I saw a post on here about Mark Constable and his bucket forges so I dropped him an email to ask more about it. We exchanged quite a few emails over the next few weeks and discovered that both he and I have the same interest when it comes to bladesmithing, woodworking tools. We both love the simplicity of the sloyd and the overall style of the scandinavian. One big plus is that he's not a million miles away, in East Yorkshire so there wasn't a massive expense and 8hrs travelling involved.
He said he wasn't keen on doing group courses as he feels that it's too hard to get everyone together at the right time ect. ect. and he never covers the amount he wants too, there just isn't time. So he asked if I would be up to a bit of one-on-one.
So that's what we did.
We decided that what was really important to cover was the main techniques involved with bladesmithing so it was agreed that there was no need to end up with a finished knife by the end of the day. I was more than happy with this, after all you can read about tempering on the internet, you can experience how to to hit the steel or how it feels using tongs.
With a seemingly endless supply of tea and a bacon butty Mark and I talked about the techniques first, then I would watch him put those into action and then I would have a go. This worked well for me because I'm a see-do kinda guy. I had so much info to take in that it's still in my head so excuse me if I can't give you a full blow-by-blow of what we did. But essentially Mark armed me with all the technique I would need to solve pretty much anything that would and can go wrong with making a stick tang knife.
So, to cut a long story short, forged a blank on the bucket charcoal forge and then another on the little gas forge, with a lot of discussion about what we were doing while we were doing it.
So! Onto the pictures. These are, as I said straight from the anvil so need cleaning up, bevelling then tempering and hardening. So don't expect nothing too beautiful!
from top: my charcoal forged. 2. my gas forged. 3. Mark's gassed. 4. Little hook knife by Mark (just because I asked how to shape them should I ever make one)
Spine profiles. First one
Spine profiles. second one
Spine profiles. Mark's
For scale, my hand.
Well there you go. A big thumbs up from me. Marks philosophy is based around less is more and I'm all about that. It's amazing what you can do with a bit of heat and not much else. I can't wait to get started again.
He said he wasn't keen on doing group courses as he feels that it's too hard to get everyone together at the right time ect. ect. and he never covers the amount he wants too, there just isn't time. So he asked if I would be up to a bit of one-on-one.
So that's what we did.
We decided that what was really important to cover was the main techniques involved with bladesmithing so it was agreed that there was no need to end up with a finished knife by the end of the day. I was more than happy with this, after all you can read about tempering on the internet, you can experience how to to hit the steel or how it feels using tongs.
With a seemingly endless supply of tea and a bacon butty Mark and I talked about the techniques first, then I would watch him put those into action and then I would have a go. This worked well for me because I'm a see-do kinda guy. I had so much info to take in that it's still in my head so excuse me if I can't give you a full blow-by-blow of what we did. But essentially Mark armed me with all the technique I would need to solve pretty much anything that would and can go wrong with making a stick tang knife.
So, to cut a long story short, forged a blank on the bucket charcoal forge and then another on the little gas forge, with a lot of discussion about what we were doing while we were doing it.
So! Onto the pictures. These are, as I said straight from the anvil so need cleaning up, bevelling then tempering and hardening. So don't expect nothing too beautiful!
from top: my charcoal forged. 2. my gas forged. 3. Mark's gassed. 4. Little hook knife by Mark (just because I asked how to shape them should I ever make one)
Spine profiles. First one
Spine profiles. second one
Spine profiles. Mark's
For scale, my hand.
Well there you go. A big thumbs up from me. Marks philosophy is based around less is more and I'm all about that. It's amazing what you can do with a bit of heat and not much else. I can't wait to get started again.
still, I'll sharpen it up like the rest
