Blacksmithing 101: How to Make A Forge & Start Hammering Metal

If you want to work with metal, there's one thing you have to confront: You need heat. With it, you can make the toughest metal submit to your will. Without it, you'll never gain full mastery over this stubborn material. Over the years, I have been frustrated by my inability to work hot steel. I've bolted metal together, welded it and soldered it. But blacksmithing never felt alien. Building the Forge Maybe it's because our smokestack industries are in decline that a rising number of Americans feel the need to get their metalworking fix in home workshops. First, I needed a forge. I enlisted the help of Mike Allen, our senior auto editor and a crack metalworker. Once the supplies were in, we set to work building the forge, beginning with its stand. With the stand tacked, he flipped up his mask and handed me the welding gun: "You take it from here." After we comÂpleted the stand, we riveted sheetmetal into a hood and fashioned a chimney from a 5-ft piece of stovepipe. Firing the Coal

Artist Blacksmith Forging Iron Leaf Starting To Blacksmith Forging the Hammer Blacksmith Basics Blacksmithing - Appropriate technology: Journey to Forever With an anvil and a hammer a blacksmith can make everything else he needs. Then he makes everything everyone else needs: the farmers, builders, carpenters, craftsmen, householders, cooks. Tools for Self Reliance: Practical Help to Practical People Overseas -- "In the struggle to develop, bare hands are not enough -- Could you work without tools?" This British charity supports workers in some of the world's poorest countries by providing basic hand-tools and promoting local tool-making. TFSR refurbishes second-hand hand tools and sewing machines collected from British homes and sends them to community groups in Africa. "The Blacksmith and the Farmer -- Rural Manufacturing in Sub-Saharan Africa" by David Poston, 1994, Practical Action, ISBN 1853391271 Poston's recognition of the significance of traditional blacksmithing to rural economies came during a study visit to Zaire and Zambia in 1986. "The Art of Blacksmithing" by Alex W. "The Complete Modern Blacksmith" by Alexander G. Machining

Indiana Blacksmithing Association, Inc.