Filling in the blanks

Astute readers of this blog will notice there is a significant gap in time between my posts last year and my post this year. I would like to shed some light on that period of absenteeism. The first sentence in my post from Thursday, August 20, 2015 says “It has been a while since I posted here and it’s time for that to change.” Well, it seems as though I may have spoken a bit hastily. I wrote that with the firm belief that I was going to focus more on smithing; building up my skills and possibly my inventory. Little did I know that in 8 days, my whole life would change.


When I’m not pounding out things on my anvil or pounding out work for my employer, I’m pounding on drums in a hard rock band called 50 Breaks. I’ve been a musician far longer than I’ve been a blacksmith and playing gigs is quite a regular thing for me. Meeting the person I wish to share my life with is considerably less common though. There I was, calmly sitting in the bar where we were playing a show, when Jessie introduced herself and with an off-handed and quite obscure quote referenced from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, our lives were welded together.

The early stages of any relationship will usually take precedence over one's hobbies and social life and we spent a good amount of time getting to know one another. I would still doodle in my shop here and there but not with any amount of progress. My time was not only occupied with learning everything I could about this wonderful new person, but also with the full length album the band had decided to record. We began working on the album and progress was made, however, as time elapsed and I was getting the need for some deliberate hammer time (and not the kind with baggy pants).


December 15, 2015 was a normal Tuesday right up until the chain I was installing on a Terex 5TC-55 Aerial Device slipped out of my grip, caught the middle finger on my left hand and pulled it sideways; hyper-extending and severely spraining that area of my hand. At the moment the injury happened I was wearing gloves and I was up on a scaffold. I pulled my hand back from the machine and just held onto it until I could gather enough courage to remove the glove and inspect the damage. Eventually I did just that. I was delighted that there was no blood and that I was able to move everything so nothing seemed broken even though it felt kind of weird. Yet slowly I came to realize that not only did my hand feel weird, my middle finger wouldn’t stand up straight and, in fact, sort of lolled off towards my ring finger if I didn’t deliberately spread out my fingers. I could move everything so I didn’t think there were any breaks but something was obviously very wrong. I notified my supervisor and headed off the the clinic where after some poking, prodding, pulling and x-raying, the doctor explained what she believed had happened.

I was then splinted, bandaged and sent on my way with directions to keep my hand immobilized for the next week after which i could begin a prescribed physical therapy routine to build up strength in that hand. It was four or five weeks before I could make a closed, tight fist and quite a bit longer before I could hold it that way without pain. Eventually I was able to get back behind the drumkit to help record the album and behind my anvil to enjoy the creation but the effects of that injury will likely be with me for the rest of my days.


I have had other things that took priority over the forge during the early and middle part of 2016 including various family duties, some health issues that have developed for Jessie but also a cohabitation with Jessie and her cat Jezebel who I’ve come to adore even though allergies make this a challenge sometimes. Really though, if you like animals at all, how could you not adore this cuteness!

Recently, and with encouragement from Jessie, I started to refocus on what I want to do with Fox River Forge and have begun working in that direction. This includes a rearrangement and organization of the shop, acquisition of some much needed tooling, setting up a proper PayPal account and putting together a spreadsheet to track orders, inventory and all that other glorious data. Being the tech oriented woman she is, she bought the Fox River Forge URL to make it easier and more professional to get people to this blog and included a dedicated email address which is chris@foxriverforge.com.

I want to thank everyone who has traded a moment of their life with mine in reading this blog. I also want to try to post a minimum of once a month here (hopefully much more) in order to share what's going on. I look forward to seeing what this new determination will deliver in return. So until next time, may your fires burn clean and your hammers strike true.

Two months in a row?

What's this? It's not going to be months before a new post is put up? WTF? (What The Forge;)
In all seriousness, I am looking to keep this more current as I refocus my efforts at the forge.

Anyway!

A couple days ago I turned 42 and my wonderful girlfriend, who is far more tech-savvy that I am, set me up with my own custom URL for the forge which includes an email address so now in addition to going to www.foxriverforge.com,  you can email me at chris@foxriverforge.com with any questions, orders, sarcasm or whatever you wish.

I have also set up a PayPal account to make purchasing some of my stuff and little easier for anyone out of the immediate area. I am looking into ways to show what I have available for purchase and as soon as that is worked out in will be sure to post about it. I know Etsy is popular for this sort of thing but I'm not sure it's right for me. It is in the list of options I'll be researching.

