December Update!

I thought I’d put together a December update. I’ve gotten the chance to get out and actually work at the forge a couple of times recently. The first time it was raining the entire time but it was good to be working. The second was just this last Friday. I spent several hours there making straps to hold the anvil on the stump we found for it. I’d like to throw a big Thank You out to Noah Armstrong who helped us locate a stump for the anvil and his dad Jim Armstrong who has been helping us document these early days at Fox River Forge with his photography skills. I will be posting some of his pictures in the near future. Near the end of the day on Friday I decided, last minute, that I wanted to do a video update so here it is.



So there you go. Here are a couple of photos I took. One is the Railroad Spike Butter Spreader I made and the other is a hook. I am working on designs for a cuff style bracelet and the hook started out in that direction but ultimately wasn’t going to work so I changed direction and turned it into a hook you drive into a beam. I am going to try to get some shelter put up over things before it snows so we can work this winter. I will keep you updated. Happy Holidays from everyone here at Fox River Forge and Spike’s Creations!

What do you mean “Metal Bonsai Trees”?

This is sort of a repost from my personal site- “Abretokia.” It pertains to some metal sculpting I did prior to creating The Fox River Forge.


(Photo by Mel Vyvyan - Her site)

I was commissioned to make some centerpieces for the wedding of a friend of mine. It was my first attempt at deliberate metal sculpting with a known goal. I am very proud of how they turned out. I made a short film showing the process of how I made the trees and included it in the post. Please check it out!

“The Creation of Trees”

Blacksmithing I Class

Recently Andy, Spike and I took the opportunity to sign up for and participate in a Blacksmithing class held at Old World Wisconsin. We found out they held classes last year and quickly decided we wanted to attend. We also found out they fill up almost instantly! It turns out they only have a class size of 4 students at a session. This makes for a challenge to get a spot but it also makes for a fantastic experience. Add to this the fact that we all wanted to go to the same class and it was a minor miracle we pulled it off.

There are three levels of class-Blacksmithing I, Blacksmithing II, Blacksmithing III each being a prerequisite for the next level. We signed up for the beginner’s course held on October 22nd. We all met in Big Bend and car-pooled out to Eagle where Old World Wisconsin is located for our 10am start time. We pulled into the lot, parked, and got directions to the building where the class was being held which was an actual 19th century blacksmith shop moved there from its original location.




Walking in to the blacksmith shop was walking back in time. It is an experience I encourage you to experience for yourself by visiting Old World Wisconsin when you get a chance! We met our instructor for the day, a gentleman named Darold Rinedollar. The three of us were joined by a fellow future blacksmith named (for the sake of distinction) Drew who I teamed up with.





After a preliminary discussion about basic blacksmithing knowledge we went to work. Drew and I were working on the forge nearest to the front of the shop while Spike and Andy worked at the rear of the shop. Outside the front door there was a guide who spoke with the visitors of the day, talking about the buildings history and describing what was happening inside. Learning a craft can sometimes be a challenge. Learning a craft as people stare at you tends to boost that challenge but Drew and I did our best to stay focused. At one point a visitor began scolding us for not being in “period clothing.” I explained we were students not really a part of the community. She explained that Drew’s motorcycle t-shirt didn’t look good in the middle of her photo. We decided she was joking and went back to work.

We worked pretty steady all day. Occasionally, we would visit one and another at our respective forges to see how things were going and compare notes. We moved from skill to skill fairly quickly.














Darold’s style of instruction was to point you in the direction he wanted you to go and watch. If you got off kilter he would stop you, explain the problem, and get you going again very rarely taking the work out of our hands. Occasionally, for times sake, he would jump in and show us how it should be done, but more often then not we did the work ourselves. Often he would stop us to say something wasn’t right and then ask how we were going to fix it. I am used to this form of teaching from my Dad so it worked well for me and the others seemed to respond well to it also. Darold is an extreemly talented man with the ability and patience to teach a skill that would otherwise be lost. All of us at Fox River Forge are truly grateful to have had the opportunity wo learn from him.

By the end of the day we had several pieces completed for us to take with us. We were all very happy with the experience we gained attending this class and will certainly be furthering our knowledge in the future by attending the other levels.

I actually edited the footage for the opening ceremony post after we attended this class and it’s amusing to see the difference one Saturday can make when given good instruction. I’m not sure we did anything right while forging that first hoop aside from having fun with each other. I have always intended for this blog to document our journey into the world of blacksmithing and as we travel we can look back to see how far we’ve come. Looking at the video and comparing it to what we produced at this class gives me a large sense of pride.




