammer from the hardware store, you may want to "dress" the surface a little to take off sharp edges, using your -Angle grinder. Slung Blade has several but honestly you can make do with one, it just means changing the disk whenever you need a different disk on there. I recommend a Milwaukee or DeWalt for really good quality, but you can probably better fit like a Ryobi or Makita into your budget. Avoid black & decker and other consumer-grade crap, unless you can get one super cheap like at a garage sale or something so you don't mind throwing it away in a year. -Bench grinder. This is a thing with wheels that spin and you'll need one if you want to make blades, for sure. I mean, you can make do with nothing but files if you have infinite time and patience, but you can do in five seconds with a bench grinder what takes an hour or more with a file, albeit with less precision. -Files. Serious files are usually packaged without a handle, because you only need two or three handles for all your files and a lot of guys like to use particular file handles. You want a nice big flat rough file for taking off lots of material, especially useful when you're doing figuring on a knife and don't want to risk gobbling up too much steel with the grinder. Get another single-cut flat file which is "second cut" or "smooth", maybe a bit smaller sized than the other one, for careful work, and get a half-round bastard for digging divots and finishing concave rounded parts on your work. -A pair of blacksmith tongs. OK, Slung Blade is absolutely right that you can make your own, and also that you can do your first couple of pieces using vicegrips (or if you have a long piece of bar stock you'll do a lot of work without tongs). But eventually you will need a pair, and it's very very nice to have one pair that is professionally made. Especially since the first pair of tongs you make are gonna be total crap. Now, don't panic, because the pair I'm gonna link are expensive, but try to get something like this. They've got that v-shape that lets you grip square stock very nicely and will also grab round stock, and they've got the wide round jaws that let you grab something with a complicated end on it (like a hook or whatever), and they've even got the ability to hold a piece up-and-down if you want. I know with your $200 budget these won't fit, but it's one of the reasons I suggested stretching to $300, and of course I think you should look around and see if you can find something similar for less money, especially locally. The other key thing is that you can grab flat stock with your vicegrips but it's very hard to hold round or square stock with them, so a pair of v-bit tongs is a great place to start with "real" tongs. -A hacksaw. Yeah, Slung Blade says you want a metal cutting tool that will be faster, and he's right, but it won't fit in your budget yet. Get a hacksaw with blades for cutting steel. -A MAPP gas torch. Like, with the screw-on burner that fits on the bottle, they sell these at home depot and everywhere else. Quite useful if you just want to spot-heat a point on a piece without going to the trouble of getting your forge all fired up. -Gloves. Some folks use a big beefy glove but I prefer a more minimalist approach with a goatskin welding glove. You're only supposed to wear the glove on the hand holding the workpiece, but I often wind up wearing a glove on my hammer hand as well, because I don't seem to be able to develop good callous so I just continuously blister-and-peel again and again. -Eye protection. You must wear eye protection at all times while blacksmithing. No exceptions. Insist anyone within 15 feet of you while you're working also wear eye protection. -Work pieces. A great place to start is a hunk of rebar. It's cheap as gently caress mild steel, which will make a letter opener or a hook or just practice turning a round thing into a square thing, curling a thing, making a point, stretching, and so on. Another great thing to get is a truck leaf spring or an automotive coil spring. This will be a medium carbon spring steel, which will make a good knife and let you practice heat treatments (annealing, quenching, tempering) and actually get good results. If you have a junkyard near you you can probably get a rusty-looking spring for less than you'd pay for spring steel stock at a metal yard, even from the scrap bin. Of course you will soon want some real bar stock (round, square, etc), mostly mild steel but also carbon steel bar for your knife-making, so do seek out those places. But to start with, you're going to gently caress up a lot of bits of metal so you might as well do it with the cheapest stuff you can find. I think the above fits OK in a $300 budget. Once you save some more money, and if you're sure you actually like doing this, your next priority is a real anvil (which will probably cost at least a couple hundred dollars), more tongs, a porta-band or a chop saw (or both) for cutting stock, maybe another hammer or two, a benchtop belt sander (for knifemaking this is nearly essential), and then maybe start thinking about whether you want a professionally-made forge, perhaps try a gas forge, maybe a welding rig, and the sky is the limit. Leperflesh fucked around with this message at 22:05 on Aug 9, 2012 |
|
#
?
