@@EmpressOfExile206 here in Germany, we usually don't have a back yard, and even in America (aka the most common place referred to on the Internet), the usual thing in the backyard isn't a pizza oven. So a backyard brick pizza oven isn't what comes to mind.
here in my place where blacksmithing is common, we use cinder blocks and leaf blower to build a forge and fuel it with coconut shell cuz it barely produce ashes not as good as propane but good enough to make the blacksmithing industry thrive because of cheap investment
I seen a primitive guy use a really nice rock and make a blower. I did my share of it for a while. It was a great learning experience and sold everything I had for a nice, very nice profit. I also made several dozen tongs which is why I made a very large profit. Toungs are a great start which gives you most of the basic skills. Once you can make a set of tongs you can BS your way in to making anything.
also optional, I have no beard and soft hands and still make all manner of handy little things, whatever I need (lot of very specific tools I'll probably only use once tbh) still never made a nail tho
unless your smith is in the military active or reserve component. Met a couple in the reserve, and yeah can't have a beard then but they make great smiths. They also tend to host the biggest beards post military hahaha.
this short brought me to your channel and i'm already subscribed, so i can come back and look at your longer videos, once i finish what i was doing. thanks for this.
love this short man, i built my first forge when i was 13 in my back yard with recycled materials from a construction site. some of those old yellow fire bricks, old iron plumbing pipes and a few logs i had to roll a good 2 miles down the road back to my house and those fuckers were like 4 foot in diameter and 7 foot long. probably like a thousand pounds lol. cant forget the hair drier bellows that i eventually upgraded to a leaf blower
@@jmoneyjoshkinion4576 it doesn't take much space. unless you literally do not have a yard you should be ok. If you don't have a yard it isn't hard to make a mobile forging station and just carry it to any undeveloped piece of land. You can literally make a tiny forge with a piece of carbide fire brick you cut in half and use long bolts to tighten it down on itself, and get a handheld propane torch and it will insulate well enough to get stuff hot enough to work. Grab a small log and a decent piece of steel and bolt it to the log and you have an anvil. grab a hammer. all 3 items are easily movable, and store in minimal space once cool. Biggest challenge is taking it home after work as it isn't safe for sedan trunks or SUV trunks, but a truck bed or small trailer will work fine, or you can just loosen up the bolts to open the bricks to air and let them cool off over 20-30 minutes while playing on your phone, tighten it back up and your good to go. Source: some of my earliest craft escapades happened when me and my wife were newlyweds living in a 600 sq ft apartment and the complex had rules against crafts and projects so i had to get creative.
I’ve been cold forging on an old vice that has a flat part with a claw hammer. I’ll only start hot gorging when I have an anvil and coal, I’ll use an old grill as my forge body.
Ride on man I prefer a good old charcoal Forge myself set from that point you got the forge,an anvil and Hammer you can make the rest of the tools you will ever need cuz that's the most amazing thing about blacksmithing
I like my rail chunks. I hired a guy to do some yard work and he spied them one day and asked what they were. I tried to explain it to him, but I'm not quite sure he understood. I say that because he thought he could move them with ease like I did. They range from 12 to 24 inches long, but some are taller and others are wider. Some flat, some rounded. They each have their purpose. Just don't underestimate something being small for being lightweight. I make it look easy because I'm used to handling them. After using them for all these years, I can't help but laugh when I see someone in the movies pick up a big brick of Gold and toss it like it was nothing. Trust me, bricks that size are NOT light at all. It'll give you a hernia, though. lol
I got all this stuff, but I also got scrap wood and needed an image of how to secure my anvil... Just a Jewler's but I am hammering silver so... gonna be coin or straw sized metal
As a smith that started out on those Horrible Fright (Harbor Freight) anvils, I can definitely say that you CAN forge on one, but you'd be much better off with a sledge head or something that's actually hard steel! You'd probably get similar, if not better results from a big rock than one of those blue paper weights
Induction heaters are also getting way cheaper and there’s a few build vids if you like playing with high voltage 😂 they def only can be used for smaller projects tho
Bear In mind with cast anvils (like harbor freight ones) they will dent with errant blows and you'll need to maintain the face, the horn will also be damaged if you're off on your strikes. Take it slow. Make sure you get an accurate hit. Speed will come with time. Look up Alec Steele's video on making leaves and follow his instructions for some goof practice
Alabama here. Got a peice of track from my pawpaw last weekend he said he’s had it longer than his big blacksmith anvil like the one you got on the stump. Anyway it’s off an old track from Lawrenceburg Tennessee. It’s wore down on top from the train. Badass I would never get rid of it. About a foot and a half. Heavy as heck though. Alright love videos. Robots lol
I made a mound of dirt with some 3" storm water pipe running from the side straight out the top and put the top of an old keg on top that my fil used to use as a fire pit. An old clapped out leafblower went in the other end of the pipe and it worked pretty well. Just concentrated the airflow too much to the center but it got me started.
