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Forging

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Kegan:
Okay, I am intersted in making a survival/fighting knife, roughly based on Tom Brown's Tracker knife from a piece of heavy spring steel. COuld someone give me basic instructions on how to cut and shape the metal once hot? I'm going pretty primtive here, since I don't have alot of materials on hand. My anvil will most likely be a heavy I beam, and my furnace will likely be a hand drill fire of hardwoods in a fire-brick fire place. I can do the grinding and what not to finish it up, but how do I rough it out?

Or, would it be better to jsut anneal it and cut it out with a power saw (I don't know if that beter or even possible). I'm pretty clueless ;D.

madcrow:
I don't think that will get it hot enough.  Hardwood charcoal (homemade) will get it hot, but you need a sourse of air going in at the bottom to help fuel the fire.  The easiest way I have seen to make the charcaol is to put the wood in a metal tub and build a fire under the tub.  It will basically scorch the wood all the way through without actuallt burning it to ashes.  A hair dryer on high, fastened to a piece of steel pipe the same diameter as the hair dryer and stuck beside the coals will work.  Store bought charcoal has alot of sulfur in it and it can ruin a blade.  As far as cutting goes, set of chisels especially for that are used to cut the steel.  I guess it would depend on the thickness of the steel.

DanaM:
Kegan go over to PP and ask the same question on the bladesmithing section, although madcrow basically answered it already.

huntertrapper:
ive done some blacksmithing and if you use some coal you can get your fire really hot. But ive had hardwood fires hot enough that  when i put the metal in after a while the metal turned bright red and lit green grass on fire, as for cutting it out i think you could use a cold chisel  but a good hammer is a big thing i think....good luck

JackCrafty:
Here is a link to an excellent video series on knife making.  There are literally hundreds of sites/videos devoted to knife making but this one is "primitive" enough to be my favorite.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ysKd1cswlo&feature=related

 ;D

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