Aug 9, 2012 21:57
|
|
|
I'm gonna go ahead and give you some idiosyncratic advice based on a few hundred hours in a historic shop, feel free to take it or leave it. My general opinion is that if they didn't have it in 1800 it's not really worth having (welder excepted, for tacking and making jigs and stuff), so I'm gonna run counter to some other posters. Different strokes, etc. Hammers: I do literally everything with a 40oz cross peen. I've never wished I had any other hammer in the middle of a project. I never switch it out for any of the half-dozen other hammers we have in the shop. YMMV. Tongs: buy a pair for holding round/square stock from 1/4"-1/2", and one that will hold flat stock from 1/8"-1/4". That should cover 90% of your needs. When you outgrow those, it's time to learn to make tongs. Chisels/punches: get a hardy, make your own chisels/punches. It doesn't matter if they're not tool steel as long as you learn how to put the right bevel on it and you heat poo poo up before you try to cut it. They're easy as poo poo to make and you can keep redressing them a hundred times before you need to worry about upgrading. Dressing with a file should take all of 20 seconds. Hacksaw: pretty good for cutting stock down to forging size, and they're cheap, so not a bad idea. Gloves: gently caress 'em. Get a pair for when you're holding a chisel over the workpiece, but beyond that I never wear them. You'll get burned, and then you'll learn not to get burned. Safety glasses: you should wear these. Anvil: don't buy cast iron unless (as mentioned above) you're absolutely sure it has a tool steel face. Check rebound with a BB or ball peen hammer, go for 80%. A big chunk of steel (4"x4"x4", at least) will do, most scrapyards should have something suitable. Train tracks ring like motherfuckers, I'd just as soon avoid them (though they do work in a pinch). Grinders 'n stuff: meh. Until you're making knives, everything should be doable with a file. Until you've mastered the file, you shouldn't be making knives. Files: lordy yes! As many as you can afford. Get good names (Nicholson, etc), don't buy any cheap poo poo. Bastard files, mill cut, smooth, etc. Get flat, triangular, half-round in a couple sizes if you can. Be careful about hot-filing, as it will wear them faster even though the metal is softened (heat). Only cut on the push stroke, then lift it up. It's not sandpaper. Also, look up draw filing. Major help with any long sections that need to be cleaned up or shaped. Vise: important, especially for filing. Ideally, you want a leg vise, but that will take some hunting. They can be found fairly cheap, though. A bench vise will work fine, but don't hammer too much on workpieces clamped in it. Forge, Fuel, Air, etc: There's loads of resources for homemade forges. Use charcoal, because it's awesome and renewable and smells real nice. If you can't do something with charcoal then it's not worth doing. Propane is nice and clean and easy, but it lacks all romance and you won't learn as much. A blowdryer is fine as long as you disable the heating element (waste of energy), with a baffle I don't see why it wouldn't do you well indefinitely. I have a hand-crank blower that's really sweet and pretty much the best, but I also paid a lot for it. Stock: rebar is crappy. It's alright for piddling around in the beginning, but 1030 isn't that expensive. Some 1/4" and 1/2" square stock and 3/8" round stock should keep you busy for a while. Might as well buy some stuff that you know is fairly inert, non-plated, etc rather than fighting with scrap. Eventually you'll know how to pick worthwhile junk out of piles of plain junk and how to make that junk into good stuff, but I'd personally just buy some metal myself if I were just starting out again. Wire brush: good for cleaning off scale. A brush and some wax is all the finish that indoor items should need. My general advice would be this: learn to make old boring poo poo (starting with blacksmithing tools) if you want a really good foundation. Make knives and axes and stuff right off the bat if you want to impress laymen. Honestly, you'll learn more from spending a few days consistently heating stock to a yellow heat in a charcoal fire and hammering it from square to round and back again than you'd learn from making and grinding a half dozen knives. When you're just starting out, even tedious crap should feel magical, so hold off on the knives until you're good enough to make one that looks like a knife. Most important advice: learn to heat your poo poo up well past red without burning it, every time. Even if that is all you learn about blacksmithing, you'll have practically mastered the art. Shaping stuff is easy and just takes a lot of practice and forethought, but getting the right heat takes alchemy and attention. You can unbend a lame hook, but you can't unfuck burnt steel. Heat treating and forge welding are what separate the journeyman from the apprentice.