Seeing the costs of many knives i have gotten into the idea of making my own (forged in fire isnt helping) im surprised to see its way cheaper to start than i honestly expected just going to the route of hand tools. Time to finish my winter woodworking projects and build myself a forge once spring breaks
Yeah. Almost forgot to mention about having one of those Heatproof hands, to grab and hold pieces of metal straight from a furnace, with a temperature over 500°c
This is how I made my first spear. Me my uncle and my cousin a wood fire in a pit some bricks that needed to be frequently replaced and whatever ball peen peice of Garbo we found in my dads garage and they weren’t pretty but they definitely looked like spears and definitely enough to make me and my cousin happy😂😂
The only use I've found for a large working surface has been in flattening longer pieces. For something that isn't going to take a huge beating, a 1 inch thick plate burnt into a stump works pretty well.
Forgot to mention the barrel chest, arms like a monster, and a beard longer than your lifespan after 20 years inhaling the fumes from the dwarven village forge.
Harbor Freight recently stepped up their anvil game. The blue cast iron ones are getting tough to find in my area, but now they’re carrying cast steel ones made by Doyle.
a windy day with a regular fire that has wind directed into a funnel "works", I have shown it multiple times. then anvil, I have used a rock (it will crumble, but hey, easy to replace). for hammer I have used another rock. true, no fine delicate things can be made, but making a slitting chissel and a drift was possible to then make a cross peen hammer from a piece of steel, even mild steel will work for a while, yes it will take damage, but that can be filed away, that then used to make better tools...
i started smithing with 2 map gas torches, and an old broken rusty vise i found in my backyard😂 unless you count the countless melted plastic spoons and the stick i would use while camping as a kid😂
Blacksmithing is a very old art, started way back in ancient times. If bronze age people could do it with a hammer, and a stone stove, you should be able to do it too. Heck, when they first started, their hammers were made of stone until they could make ones made out of metal.
Sledge hammer heads in antique/thrift shops go for 5 to 25 bucks, same at garage sales. Forges can be made with a steel tube or brick tunnel, leaf blower or hair dryer (larger ones work better than fast ones), and some scrap pallets in a hole. No more than 50 if you spend alot to get them. 8 generic red bricks cost 16 or so, at most, and the blowers cost 15 to 50 depending on what you choose to buy, and used ones can be even cheaper (same places as the sledge hammer head). Scrap wood can be found at processing plants and factories all over, such as lumber milling scrap, shipping facilities, factories and farms often have scrp pallets you can take for free just to get it off their land, and now all you need to do is find scrap iron. Also easy.
@Wolvenworks prices will vary depending somewhat on currency, but mostly based availability. I can assure you most industrialized nations will have VERY affordable options for the roles a blacksmiths tools must fill. Example: bricks can be replaced with river rock except for the ones directly against the fire, and technically the whole thing can be a dirt tunnel if you practice a bit. Essentially, if you can afford a hammer you shouldn't have a hard time getting the basic equipment needed.
