Forge welding attempt1

Now that my forge is up, running and ready. I decided that I would try some pattern welding, that I've been wanting to do since I started building my forge.... It didn't work. I'm not entirely dissappointed, the failed welding is minor compared to the actual experience of going through the actual process. Seeing for myself the welding temperature that I have been reading and researching, the occasional spark flying out of the forge indicating the steel reaching temperature, and seeing the flux dance around. All these things were what many smiths taught to look for. My diagnosis is that the "stainless steel" I got from the scrapyard in of a disagreeable alloy ,smiths say certain fire scales are hard to get rid of therefore difficult to weld. I will Change steels and try again, it feels so close!

My forge live!

Finally all is together and cooking. With in 14-20 minutes it's good to forge. I'm confident it will get to welding heat after a bit of time and tweaking. 

Tongs2

To trey out my newly assembled forge I wanted to make some tong. I saw this idea of making tongs on polar bear blacksmith supplies

PlatAfrica

PlatAfrica

Today I finally finished my platinum piece for the PlatAfrica. I am mostly happy with it. Thank you to everyone for being do patient and accommodating. 

PlatAfrica

For the platinum competition I was experimenting with repousse, I know technically it's not repousse but I was able to achieve a similar effect through fly pressing the metal. This is done by piecing out a die/stencil and placing the sheet of metal behind the die and compressing two pieces of wood and rubber to force the metal through into the die. 

BURNERS!

My forge burners arrived in the post. I'm so excited, unbelievably excited to. Set them up and get going. 

PlatAfrica test piece

In the mad rush to get my platinum piece finalized, I was busy with my test repousse piece on Thursday. It looks a bit frumpy but it will get better with the practice. I need to polish up the punches I had made on Thursday. 

PlatAfrica 2014

For the PlayAfrica platinum competition this year, I am going to be doing some repousse. Inserting the platinum onto the top of a beautifully carved African black wood ring. I will post drawings later, here are some pictures of the punches I made today to help me with the job. The three on the left are yet to be heat tereated and polished. 

A make shift forge with some kiln shelving. 

Functional and pleasing to the eye. 

Guitar bridge piece

To take a break from the craze was of my current situation. I made a new bridge piece for a friend of mine, the bridge piece on his Gretch was cracked. The bridge piece is made from African black wood. Sanded to 400 grit and finished with some bees wax to seal it. 

 

The original looks like it may have been a type of rose wood, it was lite weight. And roughly finished, not what you would expect if you're paying R12 000 for a guitar. I'm sure they have good reason for using this specific type of wood but I know the African black wood will be plenty strong enough, if not better sounding.  

Leather work

Part of the tool making was to make leather working tools to helps with making knife sheaths last year 

Knives

These are a few knive from last year. Originally I had started off my Bachelors degree in the direction using jewellery skills to explore knife making hence the knives. This year direction has changed slightly now I will be more focused on smithing. 

Seal ring

This is a sneak peak of the process of how I forged a seal ring. There is a question mark next in the picture because I will be exploring this process more in time to come. To find better more efficient ways of forging, and make tools to make the job easier

Tools

This is a picture of some of the tools I have forges and made to help me with forging. The tongs I forged to help me with forging the steel seal ring I was working on. The other tools were made as needed a skill that has become very apparent over this past time of the Bachelors degree