Anyone here a smithy?

[Night Wolf]

I'm a hobby smith and in my spare time study metallurgy and the physical properties of steel, so i was wondering since there's this forum who in here is a smith...and how far does your knowledge go.

i also study the history of the japanese sword....i am far from an expert but i know ALOT about there history, and the making of them.

:cool:

[Illuvatar]

Well...our very own Orc, who is in charge of this area of the forums and also is our Armoury Section Editor is a smithy as well.

I'm answering for him as he is in the service and currently enroute to Iraq.

We've got a couple of other weapons smiths that hang about, and I'm sure you'll find them more than willing to discuss smithying and swords at length. :p

[Nilion Elentano]

I'm sure there's plenty of adivce to be found given by Azimaith whom I don't know well but I have come to respect his unbeatable points, and other folks around.

I'm a Kendo and Kenjutsu student myself and have made blades in the past to small scale, but always trying to improve, so hopefully we can all learn a bit from each other eh? :thumbs:

What's your next project?

I have a few myself which hopefully will get to post once my forge is up and running once more :naughty:

[Night Wolf]

my next project once my gas forge is running (progressively moving away from charcoal, it burns way too much up but will always have its place) is probably a norse styled blade with the traditional 8 billet twist core and then a mono steel edge...its ALOT of work, probably with my limited time running into a year long project since i have to make the billets myself, hand draw the billets out, hand twist...etc etc :p

lets say it pushes the limits of what most smiths out there do...

...and i study when i can Eishen Ryu Iaido :) brilliant art.

[Nilion Elentano]

Good stuff mate, I'm still on Charcoal, but who knows? might make the leap to gas at some stage when I have the space.

[Night Wolf]

Originally posted by Nilion Elentano
Good stuff mate, I'm still on Charcoal, but who knows? might make the leap to gas at some stage when I have the space.

gas forges can be small, depends on what size work you'll be doing. Kevin Cashen and John Lundemo whom both are master smiths in the US are my mentor's and people who nudge me along. currently i'm doing a machinist apprenticeship but its basically my step into sword smithing.

rough shaping a blade using a milling table cuts productivity time a hundred fold...and you can do some wicked multi-fuller blades. i want to make a sword with 5 fullers, 2 wide ones then 3 thin ones in the middle and on the out side of the larger fullers. something you cant do by hand unless you hand carve it out...John Lundemo of odin blades recently done an amazing multi-fullered sword so i got inspired and nagged his ear off :p.


its good to know on a personal level top notch sword smiths....smiths are a dying breed, they will often help out up coming smiths with there knowledge to further the art. i know of one smith whom is a master smith but a complete jack@$$ in regards to sharing knowledge...his even patenting his technique.

oh well enough ranting before i go too far :p