@@kyleheins yes i suppose i could build the forge at half the price since i’m in indonesia…but i still don’t have a place for it, and i doubt i can just stick one on my backyard in the middle of a residential area in the city. Not to mention, I have no idea how to forge! Nearest blacksmith is in Buttfuck Nowhere, Central Java. I’d have to go abroad to learn the skill, and that costs money. In dollars, because Australia or Singapore uses dollars. So yeah, I’m currently not in a good position to start learning how to bang some metal. All i can do i watch other ppl have fun in this case.
I would stick with a railroad tie before I use a harbor freight in anvil. They work but after buying a vice from harbor freight and it breaking on me when I was beating on it, no thank you. For all you starting blacksmiths out there I would highly recommend getting a leg vise.
Don't ever forge without safety glasses, hot scale will stick to your eyes. Gloves are highly recommended, especially welding gloves for extra heat resistance, but regular 3 dollar leather gloves will do. Finally, anvils and hammering can be loud, a pair of ear protection will keep you from being an old smith that screams "What???" All the time. Have fun, and stay safe lads.
You need a village, a chestnut tree, and arms like steel bands
Those can come with time.
The Village Smithy
Yo...is this a reference to the poem, The Village Blacksmith by Longfellow??
And be 30kg overweight.
These really are great videos… I’m just getting into Blacksmithing and really appreciate the tips! Your fuxking rock
Thanks Joshua!
no offence, but we know you know what you're doing because you look like a dwarf from Lord Of The Rings@@VooDooTennessee
What about his rock?
Good Video
Time to upgrade my
1 Pizza oven ( forge )
2 Kitchen table ( anvil )
3 Mallett ( Hammer )
Lemme ask you something: do you live in a pizzeria
Lmao
@@Friendly_Neighborhood_Dozerlmao you've never heard of a backyard brick oven?
@@EmpressOfExile206 here in Germany, we usually don't have a back yard, and even in America (aka the most common place referred to on the Internet), the usual thing in the backyard isn't a pizza oven. So a backyard brick pizza oven isn't what comes to mind.
Why is your kitchen table a solid, sturdy piece of metal?
here in my place where blacksmithing is common, we use cinder blocks and leaf blower to build a forge and fuel it with coconut shell cuz it barely produce ashes
not as good as propane but good enough to make the blacksmithing industry thrive because of cheap investment
I was intimidated by the prospect of blacksmithing until i realized i already had everything i needed
I seen a primitive guy use a really nice rock and make a blower.
I did my share of it for a while. It was a great learning experience and sold everything I had for a nice, very nice profit. I also made several dozen tongs which is why I made a very large profit.
Toungs are a great start which gives you most of the basic skills. Once you can make a set of tongs you can BS your way in to making anything.
I'm not even a blacksmith, but I can tell you with authority that you missed the beard and meaty hands.
also optional, I have no beard and soft hands and still make all manner of handy little things, whatever I need (lot of very specific tools I'll probably only use once tbh)
still never made a nail tho
You develop those over time. No blacksmith in history was born with the beard.
Me who's never going to start blacksmithing in my life:
"Fascinating."
Always trust a man’s forging skills if he’s got the beginnings of, or full Dwarven style beard
unless your smith is in the military active or reserve component. Met a couple in the reserve, and yeah can't have a beard then but they make great smiths. They also tend to host the biggest beards post military hahaha.
this short brought me to your channel and i'm already subscribed, so i can come back and look at your longer videos, once i finish what i was doing. thanks for this.
Awesome, thank you!
thanks blacksmith internet dad ur awesome!
love this short man, i built my first forge when i was 13 in my back yard with recycled materials from a construction site. some of those old yellow fire bricks, old iron plumbing pipes and a few logs i had to roll a good 2 miles down the road back to my house and those fuckers were like 4 foot in diameter and 7 foot long. probably like a thousand pounds lol. cant forget the hair drier bellows that i eventually upgraded to a leaf blower
If you break down a couple of old microwaves, you can build an induction forge real cheap. They can heat your metal up in just seconds.
As long it's a ferrous metal* Non-ferrous barely heat up.
you can also send your heart to the moon if you don't know what you're doing with them. I'd just build a cheap charcoal forge tbh lol
Earplugs coming in at # 4
not a bad #4
WHAT?
