The Shop

Here is picture of the shop from the outside looking in. It is in one half of a two car garage. 

 This all in one stick, mig and tig welder meets all my welding needs in the shop.  

This forge uses propane and a blower to heat up and maintain welding temperatures when making pattern welded steel. 

This is a 55lb Striker Power hammer that I call Stampy, it is one of my favorite tools in the shop. The ram weighs 55lbs and can pound at a rate of about 4 blows per second when it is running all out. It can deliver fast heavy blows to really move steel or it can deliver light planishing blows during final forging. It weights about 2400lbs. It has changeable dies for different forging operations, I typically use flat or combo drawing dies for blade work.  Stampy was an elephant on a Simpsons episode.

These are two Reeded 2x72 grinders with 2 and 3hp variable speed motors and an assortment of tooling arms and attachments.  In my opinion the grinder is the most used and versatile tool in a knife shop. It can profile, bevel, and polish blades as well as shape and polish handle material. They can use very aggressive belts at high speed to hog away steel at amazing rates or they can use very fine abrasives at lower speed to get a mirror like finish. Both grinders have interchangeable tooling arms allowing me to hollow, flat and convex grind as well as use the small wheel adapter to grind tight radiuses.  

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Manual milling machine used to cut, mill and drill steel for my blades and various handle material. 

 This is a hydraulic press for forging and making pattern welded steel. The press is the brute force machine in steel making. I typical forge 8 pound billets on this press and have done larger ones too. I call the press the Serial Crusher (from the movie Boondocks Saints). The amazing thing about a press like this is that you can make an enormous amount of different dies for different forging operations. The dies can me made very quickly and cheaply with mild steel. For example I have flat dies, drawing dies, side drawing dies, cutting dies, off set dies to forge tangs, ladder pattern dies, dies to make round bars ,ect. It is also easy to use spacers to forge materials to the exact thickness you need. This is probably the most versatile machine for forging that I use 

All heat treating and thermo cycling are completed on these digitally controlled electric kilns. 

Metal lathe used for various projects around the shop. This machine has been completely restored. This is the newest piece of equipment in the shop.

Here is my anvil. There are many like it but this one is mine! This is one of my favorite tools in the shop. It is about 125lbs and it made of cast iron (the green part) with a tool steel face. This style was made popular by Fisher but I am not sure of the brand of mine. The great thing about the this construction is that it does not ring, like a traditional anvil. I know some people are nostalgic about the ring of an anvil but this work is loud enough as it is and a high pitch ring just gives me a head ache. I made the stand by gluing and screwing  some 2x12 boards together. This anvil also has mounting holes to make mounting a piece of cake. It is heavy enough to work well but is light enough to move around the shop when necessary (like a few times of year I actually park in my garage). I am always on the lookout to buy more anvils at a good price. I have had about a half dozen or more but sell them off at a profit when the opportunity arises. This one is not going anywhere. 

I converted this surface grinder to run on belts instead of grinding wheels. This conversion allows me to take much larger cuts than with a wheel. It can be easily converted back in just a few minutes if I have a need to use the wheels for a project.