Sword Forum Bugei

Hey guys!

So, as I was exploring in my previous thread, I was looking into various methods of making a forge. Since I live in a little podunk town and am at least 2 or 3 hours from a city large enough to obtain the clay I need to finish my forge(Yeah, I know...middle of NOWHERE!), I decided to use a temporary one.

Rather than play with the one I was making, I decided to build one into the hill in the back of my house. We have this beautiful incline near the back fence, in which I dug a pit and have lined it with Firebricks. I put the steel pipe underneath, have a longer extension, and am using a Hand Vacuum Cleaner, with the bag removed, as my "bellows". I'll try and get a picture up but my digital camera broke!

Anyhow, my question now is what kind of steel should I be using? I picked up some scrap from a steelyard when I was in the city, but I'm not sure if it's any good. I've been working with it, mostly just practicing to make sure my forge works(which it does, quite beautifully actually!).

I did have some slight problems; I heated a piece of steel, apparently to hot but I didn't know at the time, to a temperature where when I pulled it out of the charcoal it was shooting off spark like a sparkler firework. I thought to myself, "Yeah, awesome! This hot it will be easy to work!" and I put it down on my Anvil and started in on it, only to have the end shatter and send little bits of semi molten steel all over my work area!

I'm still learning about temperatures, right now I'm working on a pair of tongs. I think I read somewhere it's always good to start with tools.

Anyhow, here are some questions;
...What steel should I be using? Is scrapyard steel alright? Is there a way to test it to see if it's usable?
...Can I use Railroad Spikes?
...What are some good books to get into the basics? I may have built a usable forge, but I know little about specific temperatures or even basic metallurgy.
...What are some good, beginner friendly projects I could be working on?

As always, thanks for your time.
Zach

Google Don Fogg, and have fun!

I use several different suppliers however I often order from Acklands and I order O1 and L6 bar stock to forge together for my work...

B Shaw

Hi Zach, welcome to the wonderful world of blacksmithing!

It looks like your forge is working excellently, much better than the first forge I created! That first bar you heated above welding temperature, so hot it actually started burning! That's what all the sparks were.

Generally you want to work metal between orange & yellow hot, cherry red is a bit too cool to work easily, and white much to hot unless your trying your hand at welding.

I don't know exactly how your set up, but generally you want to be out of bright light as it makes it hard to judge the steel temperature. If you are set up outside, perhaps you can make a bit of a shelter over the forge?

Lee Valley has several books you can take a look at. This one ( http://www.leevalley.com/en/wood/page.a ... 6096,46130 ) is quite good, from the basics to more advanced techniques. If you are interested in japanese swordsmithing, take a look at John Smith's Youtube channel ( http://www.youtube.com/user/smithforge ), very informative.

For practice just about any sort of steel will work well. Round rebar (without the ridges) works well for practice, but won't be particularly good for projects as they are low carbon & will bend easily under any sort of use. Old files are an excellent source of high carbon steel, as are car & truck springs. Truck leaf springs are good bar stock, but if you find helical car springs you can practice on your forging temperatures by straightening them out.

Hope that helps,


Simon W