Blacksmithing and Cutlery by Gérard HEUTTE Home Index A..Z Map About... Contact Links Bibliography Events Achievements Beginners Practical Metallurgy Workshop Cutlery Forge For Sale

The workshop and tools All which is necessary to approach serenely the work of the blacksmith and the cutler! Opposite, three main tools of the blacksmith: - Anvil - Hammer - Tongs... There are much others but less essential! For the cutler the list could be long. Better is worth to have some tools of good quality you will use brilliantly, rather than a heap of gadgets. The Forge A hearth of forge is essential. The range of what is usable is very broad! The forges with gas and the forges with coal will be distinguished. The forges with gas are an expensive purchase but practical and economic with the usage. Some guys make themselves their gas forge, but it is better to have good knowledge in gas burner. The main advantage of the gas forge is the short pre-heating time. Its disadvantage is to not allow local heatings. The forges with coal are easier to build! It is just an area to put coal and with an air flow coming from the bottom or the side. On the other hand, they are longer to start. They allow local heatings of parts. Among the possibilities, you will find: - The ground forge . In general, it is a hole in the ground with some bricks laid out around. - The barbecue associated with the hair drier. In general, the bottom of the barbecue ends up disaggregating except if it is protected (by Brasque for example) - Assembly of a hearth in a metal body. See an example with the " U-shaped forge ". The anvil For hot working of metal a support is necessary. Several solutions are possible: Anvil The anvil is one of the solutions. The difficulty is to get it. New, they are out of price! Of second-hand, the prices are in general rather high. The prices rise since some jokers (to stay polite) find that the anvils make pretty supports for flowers pots ! It is necessary to speak about it around yourself, to read the newspapers with advertisements, to go to see the former craftsmen or farmers. Opposite, a small model of 25 kg. Stack In the absence of a true anvil, a stack can be appropriate. A Stack is a parallelepipedic block of steel. Contrary to the anvil, it does not have horns. This point, blocking for the iron worker is not for the cutler. The four sharp angles are quite practical to forge the edges. Here is a correctly built stack. Part of railroad rail It is also possible to use a modified railroad rail. You can make a horn. The top (generally slightly curvature) will be levelled to make the table. It will be necessary to drill four holes on the basis for fixing, or use some clamps (or jumpers). To work at ease, the anvil will be fixed on a stand. This block will be preferably out of soft wood (pine, linden, poplar). The final height of the table of the anvil will be between the belt and the crotch according to the user. Opposite a stand of 80 kg. Its high weight will compensate partly the lightness of the anvil (25 kg). If the anvil "rings", you can decrease the vibrations level by one of the following methods: - Stick a large magnet under horn. - Place the anvil in a hooping filled with sand at the top of the stand. - Suspend at one side a leather belt with a large weight. Jointly to the anvil, a hot-cutter is quite practical to cut hot metal. It positions on the anvil with the edge upwards. Hammers The hammers are the basic tools of the blacksmith. No need to have a collection of it! To start, two hammers are enough. A large hammer (1.5 to 2kg) will be used for large work of stretching. A lighter hammer (700g to 1kg) will allow the completions and delicate work. Attention, to avoid marking the surface of metal, it is necessary that the flat face is slightly curved. Moreover, all the edges of the hammer must be rounded. If necessary, modify them with the angle grinder, then polish them. The striking surface should not have marks which would be printed in metal on each blow. Opposite, the shape of the head on a new hammer and what it must become! Here is the result on a hammer. The striking surface (and edges) of the hammer have been reworked again and polished (a 240 grit is quite sufficient). The handles will be preferably in dogwood, false acacia or beech. Maintain it with linseed oil (immersion or distempering). Tongs The tongs are essential to handle the part in the hearth of the forge. There are many kinds. The absolute minimum is a flat tong. A good blacksmith is able to manufacture his tongs. Take care of the length of the branches, which must be long enough to not be burned. Here is a quick method to make tongs. Accessories of the forge Besides these fundamental tools, a certain number of accessories or secondary tools are quite useful for blacksmithing: - A water can (to sprinkle the hearth or to cool parts) - A can with coal Files The files are essential. You will use them for: - Working on the parts. One will choose some bastardes or averages files. A set of some flat, half-round and round files will allow to carry out almost all work. - The file work. It is preferable to buy a set of needle files with at least: Flat, square, triangular and round. Some remarks about the files: - A good file is rather expensive. Count at least about fifteen euros for a flat bastard file. - Calamine is destroying for the files. Bleach the blade with the forge before and/or to remove the calamine with angle grinder (handled finely) and/or immersion of the blade in white vinegar during half a day. - Separate the new files (for work of quality on the blades), of the old ones (for "anything"). - For the flat files, take care that one side is smooth, to be able to file in a corner by attacking only one of the sides. Abrasives For the completion, the abrasives are impossible to circumvent. I will not speak here about the backstand which is an excellent rather expensive tool. Manual abrasion is more "common" among amateurs! The abrasives in band or sheets are almost available everywhere. It is advised to use them with a sandind block for the flat or slightly convex surfaces. It is possible to use two kinds of paper: - coachbuilder's paper. It is used with water. It is appropriate for steel. One finds it in grits 80, 120, 240, 400 and 600. The finer grits are not very common. However, it is possible to find the 1000 grit in the good do-it-yourself shops. - "Standard" paper. It is used dry. It is appropriate for wood and brass. You can also find it in various grits. For wood, a 600 grit already gives a beautiful aspect. For the "higher" completions, one should test: Scotch tape-brit or a rag with abrasive pastes. Drilling machine Difficult to make a knife without drilling hole. You should choose a drilling machine on column, with his vice. It is the guarantee (relative ) for drilling orthogonal to the surface! Buy drills of good quality. It is necessary to avoid the boxes, attractive for the price, but not always of good quality. Prefer buy them singly. You will need a good set from 1 to 6mm. Vice Choose a good vice of mechanics and fix it to a strong stand. Prepare two movable jaws out of tender metal, plastic or sheet on which you will stick two leather bands. This will thus avoid marking the blade during the work. Files to test hardness To know the hardness of steel, there are special machines but which are out of price, unless falling on a good second-hand. With defect, you can use a set of files with calibrated hardness level. Work from the harder to the softer to see which one will "hang" the metal. There is thus an idea of hardness in a range of some HRC points (2 or 3 with experience). Attention, it is not a question to file the blade, but just to see whether the file slips or not. Not need to force! Unfortunately, this extremely useful tool is also rather expensive. It is necessary to count approximately 100 euros (without VAT) for a set of 6 files from 40 to 65HRC. Accessories for assembly For the assemblies of the handles on tang or for full-tang, a certain number of small ustensils or accessories can be quite useful: - Glue. I have a weakness for bi-component araldite with long drying time. Obviously, it is necessary to have a little patience, but you will have some time to position correctly the parts, to fix them, clean the burs... - Domestic film for microwave. This transparent film is used to protect the blade during the assembly. You can thus avoid ugly stains of glue. - Various grips or clamps. Clamp with parallel strength. Expensive but efficient ! Spring grip Epoxy Glue Always useful thingummies Here are some other quite useful tools: - Hacksaw. - Various grips. - A set to trace: Punch, reglet, square, scriber. - Slide caliper. - Micrometer (see opposite); Especially useful for the manufacture of the folding knives which do not joke with parallelism. In general, the slide caliper is quite sufficient!