Not the cleanest hammering in the world. Left the forge scale, handled in rock maple. That is all I have in the shop with hard straight grain. Will probably have to replace the handle later.
It's not all blacksmithing! One of last night's projects was tacking up the awesome little triangle from Fireball Tool Company. They offer three different DIY squares that are just plain awesome. I need all the welding practice I can get, so these things were a godsend. And just to keep it blacksmith-ish..... these squares will be used to build the new hammer/tong cart I've been thinking about forever. If you do any carpentry or metal work, absolutely consider getting yourself a set of squares from Fireball Tool. They are just too handy to not have in the shop!
More stuff ready to head on to a good home! Also got the gumption up to finally get a set of soft jaws for the vise made up. I had some 2x2x1/8 angle iron scrap from a trailer ramp repair I did for a local fellow and decided to take the cut-off disk to it. Worked like a charm, too. Only blew up one disk, but I was wearing my fancy apron and all the bits just bounced off. Now all I have to do is weld up the joints, sand everything smooth, and the pair will be ready for some pictures. Tomorrow's plan, another anniversary dish and a few pendants have to be made. I might weld up some stuff since I have some stuff needing welding. Oh, and I'm waiting for a new Tilman apron to get here so I can tinker with modifying it. Got the leather-working bug after the fancy apron adventure, so I'm going to putzy around and see how I can adapt the Tilman to make it better than OEM. Irons in the fire, folks. Always irons in the fire!
Worked all night to get the orders forged and the boxes filled. Ugh! One of these days, I'll have some power tools to help.... and my arm will thank me. Got the boxes to the post office about 9:30. Now I'm kicking back, drinking a cold beer and waiting for the ibuprofen to kick in. As soon as that happens, I'm getting comatose and will start on the next orders on the roster when the sun goes down. Tell me again how awesome it is to be a blacksmith?????
Hand's down, the best tongs I've ever handled! Big thanks go to Jakob over at Faram Forge for his incredible skills. He's set the bar mighty high!! Until you see a pair first-hand, you just can't understand how amazing his work is!
The guy is absolutely amazing. I can't wait to get more tongs from him! I think the next pair I get will be something to hold the 1/4x1/2 blanks more securely while I turn them into hooks. I'd love to find someone that would cut this stuff for me, but until then.... This is 10' of bar cut into 6" lengths.
Yeah, he made me some bolt tongs to hold 1/4'' square and Scroll tongs. Took some convincing for him to make the bolt tongs though. You using a normal bandsaw, or the auto ones?
I have an Ellis bandsaw to do the cutting, but it doesn't have auto-feed or such. To cut out all these pieces, you have to line the bar up, cut off a chunk and then repeat the process ad nauseum. I tried bundling the bars so I could cut several pieces at the same time, but that's proven to be a complete pain and not appreciably faster than simply cutting a single stick. I don't have room for more equipment in the shop, but I'm thinking about buying a manual shear just to make chopping these bits a little faster. That brings up issues, though, since none of the shears I've seen have any kind of length guide and I really don't have the room to add yet another table or stand. Makes me wish I had a nice hydraulic press so I could fab up a shear fixture for it and kill two birds with one stone!