Nope, a pair of tongs is #4 so you can continue forging after you're done with that end. Earplugs come after power hammer.
You forgot the epic beard, great voice and mittens the size of a grizzly bear.
Built a brake drum and fart fan forge years ago and it is still working strong!
Just bought all three of those things and today started on my first forged knife since I have in the past made some with old saw blades
The ONE main thing anyone needs in order to start blacksmithing is to STOP PROCRASTINATING.
But I don't have any space to make a forge. I live in town way to close to the neighbors.
And put away the RUclips
@@jmoneyjoshkinion4576 it doesn't take much space. unless you literally do not have a yard you should be ok. If you don't have a yard it isn't hard to make a mobile forging station and just carry it to any undeveloped piece of land. You can literally make a tiny forge with a piece of carbide fire brick you cut in half and use long bolts to tighten it down on itself, and get a handheld propane torch and it will insulate well enough to get stuff hot enough to work. Grab a small log and a decent piece of steel and bolt it to the log and you have an anvil. grab a hammer. all 3 items are easily movable, and store in minimal space once cool. Biggest challenge is taking it home after work as it isn't safe for sedan trunks or SUV trunks, but a truck bed or small trailer will work fine, or you can just loosen up the bolts to open the bricks to air and let them cool off over 20-30 minutes while playing on your phone, tighten it back up and your good to go.
Source: some of my earliest craft escapades happened when me and my wife were newlyweds living in a 600 sq ft apartment and the complex had rules against crafts and projects so i had to get creative.
@@jmoneyjoshkinion4576 There's often "Makerspaces" or other hobby organizations you can join.
Very informative for beginners.
Induction furnaces are also super neat
I’ve been cold forging on an old vice that has a flat part with a claw hammer. I’ll only start hot gorging when I have an anvil and coal, I’ll use an old grill as my forge body.
For a simple anvil I have a small piece of leaf spring about 3 inches by 7 inches or so. I mostly use it on its side for straightening nails
Something to heat, something to beat with, snd something to beat on
Hey, nice looping short!
Thanks for keeping it real
Ride on man I prefer a good old charcoal Forge myself set from that point you got the forge,an anvil and Hammer you can make the rest of the tools you will ever need cuz that's the most amazing thing about blacksmithing
Pure, and simple.
Wasn't sure of wood, but thanx for confirmation. 😊
Thank you man this is so dope
Glad you like it!
I like my rail chunks. I hired a guy to do some yard work and he spied them one day and asked what they were. I tried to explain it to him, but I'm not quite sure he understood. I say that because he thought he could move them with ease like I did. They range from 12 to 24 inches long, but some are taller and others are wider. Some flat, some rounded. They each have their purpose. Just don't underestimate something being small for being lightweight. I make it look easy because I'm used to handling them. After using them for all these years, I can't help but laugh when I see someone in the movies pick up a big brick of Gold and toss it like it was nothing. Trust me, bricks that size are NOT light at all. It'll give you a hernia, though. lol
I got all this stuff, but I also got scrap wood and needed an image of how to secure my anvil... Just a Jewler's but I am hammering silver so... gonna be coin or straw sized metal
As a smith that started out on those Horrible Fright (Harbor Freight) anvils, I can definitely say that you CAN forge on one, but you'd be much better off with a sledge head or something that's actually hard steel!
You'd probably get similar, if not better results from a big rock than one of those blue paper weights
Coal and steam powered blast furnace would be nice. Probably about as simple as a brake rotor and a bathroom fan
Induction heaters are also getting way cheaper and there’s a few build vids if you like playing with high voltage 😂 they def only can be used for smaller projects tho
I like this guy.
I use a hair drier with the cool function on for my coal forge
That’s great I have all that random stuff! I saved it for a reason.
Bear In mind with cast anvils (like harbor freight ones) they will dent with errant blows and you'll need to maintain the face, the horn will also be damaged if you're off on your strikes. Take it slow. Make sure you get an accurate hit. Speed will come with time. Look up Alec Steele's video on making leaves and follow his instructions for some goof practice
Nice short for today 😊
Thank you!