I can’t wait to see what we do next!

Opening Ceremony!

I am proud to announce that Fox River Forge is now officially operational! Spike, Andy and I lit our first forge fire on Sunday Sept 25th 2011. That day also happens to be Spike’s birthday so she got to have one of the coolest (or hottest) birthday candles ever!

I started thinking about forge designs probably a year and a half ago when I decided I wanted not only to read about blacksmith work but actually do some blacksmith work. As time moved on and Spike and Andy became part of the picture, the quality of the forge design improved. There are many functional make-shift scrap forges to be seen on YouTube but I decided that if this was going to be used by other people, it should be planned out a bit more. I began thinking about different designs, looking at different forges in videos and books. Spent a great deal of time “Plan-Dreaming” which is a method I use a lot when I’m being creative. I will sit and sort of pre-create in my mind and then eventually I attempt to pull it off in real life.

To explain what I did, I will tell you first that I saw the forge as consisting of 3 basic parts; the fire pot, the blower and the hearth. The first part would be the fire pot. The fire pot is what holds the actual coal fire used to heat the metal that the blacksmith will be working. It needs to be heavy enough to handle the temperatures generated by a blacksmith forge. It also needs to allow a device commonly called a Tuyere (rhymes with query) to introduce more air to the fire to be hooked up to it. Finally, it should have a way to dump ashes out of the fire pot.

Next would be the blower which, as it sound, blows air into the fire causing it to burn hotter than it normally would. This allows the blacksmith to heat the piece he’s working to specific temperatures in order to perform different functions. Now-a-days electric fans are used even in hobby forges like the one I built, however, prior to electricity blacksmiths used hand or foot operated blowers and before that leather and wood bellows. I chose to go with a hand crank blower primarily because I didn’t want the forge dependent on electricity.

The last part is the hearth. The hearth is the structure that holds the fire pot and the blower. Hearths come in all shapes, sizes and material. Most traditional hearths were made of brick and mortar. It is most common today, especially with hobby forges, to see a hearth made from a metal structure. I’ve seen them made from random scraps from automobiles, old gas grills with stovetop exhaust fans reversed as a blower, I even saw a guy who used an old push-mower flipped upside down with a hair dryer hooked up to it, and they were all productive.

The blower was purchased on line and the fire pot was bought at a blacksmith and farrier supply store in Burlington Wisconsin called Centaur Forge. The hearth was going to be designed and fabricated by Abretok Industries (me). I was able to source the plate steel for the hearth top through a donation by a good friend of mine so all I needed was to design, acquire, and build the rest of the hearth. I sat at The Steaming Cup a couple of weeks ago and drew out the plans for the hearth frame based off the steel plates I got from my friend and the images in my mind. I came up with the following drawings.








It might be obvious to some that I never took a drafting or mechanical drawing class while in high school. I can read electrical and hydraulic schematics created at the place I work and that’s about it. These were not meant to be blueprints anyway. Instead they were a way for me to decide how much and of what kind of steel I needed to build the hearth. Once I had it laid out, I was able to come up with a shopping list of steel which I promptly submitted to my supplier. Next I had to secure a location with the proper tools where I could assemble the hearth. I got permission to use the service shop I used to work in. My 40 hour work week is Monday – Thursday 8:30am to 7pm allowing me off on Friday so it makes sense that I will build this on one of the Fridays I have off. There is no 2nd shift in the service department and company policy states that there must be 2 people on the floor when work is being done so I can’t work on it during the week after my shift. This means I have to complete this project in one day or wait an entire week to complete it. I also needed to wait for payday to roll around so I could pay for my end of the fire pot. I needed the fire pot as I was building the forge to determine what size hole to cut to allow the pot to sit down in the deck. Friday, September 23rd 2011 was the day that fit all the necessary criteria for this to be successful. I scheduled this with the shop leaders and Jeff, a mechanic who I have a great deal of respect for and whose area I would be sharing, stating that I would start at 6am work until about 10 am when Centaur Forge opens, drive out and purchase the fire pot, drive back and finish work.

So

Due to some poor planning and judgment on my part, I didn’t get to bed the night before until about 2am so waking up at 5:30 was a bit of a struggle but I got to the shop right around 6am. After a trip up to my favorite coffee machine, I unloaded my gear, got set up on a worktable and got to work. Working on personal project in the shop opens you up to a great deal of questioning, ribbing and general harassment. I am no stranger to this. The most common questions that day seemed to be “What the hell are you building now?” and “A forge? What is that?” The only real exception was a guy who jokingly wanted to know if I’d make him a cannon.

