They don’t worry about it because all their equipment is 100% indoors.
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Could we partner with them to hold classes until we get up and running so we can get more people up to speed and cross pollinate. Help grow their membership as well and do some combine social media post expanding both our audiences. Wednesday is Communications Committee meeting but I can come take pictures after, I live 10 minutes from there walking.
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It’s a thought that has crossed my mind once or twice. I don’t know how receptive to that they will be as it might limit our members availability to learn based on their shops hours or tie up their forges from their own people to teach us. If they are on board with the idea I might try and see if we could set a time outside their public times for us (which would require extra time commitment from them) or maybe the possibility of trusting one of the forge committee with the ‘keys to the castle’ (Not as likely but you never know unless you ask).
As far as “up to speed” goes when Rust and I got to pick Lee’s brain for a bit on forges he made the offer of instructing a knife making class. That is a fairly big ‘get’ for us if we can get the forge itself hammered out.
[for reference Lee Crawford was a contestant on the series ‘Forged In Fire’, specifically Season 6 “Battle of the Braches:Navy” where he won and “Battle of the Branches: Final” where he did not but put on a herculean effort considering time restraints of the show. If you even have a chance to talk in person see if he will show you pictures of his cavalry saber build, it is absolutely beautiful.]
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Cool!
I personally would love to see basic safety and authorization classes taught here and then some kind of go down and apprentice under the masters in Haysville. It could be something as simple as “bring us a leaf you forged” and that, along with your safety classes would get you carte blanche access to the gas/coal forges in the space. We can even do a badge sticker. At least in the beginning this would get us a number of people who are qualified and trained by people who are proven in the blacksmithing community.
That said, I’m about to schedule some classes on “know your propane forge” that will cover familiarity with the parts, basic construction (not enough to make your own, that would be a separate class) and go through the procedure to light the forge and how to turn it off and store it safely. I will bring over my personal forge for the demo until we have everything set up for use in the space and can do authorizations
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I’m all for getting some basic knowledge under peoples belts, and having a ‘know your forge’ class on the roll even before we get rolling may draw a lot more attention from our non-forum trolling members. Might even be helpful just to bring it out and light it up so we can get some base noise levels at certain distances outdoors at a few possible areas.
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Lighting it up and showing how to turn it down safely and store it are also part of my class proposal
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I have stayed out of this discussion until now.
For starters I have been blacksmithing for roughly 40 years. I also helped found the Great Plains Blacksmith association. Currently called Central States Metal Artisans in Haysville.
It costs $20.00 a year to join, Get their training and you will be safe working in a forge.
The hours are Mondays and Wednesdays 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm, and the first Saturday of each month see their news letter for details, it’s part of the membership.
Casting: the Jewelry lab has everything needed for casting Jewelry, you supply the meatal.
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Wow. Fourty years is a lifetime of knowledge. I’d love to sit down and pick your brain for a bit to get your take on, well, everything. I am an enthusiastic neophyte at best but it’s never stopped me from giving it a whack on my (no) budget-build personal forges. Joining MakeICT has been the first real time I’ve had access to enough machines to even think of doing one up right.
The ‘plan’ is myself and probably a handful of committee and hopefully board members will come calling to the CSMA shop tomorrow around 7p to ask some questions and take a look at what a professional blacksmithy looks like. More then likely I’ll be tossing a $20 down just to start off advancing my own knowledge base and hopefully bring it to the baby MakeICT program if/when we get it off the ground.
My hope is to get enough combined years of experience on the committee that we can seize the moment and build off the enthusiastic neophytes like myself and get a good, safe program started. I never envision getting a program as big as CSMA but a small to medium program where MakeICT and CSMA could work together and fill possible gaps in the offerings of the other might be in the cards? Who knows, I’m a pessimistic dreamer so I like to aim my disappointments high.
And I think the casting in mind was somewhat… bigger? Like bookends or other large things that one might make of poured of molten metal. I know Campus used to make colt-head coat hangers or mantle pieces? Not 100% on that as I really wasn’t interested in casting as I was trying blacksmithing.
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I agree I think being complimentary in what both groups offer is a good thing. There are many areas I am sure we can supplement each other.
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Friendly reminder today (May 26) is the pilgrimage/recon to CSMA in Haysville. Safety glasses and non-sythetic (leather preferred) close toe shoes are recommended. My target time to meet is 7pm ish.
For myself I have already put in my membership application ( more of a questionnaire) and paid dues so as we try to get our own program fired up I can start learning a bit of the art from some experienced artisans in hopes of applying it at makeict.
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One question worth asking is if we can have stuff hardened.
Like if I grab some tool steel and an angle grinder and shape out a screwdriver can I have someone heat treat it for me without a bunch of classes and stuff.
Case hardening should be possible. If my memory serves it’s just quenching in carbon rich oil. Used motor oil is what I’ve seen used.
I always assumed the phrase "forged in the blood of my enemies " meant it was quenched in someone’s chest.
That would be a good DND event. You must quench this blade in the heart of a shuchnsuch…
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Depending on the grade of tool steel, it can be done with just the torch even. Shade tree mechanic style is just dunk everything in used motor oil. There are air hardening, water hardening, and oil hardening steels, though. All should be tempered to a hardness that depends on the characteristics you want in the tool. Tool steel doesn’t case harden. Case hardening is not a thorough hardening, which is why casenite or used oil can be used to harden metals such as mild steel. A screwdriver would be a pretty basic thing to do, but even then, care must be taken to ensure that it is quenched evenly so that it doesn’t warp. Far more critical on a shaft spinning several thousand RPM, or even a knife, but a bent screwdriver can be pretty annoying to use, too.
Yea,
So if I make myself a new skiving knife or awl, I’ll want it hardened and… whatever-ed. They would be way better at it than anything I could put together in my garage.
In my line of work bent screwdriver is just another name for prybar.
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That’s how it got bent in the first place!
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Should have bought a better prybar.
Just thinking forward a little, eventually we are going to need things like a power hammer, etc. Wherever we site the forge outside maybe we need to be looking at is this a suitable area that eventually we can extend the building to make it an inside area, somewhere that running power, water etc to is easier rather than harder?