Alabama here. Got a peice of track from my pawpaw last weekend he said he’s had it longer than his big blacksmith anvil like the one you got on the stump. Anyway it’s off an old track from Lawrenceburg Tennessee. It’s wore down on top from the train. Badass I would never get rid of it. About a foot and a half. Heavy as heck though. Alright love videos. Robots lol
I made a mound of dirt with some 3" storm water pipe running from the side straight out the top and put the top of an old keg on top that my fil used to use as a fire pit. An old clapped out leafblower went in the other end of the pipe and it worked pretty well. Just concentrated the airflow too much to the center but it got me started.
Me with a forge, an anvil, and a hammer but no metal: 👁️👄👁️
You can also go magnetic with your forge.
"You're anvil doesn't need to look like an anvil, it can even look like this!" (pulls out another anvil)
That wasn’t an anvil, it was an anvil shaped object
Thats a cool ass anvil
Appreciate the bit of knowledge
a back, a arm, a fire
Seeing the costs of many knives i have gotten into the idea of making my own (forged in fire isnt helping) im surprised to see its way cheaper to start than i honestly expected just going to the route of hand tools. Time to finish my winter woodworking projects and build myself a forge once spring breaks
Great video.
Glad you enjoyed it
OMG! Another Blacksmithing channel to sub.
I would love a foundry instead, to work with copper and bronze. Steel never interested me personally. But bronze is just gorgeous
Subscribed!!!!
Nice loop technique
You forgot to mention the spectacular fuzzy beard without which no job is possible
Great tips! 🙌
Thanks Max!
Yeah. Almost forgot to mention about having one of those Heatproof hands, to grab and hold pieces of metal straight from a furnace, with a temperature over 500°c
This is how I made my first spear. Me my uncle and my cousin a wood fire in a pit some bricks that needed to be frequently replaced and whatever ball peen peice of Garbo we found in my dads garage and they weren’t pretty but they definitely looked like spears and definitely enough to make me and my cousin happy😂😂
That's and gloves with some good protective glasses. It gets old getting metal shavings in your eye XD
No gloves needed
The only use I've found for a large working surface has been in flattening longer pieces. For something that isn't going to take a huge beating, a 1 inch thick plate burnt into a stump works pretty well.
Just got a cast iron anvil! My pops and I mounted it to some wood and I'm ready work!
4: epic 13th century blacksmith beard
Forgot to mention the barrel chest, arms like a monster, and a beard longer than your lifespan after 20 years inhaling the fumes from the dwarven village forge.
Harbor Freight recently stepped up their anvil game. The blue cast iron ones are getting tough to find in my area, but now they’re carrying cast steel ones made by Doyle.
A large hard thing, a smaller hard thing on the end of a stick, and a really hot thing. Gloves are a 4th if holding things is a skill issue.
a windy day with a regular fire that has wind directed into a funnel "works", I have shown it multiple times.
then anvil, I have used a rock (it will crumble, but hey, easy to replace).
for hammer I have used another rock.
true, no fine delicate things can be made, but making a slitting chissel and a drift was possible to then make a cross peen hammer from a piece of steel, even mild steel will work for a while, yes it will take damage, but that can be filed away, that then used to make better tools...
material, something to hit it with, and a rason. everything else is just a tool, hopefully to make life easier.
Good advice. Well done.
What is the old adage, necessity is the mother of invention?
i started smithing with 2 map gas torches, and an old broken rusty vise i found in my backyard😂 unless you count the countless melted plastic spoons and the stick i would use while camping as a kid😂
Thanks, now I'm going to become a legendary sword Smith!
I started with a #10 tin can and a hair dryer.
Oh that kind of forging... I was a little confused when it wasn't a pen, a document, and a false identity as the three things you need
Anyone got a video on how to make that rotor forge? I was gonna try making a brick/charcoal/hairdryer forge lmao
Brake drum model called a devil's hot seat......
Mine was excellent
tried googling that term... nothing up sports articles came up :/
i used bricks and a hair dryer and wood for my forge
you made me instantly laugh at the end
Ooga booga fire, hard smacky, and el smacko hardo.
