Day two of my Mid Wales adventure

Well its been a long day and its all looking very positive which shows we've worked really hard. We got in to the workshop for 9.30 and within minutes had a fire going, I will admit I was hoping to have one of the hooks fully completed by the end of today but it is ready for construction which was a positive end to the day. We focused on getting the rest of the pieces in to kit form, to which we came very close and this means that tomorrow will consist of mainly drilling and riveting. Towards the end of the day it really started to show that we had brunt ourselves out, working all day and with very limited break times, we were very exhausted afterwards. All in all we got alot done and tomorrow being crunch time keep your fingers crossed, we should get this all done by the end of tomorrow.  !..!,    

1500 views

I've just seen that this blog has reached 1500 views and just wanted to thank everyone for support on this blog over the past eight months. Its been a bumpy couple of months as I've haven't been that active but things are looking up and I hope to have lots to update you all in the future... !..!,

Day 1 of my second mid Wales adventure

Well its day one of being back in the forge after nearly two months and I'm a little out of touch with my forging but even with this little set back today has been a very productive day. We only managed to get in to the workshop for five hours after travelling around picking up steel, tools and fuel but in those five hours we made some real progress.

This is Nick's new workshop with more space and he has some new toys too! With a much bigger forge it can easily have two people working comfortably from the same fire and thanks to Matthew another fellow Blacksmith graduate Nick has a vast section of tongs and hammers to play. One of his toys hasn't changed and I was very happy to see which of course was his blacker, which will make all the forging so much easier and quicker.

We managed to to forge out and bend 1/3 of the components and should have one fully made by tomorrow lunch time and the rest of all the components forged out and partly bent by the end of the day. Its really great to see the pieces of my design coming to together and by tomorrow to have one finished is going to be great. I hope to have more pictures of what we've been forging for when I update you all tomorrow.
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Back in mid Wales for another forging adventure

Its been almost two months in the waiting but I'm finally back in mid Wales to forge these guitar hooks that I designed. I now have three days to complete this task but with the help of Nick I'm sure we can get this done, I've been looking forward to this for ages now and can't believe it finally time. I will be posting all the details and hopefully some pictures of the hooks in progress as each day goes by, so please look out for my future posts.

I also have some great news its taken a month and a half of negotiating I have finally put a deposit down on a workshop space Yay!!!!! So when I get back there's alot of work that needs doing and alot of things that need moving like the power hammer and flypress which will take some extra work but it'll fun to see how it goes.  

Little finds... so fun

Every Sunday I like to keep an old British tradition and go car booting. It way seem silly to some but I really enjoy travelling out of Bristol to car boot, this Sunday was different as to make a change I found myself at a flea market in Ashton court which I have to say was really fun looking at old antiques and collectables. There was a huge range of jewellery but the one area that really took my fancy was of course the vinyl's where I picked up some amazing one to add to my collection. (Jimi Hendrix, Motorhead and Queen) I was very happy with my purchase there.

But this is what really caught my eye and what I wanted to show everyone, I'm a little upset I didn't buy it but it would have been for a novelty than practicability but this little mini anvil with vice I thought was amazing. I think this would have been used by a jeweller due to the size been very small. I really wanted it but I resisted spending all my money as there were also many other things that could have drained a hole in my pocket.