|
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2012 06:06
|
|
|
All good advice, but I'll clarify something that I ran into early on- don't expect to be able to do big projects at first, and don't bite off more than you can chew. Being able to make axes and poo poo is awesome, but it involves moving ~a lot~ of metal, and it gets really easy to spend all afternoon wailing on a big mass of metal and not really getting anywhere. The fact that these things are all theoretically possible to hand-forge doesn't actually mean you can, or that you want to. Heating large masses of metal is also really, really time-consuming, and you tend to get anxious and work it colder than you oughta. Start small. When I first tried to make a proper knife, I used a big-rear end 1/4"-thick flat of 4140 and spent an entire afternoon just preliminary-roughing out the blade and it's still not done; it's massive enough to be a cleaver or something. On the other hand, if you start with something much thinner, maybe 1/4" rod, you'll be able to complete projects quickly (if not super-professionally) and work through all the steps you'll have to take later on, and if you mess up it isn't such a huge deal. I make wee nail-knives now because they're 20 minutes from nail to nearly-finished. Also because having a plethora of tiny knives is coolio.
|
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2012 15:17
|
|
|
I'm going to throw in my own two cents. Question 1: The Forge I use a gas forge. I like using a gas forge. It's fast, it's hot and heats up large portions of the metal. I've only once used a coal forge, and it had it's own advantage. It isolates the heat well, and is great for forge welding. Question 3: Tools Hammers - I mostly use a 2 pound with a round and a flat face. Round is for forging, flat is usually for straightening and hitting down high spots. I'm very small though, most adults use 3lb. I also sometimes use a cross peen or a ball peen but not too often. I can do almost everything with that 2lb hammer. Tongs - I would say start playing with some standard sizes. I tend to use 1/2" a lot. Your tongs depend on your materials. Punches - You can buy these, but most blacksmiths make their own tools. You will need too steel and will need to learn how to properly temper. Chisel - Learn how to make them, in all shapes and sizes If you have a metal water bucket, it is good to have a way to quench things Clothing: ALWAYS wear natural fibers even on your feet. Synthetics will adhere to your skin when burned and you will get burned. You can do without gloves, but if you do wear one only on your non-dominant hand for your tongs. Question 5: Crafting Materials Scrap steel works great, you can use a magnet to make sure its steel and use an angle grinder to find out how much carbon is in the steel. It's called a spark test and you can probably find a diagram online. Be very aware of anything coated in another material. Galvanized metal is toxic and so are coatings. You do not want to breath that poo poo. [b]Question 6: Holy poo poo, how do I turn this chunk of metal into something cool? Your best bet is to take a class. I have seen kids spend a week and class and by the end of it are making better things than some at home hobbyists who have been playing for a few years. I played with metal for a few years before I took the beginning class at our forge and realized I should have taken the class years ago. One more BIG recommendation. It's expensive but Mark Aspery's books are the very best that I've seen on blacksmithing. I saw him at the CBA Spring Confrence and he was an amazing teacher. Four people at our smithy bought his book afterwards including a couple of the instructors. You can not only learn how to do it with his book, you will learn how to be a good at it. http://www.markaspery.com/School_of_Blacksmithing/Home.html Most of this advice is way over your budget. Learning to make your own tools, will make blacksmithing much cheaper for you. Have fun! ArtistCeleste fucked around with this message at 18:54 on Aug 10, 2012 |
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2012 18:13
|
|
|
Leperflesh posted:-A MAPP gas torch. Like, with the screw-on burner that fits on the bottle, they sell these at home depot and everywhere else. Quite useful if you just want to spot-heat a point on a piece without going to the trouble of getting your forge all fired up. No they don't! We all have to get used to saying MAP//Pro now instead of MAPP Gas..Its not the same either. God damned shame too. There are a few things you could have used MAPP for but MAP//Pro won't hack it, so now you have to break out the Oxy/Acetylene torch. (Air/Acetylene might work for at least 98% of them though, but gently caress if you're gonna go, go big and hot, damnit!)
|
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2012 19:10
|
|
|
OK, smithy thread! Here's my rough (so rough) plan for the forge, given what I have to work with. I can get a big plate of steel for like $40, so all I need is firebrick and a pipe! Would this work for my forge or will I be in trouble?