Blacksmithing is a very old art, started way back in ancient times. If bronze age people could do it with a hammer, and a stone stove, you should be able to do it too. Heck, when they first started, their hammers were made of stone until they could make ones made out of metal.
Can you show us how to make the homemade forge
Unfortunately i don’t have a budget for anything except the hammer 😂
Sledge hammer heads in antique/thrift shops go for 5 to 25 bucks, same at garage sales.
Forges can be made with a steel tube or brick tunnel, leaf blower or hair dryer (larger ones work better than fast ones), and some scrap pallets in a hole. No more than 50 if you spend alot to get them. 8 generic red bricks cost 16 or so, at most, and the blowers cost 15 to 50 depending on what you choose to buy, and used ones can be even cheaper (same places as the sledge hammer head). Scrap wood can be found at processing plants and factories all over, such as lumber milling scrap, shipping facilities, factories and farms often have scrp pallets you can take for free just to get it off their land, and now all you need to do is find scrap iron. Also easy.
@@kyleheins you do realize that not everyone is in a dollar-based country, right? And that $5-25 is a large price gap?
@Wolvenworks prices will vary depending somewhat on currency, but mostly based availability. I can assure you most industrialized nations will have VERY affordable options for the roles a blacksmiths tools must fill. Example: bricks can be replaced with river rock except for the ones directly against the fire, and technically the whole thing can be a dirt tunnel if you practice a bit. Essentially, if you can afford a hammer you shouldn't have a hard time getting the basic equipment needed.
Scrap can fill alot of these roles too.
@@kyleheins yes i suppose i could build the forge at half the price since i’m in indonesia…but i still don’t have a place for it, and i doubt i can just stick one on my backyard in the middle of a residential area in the city. Not to mention, I have no idea how to forge! Nearest blacksmith is in Buttfuck Nowhere, Central Java. I’d have to go abroad to learn the skill, and that costs money. In dollars, because Australia or Singapore uses dollars.
So yeah, I’m currently not in a good position to start learning how to bang some metal. All i can do i watch other ppl have fun in this case.
Coal way to go
And tongs cheap channel locks work or lock jaws
2 anvils railroad trac thank you
So great video but isn’t ur anvil a little short is that a preference thing
Hammer , heat , metal
I feel like you should add health insurance to that list because especially if you’re new… you’re probably gonna get burned at least a little.
I would stick with a railroad tie before I use a harbor freight in anvil. They work but after buying a vice from harbor freight and it breaking on me when I was beating on it, no thank you. For all you starting blacksmiths out there I would highly recommend getting a leg vise.
I think I covered that, ruclips.net/user/shortsAVc__C_nO-g
I have a question about the forge part. Would an electric one work? I've seen those heat up stuff very fast
Beginning blacksmith induction forge
I started out using a really shitty pan forge with a hand crank fan
Need space to make noise and/or fire. That space has been hard for me to find
I have a brake rotor or 4 LoL and a bouncy house fan...can you show how to set that up?
How high do you set your anvil?
Safety glasses and a leather apron.
Propane is kinda expensive. Isnt it easier to use just fire from coal or something
Don't ever forge without safety glasses, hot scale will stick to your eyes. Gloves are highly recommended, especially welding gloves for extra heat resistance, but regular 3 dollar leather gloves will do. Finally, anvils and hammering can be loud, a pair of ear protection will keep you from being an old smith that screams "What???" All the time. Have fun, and stay safe lads.
Clay in a freezer and a hammer will give you the feel for smithing if you're not sure it's something you want to invest money into.
I almost feel obligated to get into some sort of smithing, it almost feels like it's in my blood to do so...
how about going old school, charcoal/furnace without anything else to blow air except for airflow ?
Need a fort a good source of metal to work with! Scrap metal is cheap what is good scrap metals to work with?
You also need some significant upper body strength. It is DEMANDING.
If you don't have upper body strength yet, you will have if you keep at it, lol.
Wouldnt it be better to also atleast have a set of tongs. So maybe 4 items needed to start smithing