Emmortal’s Weblog

Soooooo, the installation fell through for today, and I hadn’t packed a full lunch.  My stomach was already grumbling at the thought of going through the day without enough food.   Fortunately for me, Charlie and I were having too much fun playing around in the forge to really notice.  I finished my third pair of tongs, which are the ugliest things, but they work on round stock pretty well, so I’m only mildly complaining.   Then Charlie and I both attempted to copy that Jim Wycoff hook, but once again, mine didn’t turn out well.  I spent a lot of time after that trying to figure out how to fuller the bar before the bulk of the leaf without A) smooshing it, or B) making it look ugly.   Then of course, the train of thought went to leaves and I showed Charlie how to make a folded leaf.  I bet he was pleased, I pretty much taught him how to do something today.

Then came the really cool part.  We were talking about how to perform a pineapple twist, got an idea, and rolled with it.  We both tackled twisting at the same time, handing off crescent wrenches to each other.  Maybe this is what the old blacksmiths had in mind with the apprentice stuff, except we were both experimenting this time, equally oblivious to the final outcome.

So yeah, great day today!

Even though Charlie might think that grinding the paint and wear off of a stair railing is boring, it’s still a pretty awesome thing to do for me.  Advantage of being young, everything is new and interesting, so the simple tasks are quite enjoyable.   The railing will probably be installed by us tomorrow at whatever time, that is if Charlie is feeling better.

After the excessive amounts of grinding (my hands wouldn’t stop vibrating), I tried to make a third pair of tongs out of some thick stock, 1/2 ” I believe.  Well, I made the jaws, the joint, and started drawing the reins and my arms just gave out.  Unlike Charlie, I didn’t have the power hammer to work with, so I was trying to draw them out with just a hammer.  Well, I took a break, like any normal human being, and Charlie and I started wizzing through the catalogue for McMaster-Carr and trying to figure out the numbers and purposes for different allows of metal.  I think we might’ve talked for a whole half hour before we realized that we weren’t going to get back to work.  What a day, looking forward to the next…

Wow, I’ve got no idea what the temperature was outside, but the combination of the heat from the weather and the forges with the humidity made for a particularly unpleasant day in the shop.  I decided to attempt a forge weld today, but to no avail.  I couldn’t get the piece hot enough or clean enough for a weld, so I moved on to trying to recreate a hook made by one of my instructors Jim Wycoff (certainly hope I spelled that right).  That too didn’t end so well, as the hook eventually broke into four pieces as a result of burning, breaking, and acts of God against me.  Oh well, I learned a lot about working metal at a very tiny scale and how delicate it becomes.

Also, I watched Charlie make a sample corner for a table.  It was interesting to see him work on it, and how quickly he got it done.  I guess when you do this for as long as he has, you get nimble.

Most of my experience lies in the realm of metalwork and fabrication. So when I say that I was slightly out of my element when Charlie and I installed a stair railing today, know that I am being generous. Nonetheless, I did learn quite a lot, most of the time I was in quiet mode trying to take in as much as I could. Thankfully, the installation went of without a hitch (on my part at least), and I’ve built a little confidence concerning the matter.

In other news, I was experimenting with good methods for upsetting steel yesterday and today, and I came up with two good methods.

First: put the piece to be upset in a vice and hammer down on it with zwei (two) hammers.

• Advantage- Moves the metal really quickly
• Disadvantage- leaves a bite mark in the metal from the jaws of the vice. Should be easy to resolve with a little aluminum plating or perhaps simply grinding the jaws to a nice curve (but it’s Charlie’s vice, so I wouldn’t do that)

Second: I made a hardy tool that allows me upset at a lateral angle to the anvil.

• Advantage- Makes particularly square upset, and can be done with a non-focused heat (with limits).
• Disadvantage- Unknown effects, but the hardy tool might be prying the anvil in a place it doesn’t like to be pried, but this has yet to be seen.

Today was a short day, so there isn’t much to say, except that I went to a great metal concert last night called Progressive Nation, with great bands 3, Between the Buried and Me, Opeth, and Dream Theater. Today’s song of the day is Bramfatura by 3, look it up when you get the chance.

That’s all, I’m off to Vermont for the weekend, cya all! Have a good Memorial Day!

FIRST PAIR OF TONGS!!!  Now the second, third, fourth, and fifth pair will go that much quicker.  Charlie has observed that it probably would be beneficial for me to continue making tongs for myself and for him, since he doesn’t have many and has little time to fudge around figuring out different holding methods.   So, I’ve found a purpose in the shop,  tongmaker,  one of my many duties excluding all forms of menial labor (which is part of the package that I’m perfectly willing to perform.)

At the beginning of the day, Charlie swung over to my house to pick up my anvil to bring to the shop.  The purpose of this would be to not get in each other’s way in regards of using an anvil, so now we both have our own.  Fun times…

So, the major lesson of today was, “The ends justify the means,” in the sense of using convenient tooling to get a particular job done without breaking your back and with the end result turning out nicer than it would have otherwise.  For example, toiling away on an anvil vs. using a power hammer, grinding and cutting metal rather than forging the majority of it, these things are all perfectly acceptable as long as the job gets done.  If a ceremonial dance and sacrifice of a lamb is required, then I suppose that is just part of the job as well.

Looking forward to tomorrow, where we’ll probably do some traveling and gas forge repair (which it is in desperate need of I think).  Marvel at the the pictures and good day!

Hello there everyone, Stephen Rooney here, I’m Charlie Spademan’s intern.  So far things are going great, learned how to make some pretty cool stuff, a real relaxing start before the REAL work begins.  Today’s highlights, Charlie and I were making tongs (trying to make would be more accurate) and while quenching a piece, I burned the tip of every finger on my right hand excluding my pinky.  Feels kinda leathery now,  this won’t be the only time.  The dirt, slag, scale, and burns make me feel like I’m working though.  And this is only the second day!

A short bit about me, I’m a high school senior who is off for a month to take an internship with Charlie.  I first did metalwork in the summer of my freshman year at Peters Valley Craft Center, instantly fell in love with it, and here I am.  My plans are to go to college, I’m going to be heading to Alfred University, and I plan to study both metal art and metallurgical materials science.  Hooray for workaholics!

Alright, well, I hope to have some pictures up soon.  I’ve taken some pretty low resolution shots with my cellphone, so I’ll probably bring in a real camera just for online photos.  The basket twist I did is awesome, so you’ll be able to see that soon.

That’s it for now

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