|
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2012 19:51
|
|
|
You need a way of fixing all the bricks in place, just leaning em wherever won't cut it for more than a weekend. Won't be durable in either case, you'll be stabbing the walls of the firebowl with bits of sharp metal all the goddamn time- in your design that might just crack the side-bricks. For a charcoal/coal forge, an insulating firebowl really isn't that important- making it all out of steel is just as effective and (given the price of firebricks) probably about as expensive to boot. Also this setup is gonna be heavy as hell depending on what bricks you choose to use, hope you don't plan on moving it any time soon! I built my first charcoal forge in the bottom of a 55-gallon drum filled up a bit with sand, and what a goddamn mistake that was, because you'll have to move it sooner or later. Unless you're building it right into a dedicated shop, in which case doing massive in-earth plinth forges out of heavy brick filled with earth and fireclay is pretty viable. Also don't put it on stilt-legs that aren't firmly affixed because you -will- knock it over eventually and hot charcoal will go everywhere and it'll suck. And are you intending to make long blades or long twists or some other type of smithing requiring a long, even heat? Because that's what that forge is good for. General smithing requires (or rather is suited to) a smaller, more focused air tuyere. This forge will consume an ungodly amount of fuel on account of burning hotly along its entire length (obviously dependent on the blower fan and the particulars of construction, I can only speculate from the drawing). In my pipe-forge, I used a single cluster of holes and made a clay cone sloping away from it- in retrospect I maybe woulda split it into 3 or 4 equidistant smaller-holed clusters drilled to push more air towards the sides of the firebowl instead of just straight up, but it's the same basic idea. You seem to be drawing inspiration from BBQ burners or something similar, which may not be your intention. I think some people who do long forges adapt by clogging un-needed tuyere ports with fireclay when it's cool and then firing it up, but that's a kludgy solution at best. e: Goddamn do I ever need to build another forge, I've learned a shitload since the first but haven't really applied it.
|
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2012 20:12
|
|
|
drat! If I only drill holes at the end of the capped pipe and kind of make a bowl around the bottom with heat resistant material? I could use a brake drum, sort of like this (also I found a smaller steel plate!): Basically I'd cement together some brick (wouldn't have to be firebrick) to form a base for the drum, and just set the drum over holes I drilled into the pipe at the end? I feel like I'm grasping at straws here!
|
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2012 20:46
|
|
|
I suggest you experiment a bit before you cement stuff together. You don't want a frustrating experience where you decide after five uses that you really wanted those bricks an inch farther apart or something. But yes, that looks like it could work. e. one modification you might consider: put a 90 degree bend in the pipe at the end, and get a cap that fits on the pipe. Drill your hole through the cap. The advantage is that if you decide you need to make the hole smaller, you can just replace the cap, rather than having to saw off the pipe and add more pipe. It's also a lot easier to make the hole bigger or make more holes, because you can remove the cap and take it to your drill press or your bench vice or whatever. Also seconding the thing about classes. I learned at the Crucible in Oakland, CA, and even after the first three-hour class, I was able to make a hook and a spoon and I'd reached a basic understanding of what I was doing. It's invaluable to have an instructor there to say things like "strike that at a steeper angle, that's too shallow" or "you're getting too deep into the red, time for a reheat" or "that's too thin, it's cooling instantly and you're just denting the poo poo out of it now." Stuff that might take you quite a long time to figure out why something isn't working, where the expert can tell you in ten seconds. Also with a class you get the opportunity to work with proper tools and equipment. You can quickly figure out what aspects of the kit you want, without needing to experiment at home. So you can say, ah, I prefer this hammer and then just buy a single hammer, and you can go "ah, I like this anvil's height" and put your anvil at exactly that height, even if your anvil is just a block of metal. poo poo like that saves you a lot of trial and error. Leperflesh fucked around with this message at 21:25 on Aug 10, 2012 |
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2012 21:20
|
|
|
Leperflesh posted:Also seconding the thing about classes. Yeah, you guys had mentioned that and I was looking at this place for classes: http://www.austinmetalauthority.com/lessons.html Maybe the fire-poker class? $50/hr is pricey, that's most of the cash I have saved for building my stuff up. Is that a good price? I know these guys are pros so I know their time is valuable.
|
|
#
?
Aug 10, 2012 21:31
|
|
|
I will post some of my steel artwork here. I don't have pictures on my computer of my blacksmithing work. My USB cable is broken. I will have to post them later. I think this forum would appreciated the tools and decorative things that that I've made more. Don't get me wrong, my art is very meaningful to me, but my practical things show my skill more. My avatar also shows one of my pieces.   (the chair) 
ArtistCeleste fucked around with this message at 05:37 on Aug 11, 2012 |
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2012 05:31
|
|
|
OK, the forge is almost completed, I'm just missing some firebrick, the vice/anvil, and fuel. How many pounds of lump hardwood charcoal would be a good start? Will I need hundreds of pounds? How much do you guys go through in a single session?
|
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2012 01:07
|
|
|
areyoucontagious posted:OK, the forge is almost completed, I'm just missing some firebrick, the vice/anvil, and fuel. How many pounds of lump hardwood charcoal would be a good start? Will I need hundreds of pounds? How much do you guys go through in a single session?
