Niels Provos (Entries tagged as blacksmithing)

Casting a forge-shell from Kast-O-Lite 30 LI

nospam@example.com (Niels Provos) — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 17:26:07 -0700

Here are some pictures of my recent forge rebuild. When I originally started to look into refractory concrete as an option, I noticed that there were not a lot of articles on the web describing the process of casting a forge shell from refractory concrete. While many of the steps are pretty straightforward and do not significantly differ from using regular concrete, some people might still find my experience with using Kast-O-Lite 30 LI useful. My need for a new forge arose after some extended forge welding and bloom consolidation caused the roof of my previous forge to cave in. After thinking of different ways to construct a new forge, I decided to go with refractory concrete as it can take more abuse than the kaowool based solution I had employed previously. Kast-O-Lite 30 LI seemed like it fit the bill with a maximum use temperature of 3000F which is not something I am likely to reach unless I am over boiling iron. For general forging, Kast-O-Lite 26 would have been better suited as it provides better heat insulation but I had the 30 LI concrete available. Here is an outline of the process:

The construction used five pieces of concrete: Two sides, one roof, and two pegs. Where the pieces met, I had to split the angle, so used 22.5 degrees on each side of the different pieces. The end result was going to be a shell that would support itself. The first step was creating the forms from 2x4 and some wooden boards. The forge itself is about 13in long, and about 9in high. To get the angles, I used a bandsaw with a swiveling table that I could dial to 22.5 degrees. The measurements that determines the spacing of the pieces were all done on the outside and piece of 2x4 was attached to the board with wood screws. Here is how they looked like.

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The Serpent in the Sword continued...

nospam@example.com (Niels Provos) — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 21:06:24 -0700

The Serpent in the Sword project is slowly progressing. I have posted a couple more videos documenting the process. In part 2, the bevels of the sword are forged, the geometry is established on a belt sander and the sword is finally heat treated. In part 3, the sword fittings are made, e.g. the lower and upper guard as well as the pommel and wooden hilt. If things go right, the sword will be finished just in time to my visit to Germany in July. The Viking museum in Haithabu has a special event in which 20 Viking ships will sail to its harbor. There is also the new Viking Puppet Theater which should be fun to watch. It's called "Wikinger Puppentheater Ygdrasil" and has it's premiere in April at the museum in Haithabu.

The Serpent in the Sword

nospam@example.com (Niels Provos) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 22:47:00 -0800

Inspired by "The Serpent in the Sword" from Lee A Jones, I embarked on the quest of forging a pattern-welded double-edged sword that has a visual serpent at its core. The video shows my progress over about 7 days of work. Pattern-welding in addition to structural benefits is also visually very attractive. The sword in this video is constructed from a total of seven bars. Two edge bars, two twisted bars and three bars for the serpent. The whole process while using modern tools is very similar to the one that anglo-saxon or viking-age blacksmiths might have employed. Each step in created a pattern-welded sword is explained and narrated in the video above.

Forging a Chest Handle

nospam@example.com (Niels Provos) — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 18:25:59 -0700

As my work on the Mästermyr-like chest is slowly coming to completion, I noticed that due to thicker planks, the chest is getting too heavy to carry comfortably without handles. Although, the original chest did not have any handles, I decided to forge handles anyway. None of the books in my library had good illustrations of Viking-age handles but the simple design above is going to fit with the hardware I have forged so far.

This handle was forged from a 7in long piece of 3/4in round steel. I isolated a 1in piece in the middle by fullering with a spring fuller at 3in and 4in from the end. After the middle piece was isolated, I tapered both sides to 1/4in so that each end was about 6in in length. The transitions were square, octagon and then round as usual. Each end was bend at 3in over the horn of the anvil.

The loops were forged from 1/4in thick and 1in wide rectangular steel. I used a butcher to get a tenon that could be forged down to 1/4in round and then drilled a 1/2in hole for the eye where the handle is going to fit through.

To make the handle stop rotating at 90 degrees, i.e. to avoid squeezing the hands, I put each end of the handle in the vise and used a set hammer to bend a stop that is going to engage with the plate, see the picture. The base plate is 1/8in thick and the loops where riveted to it with the handle in place. The whole process took about 5 hours.

Surprisingly, aside from a couple blacksmithing books, I could not find any article on the web that shows how to forge a chest handle.

Cable Tantos

nospam@example.com (Niels Provos) — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 19:16:18 -0800

Although, I have made various attempts at forging knives, this tanto is the first knife I have completed. It's a shinogi-zukuri tanto with choji hamon. The steel was made from forge-welded high carbon cable. Originally, this was supposed to become a wakizashi, but due to a bad hammer blow when forging the sunobe, I had to fold it over and no longer had enough steel for a longer blade. As a result, the blade is only about 9in long. The habaki was made from brazed copper and the shira-saya was carved from a popular blank.

The picture to the left shows two more cable tantos in various stages of progress. The top one had some rough grinding done to it whereas the bottom one is straight from the forge. Only about 10% of the time is actually spent forging the blades. The rest of time is spent grinding, polishing and working on the habaki as well as on the saya and everything else.

Testing the Zowada Forced-Air Manifold

nospam@example.com (Niels Provos) — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 21:21:48 -0700

I had time to forge down the 2in pipe for the nozzle today which completed everything needed for the burner. Here is a video of the first test run. Propane and air can be mixed separately via the gate valves which should allow precise control over the atmosphere in the forge.

Making A Monkey Tool

nospam@example.com (Niels Provos) — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 14:23:45 -0700

I learned how to make a monkey tool today. Monkey tools can be used for dressing tenons. The basic procedure is as follows.
Take 1in square stock and chamfer the edges. Take a slot punch and move it about an 1in from the corner - this is the hammer end. Line the slot punch up very carefully, so that its straight and divides the stock in the middle. Hit it a couple times to get a registration. Now, get the stock nice and hot, align the slot punch with the registration, hit it hard three times, cool the slot punch in water, rotate it by 180 degrees and repeat. At some point, the slot punch is almost through, flip the stock over and use the slot punch to punch out the remaining piece of metal. Now, use a drift to open up the hole to the desired size. Start the drift from the other side of the slot. Doing this over the hardy hole is a good idea. With the slot still inserted, dress up the faces. Then chamfer the corners. Cut off the other side for the length of the tenon and drill a hole of the right size.
That's it. Out of the four holes I drifted only two came out sort of in the middle