This is one of the most beautiful forges I have ever seen! And my thanks go to Oliver for sharing the pics and information with us. It is simple and well designed. And it has a manual bellows! Can't ask for more than this when you are blacksmithing up blades!!

Oliver tells us about his forge and some of the work he is doing with it:

Here are more pics of my medieval style forge, including the bottom half of my double chambered great bellows when it is extended; the bottom has twice the depth of the top half. The length of the bellows is 40 inches, width about 28 inches.

Everything is close in this set up so that I can operate the bellows with my left hand and manipulate the work with my right hand, the tools are close by, just right of the forge wall so that when the forged piece comes up to heat I can start the hammering straight away.

The forge has a 1 ½ inch diameter pipe running down it with centred 5/16 th of an inch holes drilled down its length. I plug and unplug certain sections when I am heat treating in order to avoid hot spots and keep things even in the area closest to me, the middle and also the opposite end, works out very well, and I normally do a dummy blade test run to make sure.

I forget to mention that the dagger that I forged was clay hardened, with the hamon or hardening line appearing from tang/ricasso junction and finishing almost two inches away from the point. It doesn't show very well on my photo, but I was looking for the more mechanical aspects of the soft centre than aesthetics, although further polishing in the finer grits and several lemon etches would give a more pronounced traditional looking line if one was aiming for that.

I think I have just worked a great way to form fullers, but I will keep quiet until I have made some tests and verified that it works out well. May add them to the sword.

Here is an update to the sword project Oliver is doing. He tells us about what he has done:

Most of the forge work for the sword has been completed. I will use files to make the necessary profile adjustments, including some draw filing. The fuller will go in the top third of the blade, and I will outline the tools and methods in a future update with some pics.
BTW I initially wanted to make the box bellows before getting started on the sword, but time has allowed me to get going on the blade. The plan is to throw up a temporary charcoal long forge on the ground for the heat treatment of the sword, and use the box bellows for the air supply, and then complete the blade.

Make a subhilt knife

This is a complete tutorial where I take you through all the steps of making a subhilt knife. It has the extra guard on it which prevents it from being pulled out of your hand. Good looking knife! Make a subhilt knife

The Atlas Knife Forge - This is a wonderful little gas forge for knife making. I also have pics of one sent in by a web visitor right here: The Atlas Mini Forge. Thinking about knife making and looking for a forge to do the job? This is it!

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