I declined

I made pretty good progress and around 9:45 I headed out to Burlington to pick up the fire pot. Everything went smoothly there and back and with the exception of the 2 hours out of production time it took, it was an enjoyable little break. I got back to the shop right around 11:30 and went back to work. I started welding and was getting some awful results. It looked like I was out of shielding gas. I checked the tank and sure enough the meter read empty. I changed out the bottle (which is a time consuming and heavy task since some the tanks can weight over 100 lbs ea) right around Noon. Shop etiquette when working on your own time generally calls for respect of people’s lunch time meaning no grinding, hammering, or welding. So I went and paid a couple of bills, got my own lunch a got back around 1pm to get going again. I set up and started welding and got more crappy welds! After a stream of frustrated language, I checked to see if someone turned my bottle off as a joke but nope, the bottle was empty again. In about a half an hour and entire bottle of shielding gas leaked out. I had Jeff check the machine to make sure I didn’t overlook something when I changed out the bottle and we agreed that the machine was faulty. After a few minutes, I get my hands on another welder and away I go. I have now essentially lost 3.5 production hours and getting this done by 4:30 when the shop closes is starting to look like a potential problem.

New welder in place, I get back to welding and within an hour I have the frame assembled and the deck plates welded on. I now have to measure out and place the support for the leg vice that will be attached to the workbench portion of the forge. Once that is trimmed and welded in place, the time has come to cut the hole for the fire pot. I had a discussion with Jeff on the best way to cut out the hole and he suggested plasma cutting the hole out. I told him I had not experience with that machine and he offered to do the cutting himself. I marked out the area to be cut and in a few minutes he had it cut out. I set the fire pot in the hole the first time and grinned. I could see the forge for what it was going to be! I thanked him a great deal for helping me out and got back to work. With the fire pot in place, I began working on the pipe joining the blower to the fire pot. I hadn’t done any planning on that because I wanted to see how the fire pot sat in the hearth and where the blower could go. I studied it for a bit and then headed for the scrap steel bin. I couldn’t find a section of tube that was close to the correct length but I found two pieces I could weld together and make work.

It was already 3pm and time was flying. I got back to my area and started fabricating the flanges that would bolt up to the fire pot and the blower. Both faces were different so I had to make them individually. I had no success using a holesaw to cut one large hole in each of the flanges and was forced to drill several holes in both flanges to allow the air to move through them. After fabricating the flanges, I prepared to weld together my scrap for the tube when a different colleague walked up and asked what I was doing. I quickly explained about welding the scrap together and he was surprised I couldn’t find a piece long enough and insisted we could find one that would work rather than half-assing it with scrap. While I agreed what I was planning wasn’t ideal; I was desperately low on time and didn’t want to bend any rules about obtaining material. However, I hold this man in high regard and know very well how resourceful he can be. Another 40 minutes pass as we search the plant for the tube scrap I’m looking for. We find it after consulting with a friend in the body shop. Scrap in hand I head for service with 45 minutes to go. I check the length of the tube to make sure it is long enough and weld on my flanges. After gathering some hardware, I set the fire pot in place, bolt on the adapter tube, bolt on the blower and discover that the system is left side heavy. Since the fire pot is not bolted in place, the weight of the blower and the adapter tube causes the fire pot to teeter-totter on its left side. I quickly decide to weld a support bracket between the adapter tube and the hearth frame. I put the last weld on the support bracket at 4:19 pm. I now have a forge that is usable. The only thing left to do is mount the leg vise, weld some feet on the leg tubes and weld the angle iron around the fire basin all of which can be done on site at a later date. It was done! The Fox River Forge has been created!!

I picked up Andy and went out to get the trailer so we could transport the forge to the site. I removed the blower and the fire pot and we loaded the hearth on to the trailer, cleaned up the shop where I was working and headed out to deliver it. By the time we arrived at the home site, it was after dark. We discovered that carrying this hearth over uneven ground in the dark was going to suck so using the trailer as a large wheelbarrow, we rolled the forge back into the area where it needed to be and unloaded it there. We then placed it in position, tarped it and left.