Hey, Have you heard....

When you have a hobby you suddenly become an expert to everyone you know on all things even remotely related to that hobby. It's a natural phenomenon. People interact with you, discover your hobby and, either out of genuine interest or mere politeness, they try to engage with you on that topic. Sometimes it's a bunch of questions on the origin of the hobby and how you came to be involved, or it's a story about a friend or relative who is also into that hobby. Sometimes they relate a time when they, themselves, dabbled in that hobby.

As a hobby blacksmith, there is a minimum of 5 common points of conversation that come up.

1. Ancestral blacksmithing, either mine, theirs or someone they know
2. Horseshoes
3. The Renaissance Faire
4. Civil War Re-enactment
5. Have I heard about the blacksmithing shows on The History Channel called "Forged in Fire" and "Milwaukee Blacksmith"?

These are all fine topics and talking about them is a pleasure. I appreciate, just like anyone else, someone taking an interest in me or the things I like to do.

When "Forged in Fire" came out, I heard a lot about it because it had the word "Forge" right in the title. I don’t subscribe to any cable or satellite service nor do I even have an antenna hooked up for broadcast television so I couldn’t watch the show on schedule. My TV viewing experience is limited primarily to my Bluray player for disks, Netflix or YouTube. It wasn’t until I discovered I could cast the programs on the TV via my smartphone using The History Channel App that I started watching these shows with some regularity. Most people know I carry a knife with me most of the time and have a small collection of them that I rotate through. People naturally thought a show about making knives and swords and axes and all kinds of other weapons would not only be a show I would love to watch but also, since it's a competition show, try to compete on.

They are partially correct.

I very much enjoy the show. It's style is identical to a competitive cooking show on The Food Network called "Chopped". Four smiths use their skills to complete a challenge in a set amount of time with one smith being eliminated after each round. The winner gets $10,000. It’s a wonderful show, the panel of judges are tough but fair and often act as cheerleaders for the people competing. There is a minimal amount of drama and the show mostly focuses on the craftsmanship of the smiths competing. You can see some truly wonderful work and if you're not too jaded, you might even get swept up in the action. I watch this show with my wonderful girlfriend Jessie and we both find ourselves gasping when something goes really wrong or oohing and ahhing when something goes really right. We look forward to watching whenever we can.

However, as much as I like watching this show, there is NO WAY I want anything to do with being on it. I don’t like working under that kind of pressure and I cannot stand having someone scrutinize and judge my work. When I’m working on stuff I like keeping my own pace and having the piece naturally come to fruition. I will happily remain a spectator.

Milwaukee Blacksmith is a whole other matter. That show appears to be closely modeled after “Orange County Choppers” where there is a family business and they have a crazy deadline or challenge to meet and or overcome and there are family arguments but in the end there is success. There is also an unnecessary recap after each commercial break taking away from overall content. The show has a much more scripted feel about it and some of the drama of the episode can induce a bit of eye-rolling.

That does not keep it from being a show I’m very fond of. Jessie and I have watched the episodes as they have become available and quite enjoy a good deal of the programming. The projects that come out of that shop are wonderful and seeing scenes from around Milwaukee and the surrounding area in a program like this is pretty cool. Earlier today we were at the Kenosha Harbor Market and afterwards stopped by the Dinosaur Museum to check out the T-Rex Statue they created in the most recent episode.

We have already planned on adventuring to see other projects on display. The show is also good for Milwaukee in that it promotes a city that has a long history in manufacturing. There are also some really beautiful shots of Milwaukee in the transition scenes. Providing the show doesn’t turn into the drama-filled screamfest that O.C.C. turned into, I expect we will be watching regularly. I may even look into taking their Blacksmithing 101 class offered on their website. Learning is an ongoing adventure.

Hey Stranger!!

It has been a while since I posted here an it is time for that to change. Life is gathering momentum. Fox River Forge has been at it's final permanent residency for several months now and the anvil has been more active then ever before! I have a great many stories to share so please check back from time to time to see what's going on. I will post updates to the FRF Facebook page when theu occure but I have always felt this platform is better suited to what I want to do. I look forward to sharing with you.

