- Joined
- Jan 10, 2010
- Messages
- 1,818
If you noticed that I haven't been posting lately.. well it's because my family and I bought a new house (not too far from the old one) and I'm currently setting up my new shop. Our new place is still in Northern Wisconsin close to the Lake Superior shore.. but we are now further into the woods and right on the edge of the vast Chequamegon National forest. We have 10 acres of what was a small horse farm and is oak/sand barren country... nicer than the swamp I was living in before. And the stables were perfect for my new shop. Although we have no interest in the short term in getting horses... we will probably get some hogs and a couple of beef cows since we have two nice hay pastures and another pole barn. It will be nice to have some extra income on top of my knife making.
Anyway.. I will post more pictures of the shop later when it's done... but here is where it is now. My finishing shop will be in the actual stable part... which has a nice sand bottom topped with horse mats. Very nice on the feet... and no more heat getting sucked by concrete! It is insulated and will be heated with a wood boiler. The forge is in the 'barn' part of the shop and only has the roof insulated. But will be a great open space for me to forge in. I've also taken advantage of the situation to put digital temperature control on my heat treat forges as well as hooking up a VFD to my KMG and to a new 9" disk grinder (from Wayne Coe). So... a vast improvement in my knife making habitat.
Here is the finishing shop coming together. The horse stalls were composed of tongue and groove cedar planks that we were able to re-stack into a second room.. which will be dust free and used for leather working and layout/design. I'm excited to have some horizontal surfaces in a separate room that won't be buried under dust and miscellaneous crap!
Anyway... still lots of work to be done.
I didn't quite stop knife making through all of this... I finished this 8" blade chef knife from Aldo 1075 and fossile mammoth scales (with lacewood 'frame' handle).
And I've made some progress on a composite Irish Celtic blade based on excavations from the Crannog bog... an early Iron Age site that had many iron blades. My version will have a low layer 'piled' core of 1095 and wrought iron and a wrap welded edge of 50 layer wrought iron/1095 twist. This is my first attempt at this kind of construction. The blade is 19" long. The handle will be deer antler with copper throat plate, ebony grip and more deer antler and copper for the pommel. It will have a copper scabbard.
Anyway.. I will post more pictures of the shop later when it's done... but here is where it is now. My finishing shop will be in the actual stable part... which has a nice sand bottom topped with horse mats. Very nice on the feet... and no more heat getting sucked by concrete! It is insulated and will be heated with a wood boiler. The forge is in the 'barn' part of the shop and only has the roof insulated. But will be a great open space for me to forge in. I've also taken advantage of the situation to put digital temperature control on my heat treat forges as well as hooking up a VFD to my KMG and to a new 9" disk grinder (from Wayne Coe). So... a vast improvement in my knife making habitat.
Here is the finishing shop coming together. The horse stalls were composed of tongue and groove cedar planks that we were able to re-stack into a second room.. which will be dust free and used for leather working and layout/design. I'm excited to have some horizontal surfaces in a separate room that won't be buried under dust and miscellaneous crap!
Anyway... still lots of work to be done.
I didn't quite stop knife making through all of this... I finished this 8" blade chef knife from Aldo 1075 and fossile mammoth scales (with lacewood 'frame' handle).
And I've made some progress on a composite Irish Celtic blade based on excavations from the Crannog bog... an early Iron Age site that had many iron blades. My version will have a low layer 'piled' core of 1095 and wrought iron and a wrap welded edge of 50 layer wrought iron/1095 twist. This is my first attempt at this kind of construction. The blade is 19" long. The handle will be deer antler with copper throat plate, ebony grip and more deer antler and copper for the pommel. It will have a copper scabbard.
We actually used a front end loader for the table (it has a 2" thick steel top with I beam legs).