|
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2012 04:53
|
|
|
I've got no idea weight-wise, but I went through an entire big-rear end paper bag, like garbage-bag sized, of hardwood charcoal in a day. But I was probably at the forge for a good 8-10 hours so not typical. To be honest, I hate store-bought lump- for whatever reason it throws sparks like crazy, something about the way it's prepared. I prefer burning my own charcoal, it's really not hard if you have an outdoor place you can do it in. I literally just burn a barrel full of even-sized wood, wait until the fire's "eaten through" the wood and it's really settling in volume but before it goes too white-ashey, and cap it with a piece of steel sheet, let it cool overnight, done. e: In retrospect coal was a dream to work with once (when I took an initial weekend class at a proper forge) it'd be neat to use it in the workshop I have on my family's cottage up north but 1) chimneys suddenly become real important, whereas charcoal burns clean enough to just need a well-ventilated, airy workspace, 2) it's real hard to find, 3) it still costs more than charcoal, which is functionally free (burn hardwood shipping pallets, they're Free Everywhere). Ambrose Burnside fucked around with this message at 05:12 on Aug 13, 2012 |
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2012 05:04
|
|
|
I'd definitely like to make my own charcoal, but in the meantime I can use the stuff from the store? Also, some of it is mesquite or whatever, can I still use that stuff?
|
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2012 05:48
|
|
|
areyoucontagious posted:OK, the forge is almost completed, I'm just missing some firebrick, the vice/anvil, and fuel. How many pounds of lump hardwood charcoal would be a good start? Will I need hundreds of pounds? How much do you guys go through in a single session? Hello Austin goon, bout time there is someone closer to me that is interested in forging. I would totally drive up to Canada, but It's way too far for the weekend. I'm in Houston, but I am in Austin every couple of weeks. You can buy metal at Westbrook Metals (658 Canion Austin, TX 78752), their prices are reasonable. The best place would be Ashley salvage in San Antonio,Tx pretty low price for 20' lengths of round/square steel. They also have a salvage pile you can pick thru. I will see if I can put some tongs together for you, and I might have something I can hard face and surface grind, that you can use as a anvil. I will see if I can put a little kit together for you, I got some spare stuff. You would need to supply your own tree stump tho for the anvil. I got a small gas forge I use mostly for making knives. I don't really do much during the summer tho, at least your starting early. If you want to build a bigger forge that requires welding, I would be more then happy to help. Another place for forging knowledge would be the ATXhackerspace, they will most likely have someone that knows about blacksmithing, I think they are trying to offer a metal casting class too. I hope your not pissing you neighbors off with all the pinging in the backyard.
|
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2012 07:28
|
|
|
You are awesome! I would greatly appreciate any assistance- a set of tongs would be great. I was going to spring for the Oldworldanvils 4"x4" starter anvil (http://www.oldworldanvils.com/anvils/4x4.html), would that be a good option? What is involved with facing and grinding a piece of steel for an anvil? Is it expensive? I don't want to be a burden!
|
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2012 15:07
|
|
|
areyoucontagious posted:You are awesome! I would greatly appreciate any assistance- a set of tongs would be great. I was going to spring for the Oldworldanvils 4"x4" starter anvil (http://www.oldworldanvils.com/anvils/4x4.html), would that be a good option? What is involved with facing and grinding a piece of steel for an anvil? Is it expensive? I don't want to be a burden! It's not too bad, I was going to use this guide http://www.metalwebnews.com/howto/anvil1/anvil2.html for the hard facing, but I was going to build something similar to what you linked, which is a great option too. I already had plans to make one for myself so building two at the same time would be no big deal. I work at a automatic welding company, so material and hard facing wire will be free. I should be in Austin for labor day weekend, if I don't goto Japan. I will keep the tread updated with the progress of the anvil build. When do you plan to fire up the forge?
|
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2012 16:21
|
|
|
That guide is bananas! It will be a hell of a project, I'm looking forward to seeing your progress. I can definitely wait for labor day- I need a vise anyway, so I was thinking of getting the forge going this weekend and do a little smithing on the anvil face of the vise. I'll hold off on the old-word anvil 4x4- I'm excited to see what kind of anvil you can produce!
|
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2012 16:36
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 25, 2024 22:00 |
|
|
Saw this on Hackaday and thought of you guys with your forges and furnaces and metal science stuff. http://hackaday.com/2012/08/13/building-a-casting-furnace-with-heat-exchanger/ Find stuff like this on that site is why I lurk this thread. Always wanted to be a blacksmith when I was a kid.
|
|
#
?
Aug 13, 2012 17:53
|
|