Where we lived was a short distance from the village hall where, on Saturday's, the community would bring their garbage for removal. Rural community home pick-up service wasn't available at the time so we would load up the garbage cans, drive to the village hall and get in line to dump everything into a compactor that would fill a container and be swapped out by truck when full. In addition to standard garbage, they had a bin for scrap steel and other items not suitable to be compacted with the garbage; things like used or wrecked bicycles for instance.
I don't know how or why it started but I began asking the guy running the compactor if I could grab some of these bike. The used ones were still good enough to ride and the damaged ones had parts to fix each other and soon I was gathering parts together and building complete bicycles. This culminated in me building an entire bmx style bike made entirely from different salvaged bikes. Nothing was from the same bike. The forks, frame, rims, tires, tubes, pedals, gears, bearings, even the bearing cups were from different bikes. I rattle canned it flat black and called it (obviously) Frankenbike. I enjoyed making something functional out of these parts people had given up on.
Fast forward several years to my journey into blacksmithing. For over 20 years I've been working at a final stage manufacturer of utility equipment and in addition to the various skills I've learned, I've also had access to a great deal of scrap metal. I always loved looking through the scrap bins at the different shapes and daydreaming about what it could be made into. On occasion there would be a scrap that was too perfect to leave so I would check with the supervisor and get permission to take it home. The company was quite generous and as long as there wasn't any misconduct, either displayed or perceived, they were open to those requests. So when I started blacksmithing I was able to grab small bits of stock or cut off scraps that I could work in the forge to build skill. I really liked the idea of taking this piece of metal deemed unusable and reforming it into something aesthetically pleasing and sometimes function.
Sounds familiar, right?
I, too, recognized this theme in my thinking. I get as much joy, if not a little more, from turning a rusty chunk of rebar into a couple nice wall hooks as I do turning new steel into corkscrews. There's an obvious material cost savings, though the effort of harvesting and processing the steel needs to be considered. It also requires some knowledge to determine which metal is useful, can it be worked with the tools available, is it galvanized or coated with something equally as dangerous. Heating up galvanized metal releases fumes which are deadly. Metal can be soaked in vinegar and cleaned but sometimes the health hazards are just too much to make it worth using. A couple hooks or brackets aren't worth respiratory failure or nerve gas exposure. These are things I've learned through reading material online or from experiences at my actual job.
Ultimately it boils down to this, I enjoy harvesting scrap steel for my projects. I love the excitement I feel when I look at something and see the potential in that raw form and the satisfaction of coaxing that vision into a reality. Many people enjoy the idea of recycled or re-purposed material as a way to be more conscious of What we consume in this little rock we ride through the universe.
So if you see something lying by the side of the road or leaning against a dumpster and it ignites your creativity, consider doing something with it. You may find yourself in a new hobby as well!
