Things worth doing
This is a blog that has stuff that I am made. I like to call myself a crafter. So here are some stuff that is worth doing.
This is a casting stick thing that I forged today. I made it out of rebar. I use the hook end to scoop out the dross that is in the aluminum cans that I melt down. The L end is to hold the crucible. It makes it easier to take it out of the foundry and it makes it easier to pour with it. The crucible is my new one. I bought a steel 2 inch diameter pipe with a fitting cap and cut a slot to put the casting stick in. Smelting is so much easier now.
Here is a video of me forging a knife out of a railroad spike.
My neighbor goes hunting and he gave me the hide. This is a deer hide. I made a frame to nail the hide to. I am getting the fat and meat off the hide in this picture. The knife that I am using in the picture is actually something I forged earlier but never posted anything about because I forgot.
Here is the finished knife. Well, not really finished but the blade part is done. I am pretty happy with how it turned out. I used the grinder to make the blade and to make one side shiny. I couldn’t decide I liked better the shiny side or the dark side. Any thoughts? Hopefully, I will get better at this.
A picture of me hitting a railroad spike with a hammer. I was trying to make a blade. I know the hammer I am using isn’t for black smithing but that is what I had so oh well. I used the new foundry to heat up the spike.
The top picture is of a lead ingot. I used a small loaf pan for the mold. In the bottom picture, the left ingot is aluminum and the right one is the same lead ingot. The lead ingot is so heavy that it makes the aluminum ingot feel like it is a feather. I used the new foundry to melt these babies.
Here is the new foundry. It still uses two coffee cans for the base of it but now I have bricks to support it from moving around so much when I put stuff in it. Also with the bricks, it retains a lot more heat. It got so hot that it started to melt some iron nails I put in.
Here is the completed sword. This piece of metal can’t hold a blade at all but the blade I did manage to put on it still cut me a few times so it is useful for something.