Chris
Fox River Forge

My New Hammer

I have always been interested in working with metal and had even made a couple metal sculptures but nothing ever really serious or focused. A little over 6 years ago I received a book about blacksmithing as a birthday present from my parents. As I was reading through it I began to think that this was something I would like to try. As I do with most things I am interested in, I began to research it. Looking online for blacksmithing websites and checking out the library and of course I ended up on YouTube.
As a research tool, YouTube is almost priceless. It allows me to access practical information regarding almost any subject I’m looking for. I began surfing through the pages and pages of videos from all over the world covering all kinds of things related to the topic I was interested in. I began to notice that two names kept popping up. One of the names was GaryHuston and the other was TechnicusJoe. I began watching and re-watching various videos these guys posted and I learned quite a bit. I sort of considered myself as their unofficial intercontinental apprentice.
Time went on and I joined a blacksmithing page on Facebook. One day I see that TechnicusJoe has joined this same page! I was jazzed so I sent him a friend request which he accepted. He then sent me a message saying hello! I will fully admit to being a little star struck. Here is a person, who lives in The Netherlands, whose channel I’ve been studying for years and has thousands of views sending me a message! I had to fight to contain myself. We chatted briefly and time moved on.
Recently, Joe’s YouTube channel hit 1 million views and he posted a video on the subject of raising money in order to continue to make videos and support himself. I sent him a message asking if he would consider commissioned work. I saw he had made a couple hammers and I was interested in maybe having him make me a 2.5 lbs. cross-peen. He replied saying that he could make me a hammer but that it would be very expensive and the cost of shipping would be high considering it was coming from The Netherlands.
I had previously priced out hand-forged hammers so I knew what to expect. We talked back and forth and negotiated a deal that worked out for both of us. He even offered to make a video of him making my hammer! I said I would do an honest video review of his hammer in turn. Here are those videos.


Joe Making My Hammer


Some pictures Joe sent me of my hammer being made

Footage of me using my hammer for the first time




My Review of the hammer Joe made me




As I said in my review video, Working with Joe on this was a wonderful experience. He was very accommodating and asked a variety of questions so that he could make me the best hammer possible. If you’re in the market for a custom made hammer that will last a lifetime and out-perform ANYTHING found in the stores, contact Joe HERE.

2015 update and goals

Happy 2015 Friends!

I thought I’d update everyone on how things are going at Fox River Forge. We are moved into our final location! We have returned to Big Bend and now reside in a garage a short distance from where we first started. In truth, I had wanted to set up in this location all along but I needed to work out the details a little more than I had at the time. Since then I have been out there working on things, building skills and working out the layout of the shop. It still needs some work but it is functional and I feel a real connection with the building we’re in. I will put together a post dedicated to the new shop location. I expect there will be an accompanying video as well.

In this post I want to lay out some goals for 2015. I’m in a place where I believe I can personally dedicate more focus on the forge. I would like to establish some items I want to accomplish this year and then at the end of the year we can review and see how we did. So here are5 things I want to accomplish by December 2015.

1. Do an off-site blacksmithing demo for a public group. This will involve loading my gear, going somewhere, setting up a portable smithy and working with people who have had little if any experience with this craft.

2. Continue to create items at the home location that will eventually be available for purchase. I’d like to have a surplus of wall hooks, bottle openers, corkscrews and other items available to anyone interested in purchasing something like this.

3. Become confident in the task of forge-welding. I see this as an essential skill I will need in order to really grasp the fundamentals of this craft. I have made 3 successful welds so far. I would like to refine the quality and appearance of my welds.

4. I would like to start offering individual blacksmithing classes. These would be a 4 to 6 hour session with an overview of the blacksmithing trade and hands-on experience leading to the student crafting their own piece to take with them.

5. Possibly open an Etsy store. This will depend almost 100% on how goal #2 works out. I briefly looked into it recently and it was enough to confirm my guess that I am not at all ready for one right now.

So there it is, my 2015 goal for Fox River Forge. Here are some photos of items I have made in the past few months.

Skill Set Breakthrough!

Greetings everyone!  Things have been moving along here Fox River Forge. We will be moving, yet again, in the near future to our final location but in the meantime I have been able to put hammer to steel a little more regularly. 

I recently achieved a very important personal goal I set; forge welding. This is exactly what it sounds like. I was able to weld two pieces of metal by heating the metal to near its melting point and hammering it together to form one piece. 

The first weld I achieved was some flat stock I bent into a ring and welted the ends together.  After that success,  I decided to try it again with the purpose of making two connected rings. 

Success was sweet. They aren't very pretty and I think the integrity of the weld may be low to moderately decent, what I learned about the process from these successes was immense. I'm very proud of this. I will be working on this skill more in the future. It is a very important skill for a blacksmith to have.