question about tradition

[Omega]

what is blacksmithing/bladesmithing do you feel is not allowed? is it ok to grind to a rough shape then grind in the final look? is it alright to use a cutoff wheel rather than a cutoff hardy?

thoughts....opinions

bill

[NuViking]

I beleive it has to do wiht what tools you have at your disposal. A cutoff hardy would be darn handy instead of having to carry the work to the chopsaw,,one can just change the hardy and a few good wacks and a light one and the job is done way faster. I will be making one as soon as I finish up my fall work and get the forge fired up.
My self I have a few power tools that help but little by little am tooling up to be less reliant on a plug and more relieant on treadle powered lathe to do lots of my grinding.
Whatever works.

[Doug Lester]

It comes down to what makes it easier to produce a quality end product and that is an individual thing. Dogma is not the same thing as quality. Some makers feel that they can make a better blade by forging to 70-80% finished and then go to the belt grinder and others may like to forge out to 90% before grinding. The thing is the end product. As pointed out above, it is quicker for me to cut off some 1/4" stock with my cutting hardy that to go inside to use my chop saw or camp it into a vice and use a cut off wheel on my angle grinder, however, it would be a bear to try to cut off some 1" inch stock with it. I could do it, but my chop saw would be a lot quicker.

Another thing to consider when it is said that when so-and-so made such-and-such a hunred years ago or a thousand years ago that they did it without things like chop saws or epoxi cement or whatever, that those things did not exist then. Had those things existed, those makers could very well have elected to use them. They used what they used when they used it because it was all that they had and not because they felt that it was a superior product or method. Doing things the old fashioned way may be fun and it may be instructive but don't delude yourself into thinking that is necessarily better or even as good as modern tools, techniques, and materials. I doubt that anyone would want to stack a case hardened iron blade up against one made of 1080 or any other modern steel but the iron blade is very traditional to a given place and time.

Doug Lester

[Tai Google]

By definition smiting involves moving, forcing or pushing the metal to shape with hammers. As long as this is the "emphasis of the process", nothing much else matters. It really just depends what your concept is, what you are trying to do, how you want to do it, and what resources you have available.

[Sam Salvati]

DO not lock yourself into following some tradition, do what works best for you and make a new tradition!

[Matt22191]

I use cutoff wheels all the time, because I don't have a cutoff hardy yet. But even when I do, I'll probably still use the cutoff wheels prettty often. Similarly, I often correct forging mistakes by grinding. I don't believe this means I'm not really a smith. (It may mean I'm not a very good smith, but I already knew that. And it's a different issue.) I don't really care whether anyone else considers it "acceptable."

The history of smithing is in part the history of finding better ways to do what needs to be done. The very first smith didn't have a hardened tool steel anvil, or even an iron one; he almost certainly used a big, hard rock -- and another one for the hammer. Eventually someone figured out that there were better ways to make anvils -- so they started making 'em that way. The original grinders were stones -- either held in the smith's hand or resting on the ground. Then someone figured out that if you made the rock round, put an axle through it and spun it with your hand or foot, it worked faster. Eventually someone figured out that hooking it up to some external power source was even better than that. And so on.

That's a long-winded way of saying that I pretty much agree with Tai: if getting steel hot and hammering it is the main emphasis of what you do, then as far as I'm concerned you're a smith.

[Tai Google]

Originally Posted by Sam Salvati

DO not lock yourself into following some tradition, do what works best for you and make a new tradition!

(Ooops sorry, hit the edit button instead of quote, Let me try that again.) Tai Google

Don't get locked into anything! Just be true to yourself.

[TexasJack]

Power tools let you do things faster, not better. Quality work is always acceptable.

[Matt22191]

Well said, Jack. In looking back at my earlier post I realize that I kept saying "better" where "faster" would have been the more appropriate word.

[Omega]

i started this thread for two reasons...1) i wanted to know all of your thoughts and 2) while i was forging my claw hammer out of 1 1/2 inch stock i found it very hard to use my hardy and opted for the cutoff wheel and felt alittle guilty, also i plan to use my belt sander to true up the sides and even out the finish..

bill

[Matt22191]

1 1/2" square on a cutoff hardy, with a hand hammer? Yeah, I imagine that'd take a few heats. We used to have a saying in the Marine Corps: there's a fine line between hard and stupid. You didn't cross that line. Nothing to feel guilty about.

Just be real careful cutting thick stock with the angle grinder. It's easy to bind up the wheel, or break it from side pressure, and the results can be not-fun.

[Martin Brandt]

You have not forsaken us Omega, you just used your brain. If staying tribal means you wreck your project cause you beat the sh-t out of it trying to stay traditional, then that's not such a good outcome. To cut 1 1/2" stock on the anvil, I'd want a good thin profile, handled cutoff tool and a striker, but would I be not tratitional if I used a power hammer and a short hack? At Ft. Vancouver they have found 4" square bar remnants that they cut off on the anvil, but I bet those old smiths would have used a cutting torch if they'd had one in their day. You will always get some tool suck (that's the pulling into the cut of the surface of the metal) when you use a punch or cutting tool at the anvil, and that can be OK, or not. If it means that I have to then grind/file away 1/4-3/8" of steel to clean it all up and true up my hammer face, then I say drag out the chop saw and make a clean cut in the first place. However, a highly skilled smith and striker with good tools can cut very tight tolerences, and almost perfect right angle cuts, and then upset any angularity back into the parent metal, but that is with years of practice at the forge. Expert skills come from much experience, and most of us are part-time pounders gaining a little here and there, and would like our projects to come out OK first, and the experience will accumulate as we go on.

[Crex]

Omega, you have to find your own path to happiness as a bladesmith, whether full-time, part-time, or hobbiest. Feeling guilty is a self imposed emotion, if you think it through you got nothing to feel guilty about, as stated above.

I get great satisfaction in seeing just how far I can take a piece of discarded "useless"? (NOT) steel with fire and hammer. The more I do the more I learn, the more I learn the more I want to do, ad infintem.
It becomes a self adsorbing competition to see if you can do better than the last time.

If you truly want to learn how much you don't know......teach a youngster how to do what you "think" you know how to do. Very humbling but at the same time extremely educational. They will challenge you to think through the process and force you to evaluate what you are doing and why. THAT'S WHEN YOU LEARN!!

[NuViking]

Ok a little confession,,one of the reasons I am trying to become less reliant to a plug in is the acreage where my forge is has no electrity. I have a little generator and it works fine. But when I was doing shoe repair for a living some of my machines were treadle and I got use to the percessoin. Much of my work has been carried to my home in town to be sanded and ground but froom time to time I missplace a part or three and this slowes the progress down. Having everything self contained and doing the final finnishing work at home is what I want to do.
But I am still finding it hard to keep away from my drill press slash home made milling machine and can always find new tasks for it.
The latest task is I got a 18 inch diamond slab saw blade from my buddy and am setting up a watering nozel so I can cut rock slabs up to 8 inchs accross. Way messyer than a lapidary slab saw but it didnt cost me $2000. so I am willing to take the time to mop up.

[Crex]

So......it's not really guilt about technique but power tool withdrawl syndrome. Whole different disease! Hand crank post drills cut clean holes if you keep them tuned and lubed. Grandpappy taught me that you can make just about anything a machine can make with patience and good handtools.....just got to want to!

Build a water powered mud saw and you can cut stone without electricity or gas.
Not many of us knifemaking lapidarys out here, but there are a few. What kind of stones?
What style lapidary work? Do you incorporate them into your knifework?