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My dad picked up a nice 6 inch bench grinder at a yard sale for me last year, thanks Dad!
Grinders, of all kinds, are deceptively dangerous tools in the shop. The wheels spin at high RPMs and they can grab and throw the work at you. If the work happens to be a [...]

Saturday I went with fellow amatuer smith,Jeff, to Pontiac, IL to the Upper Midwest Regional Blacksmithing Conference
A great day. We saw Lorelai Sims demo some forging techniques. Bought a pair of Tom Tongs, and coolest of all picked up my first leg vise (sometimes called a post vise) for $25.
Here it is temporarily [...]

Some people have been asking questions about how I fit all the hobbies into my extremely tiny house in our residential neighborhood.
Well, the hobbies only take up a 2 car garage, and is lot more low-tech than most people might imagine. To give you an idea of just how low tech it all is [...]

Colonial Williamsburg is the largest living history museum in the world, and conducts a great deal of archaeological research into the practices and methods of colonial American work and craftmanship. They have large functioning blacksmithing and woodworking shops that even act as part of the daily life of Williamsurg. For example: If the [...]

[DISCLAIMER: This involves building a steel forge to burn coal in at temperatures so hot that IT CAN LITERALLY BURN THE STEEL UP! Take all necessary precautions. When you are drilling the holes in the steel wear eye protection. When you are using your forge always wear pants over heavy boots, a [...]

Introduction
Ever since I read Roy Underhill’s Woodwright’s Shop I have had a desire to learn some basic blacksmithing skills. So this fall with Julia’s encouragement I signed up for the classes.
I am going to try and document each night’s project with pictures and explanations of what we did so that you can try it [...]