Sunday rolled around and we all met at the forge site for the “lighting ceremony”. The idea was to light our first fire and work our first piece of “iron” together. Spike’s fiancé Mike was also there to help with some of the camera work. We assembled the blower and fire pot, dumped in some charcoal and light the forge. Charcoal is not an ideal fuel for this type of forge because it burns so fast but for our purposes that day, it was a fine choice. Once the coals got going we got working. I suggested our first item be a loop formed from a piece of scrap round stock. As you watch this clip please be aware that the forge itself still needs some finish work on it and our anvil is just sitting on a bench. The anvil will be moved closer to the forge and securely mounted to a stump or stand.



It was a very good weekend. Due to my schedule, it’s taken almost a month to put together this update and in that time a lot has happened. Editing this footage, I saw a variety of things we need to improve on, but that’s how life works. You try to improve on things you do. I look back at building a forge and it kind of felt like one of those reality shows where they build motorcycles or guns “blah blah deadline, blah blah if this don’t work we’re screwed, blah blah dammit Mikey, I don’t have (bleep)ing time for this (bleep)!” It was really fun though. I’m very proud of how things turned out and look forward to seeing what we can produce. If you have any questions please send an email to foxriverforge@gmail.com and I will reply to you as soon as I can.

Ferrous Frolics

Back in July, Andy and I took the opportunity to go to a festival held at a mining museum in Iron River Michigan. Located at the Caspian Iron Mine Site, the museum holds the yearly “Ferrous Frolics”


“Tuesday, July 26, 2011 10:07 AM
CASPIAN—The Ferrous Frolics festival at Iron County Museum on Saturday, July 30, is offering reduced admission of only $3 per person from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. on that day only, courtesy of the Caspian DDA.
A pancake breakfast, sponsored by the Golden K Club, will be held in the museum Cultural Center from 8:30 a.m. to noon.
Tickets are $5 per adult and $3 per children and are being sold in advance through Golden K members, at the Chamber of Commerce and at the museum.
Tickets will also be sold at the door on Saturday morning. Everyone in the community is invited.

Vendors will be on site, selling a variety of craft items.
The blacksmith shop will be open and antique farm machinery will be on display both days.
On Saturday, Northwoods Animal Shelter “residents” will be on the grounds, looking to be adopted, or at least be petted.
Smoky Bear will make an appearance about 2 p.m.
On Sunday, July 31, the regular admission price of $8 per adult will prevail.
Vendors, food and refreshments will be available from noon to 4 p.m.
After browsing the grounds and shopping, attendees can relax or dance to the country music of Paul and Roy in the Cultural Center from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m.
The blacksmith will post hours each day.
Antique farm machinery will be on display both days, in addition to access to all the numerous buildings throughout the museum grounds.
Ferrous Frolics provides a unique opportunity for both tourists and locals to have a “peek into the past” at a bargain price.
For more information, call the museum at 265-2617.”

Andy told me about this event he used to go to as a kid and it sounded great; add to this the fact that Andy’s parents have a cabin on Camp Lake and we had the ingredients for an outstanding weekend!

We drove up on Friday the 29th. Once we got to the cabin, which turned out to be a beautiful 2 story house right on the lake, we unloaded out gear and headed over to meet up with his grandmother who works at the museum. We had a nice dinner at a local restaurant then headed back to the lake. We checked out the lake, the pier and discovered I’m a giant sissy when it comes to being in a canoe. For more on that click HERE.

After the failed canoe attempt, we headed over to a local bar where I repaired my damaged pride by winning a game of pool, drinking beer and watching extreme sports on a big TV:) We eventually decided that morning was soon to come so we headed back and crashed for the night.

In the morning we headed over to the museum for the pancake breakfast. We paid our admission, got out plates and went into the main hall to sit down with Andy’s Grandmother and some of her friends. While eating our pancakes and sausage, I enjoyed listening to several people at our table chat and tell stories of older times. Events like this are rich with history and knowledge if you know how to listen respectfully and encourage the conversation. After a while people started to move around so Andy and I set out to explore the grounds. We checked out several of the buildings and saw some really neat old machinery.














Best of all, they had a working Blacksmith. His name was George Potvin and he runs “Ten Mile Creek Forge” in Bark River Michigan. We sidled up to the open doors of the smithy and stood grinning as George was explaining to someone else what he was doing. After a while they left and George turned his attention to us, welcoming us further into his shop even offering us the opportunity to crank the blower which delivers air to the forge and helps make the fire burn hotter. Being first to crank, George guided me to an appropriate speed to gain heat but not waste fuel which turns out to be a pretty delicate balance. We asked questions when they occurred to us and listened as George and his friend chatted with people who wandered in and out of the shop. After a couple of hours or so, George turns to us and says “Well, it’s about lunch time so I’m going to grab a bit to eat. Did you guys want to hammer on some metal?” Wide eyed and barely able to contain ourselves we nodded in unison so he dug around and came up with some bar stock. “Here you go, have fun” He said, and headed for the museum.


“Whattaya wanna make?” Andy asked me. I said I didn’t know, let’s just see what happens. We put the bar in the fire and got it hot. Andy pulled it out and started pounding on one end to start a taper giving Andy the status of being the first one at Fox River Forge for strike metal as a blacksmith apprentice!



He did a couple more heats and got a decent taper going and turned it over to me. I heated the other end and made a loop. As I was working on the loop some other festival goers walked in. We hastened to explain that we were NOT actual Blacksmiths and were in fact just learning. The people asked questions anyway and there were some we were able to answer. We have both been reading and researching this craft for almost a year prior to this event. I was surprised at what I was able to explain. I’ve said for many years “Sometimes the best way to learn is to teach.” I then heated the middle and attempted a twist. This took a couple of tries before I got the tongs on it properly to get the twist. I turned it back over to Andy who was working on the taper when the actual Blacksmith walked back in and asked us what we were making. We admitted we didn’t really know, we were just working on some basic techniques. He suggested a couple of bends at the tapered end to create a fire tender. Andy followed his guidance and before long, our aimless experiment became a functioning tool we have utilized with actual campfires!




It was an exhilarating and encouraging experience.

George did a great deal to help us gain knowledge and confidence and we can’t thank him enough. Please check out this link to his website and if you get a chance visit the store. I know we plan to.

After such a great afternoon, we stopped in town for a pizza and beer at a local pub, picked up some supplies and headed back to the lake to watch a couple of movies and then hit the sack. In the morning we handled a couple of chores at the cabin and at Andy’s Grandmothers house then headed home. It was a great weekend and we look forward to checking out next year when we can encourage some friends to come up and take part in a great event.

Mid-June Update

Here is just a quick update for you. Things have been slowed a bit by an injury I got while using a ratchet strap. As I was releasing the ratchet, it came apart and I ended up with 8 stitches in my right hand middle finger and palm and some butterfly strips between my thumb and fore finger.
While no permanent damage was done, the wound makes it difficult to do anything really physical. But I’m on the mend and will be back to 100% soon.

On a more pleasant note, I was able to obtain a picture of the Fox River Forge crew! Spike and Andy came to a recent performance of mine at The Steaming Cup, a local Waukesha coffee shop I perform at with Francesca and Jerry Danks regularly.


(The Fox River Forge Crew from left to right; Spike, Chris, and Andy)

Plans for the forge have been sketched and will be drawn out in the next week or so. We are also moving forward with the purchase of a blower for the forge. I had a meeting with Spike a couple of weeks ago regarding the metal arts end of Spike’s Creations, the parent company under which The Fox River Forge operates. We discussed issues regarding inventory, studio relocation, and website store possibilities! We will keep you in the know as developments arise!

Forge area clean up!!

Well it’s been an interesting time since I last posted. It came to my attention that the property line location was a bit foggy. Rather than start a land war, I secured permission from the other owner and we are free and clear to move forward with construction. I met up with Andy on Memorial day and we began clearing the area and doing some preliminary placing of equipment in order to get an idea of the potential lay out.

Here is the location after some clean up.



This is a rough layout of where the actual forge table will be built. The plates on the ground will form the main work area of the forge.



This is a makeshift workbench we slapped together in order to get some perspective. It may be further assembled to become a permanent work space.



This is the inside of the Smoke house. This will likely be cleared our out and used as a non secure storage area.



Well that about covers our progress so far. The next step seems to be designing and assembling the forge table and acquiring a hand crank blower. Keep checking back for more updates as they occur.

Welcome

Welcome to the Fox River Forge Blog. My name is Chris Koterba and I will be the primary poster on this blog. Here we will be detailing the building and operation of a hobbyist forge in Southeast Wisconsin. The crew of Fox River Forge consists of Andy Cerney, Spike, and myself. We are currently gathering tooling, researching techniques and scoping out locations to build the forge. Once a location is secured we will begin construction. During construction we will update this blog with photos and video clips of the process. I look forward to sharing this experience with all those interested in it.