Recently, while wondering in the Missions, I found a cup! It was of the insulated, stainless steel type; perfect for hot drinks on cold days in the blacksmith shop. Having just been perusing Calvin and Hobbes, I thought to myself… “there’s treasure everywhere!”
Hello new cup!
This perspective can be brought into just about any aspect of life of course, but it got me thinking that especially in my blacksmith work - there really is treasure everywhere in the form of scrap metal that can be repurposed for a variety of specific tools or tasks.
Steel is wrought as a large variety of alloys, its content optimized for some specific use or small range of uses. When a specific tool or part, be it a car spring, drill bit or tiller blade, reaches the end of its life span, it can easily be reborn as something else via the forge. Here are some examples:
While wondering some train tracks a few years ago, I found this ~ 1.5” round bar stock (foreground). That it sheared so raggedly (on the left hand side), indicated it was some higher carbon steel. Cutting off a chunk, punching a hole and offsetting the face produced a handy ‘set hammer’ (handled tool, top). A nice tool for establishing tenons over the edge of the anvil.
On the left is a leaf spring a buddy found (also in the Missions, a range of infinite resource!). There are many applications for leaf springs as they are a great source of high carbon steel in handy stock dimensions. Here, a small piece was forged and welded to some angle iron to fit the hardy hole (square hole on the anvil) to be used as a hot cutter.
Abandoned hammer bits like this one (on the left) make great stock for general blacksmithing tools such as punches and chisels. Both hot punches were forged from the upper shaft of this drill bit. I use these every day! Thanks old drill bit!
A few years ago, when my neighbor was delivering a round bale of hay, he accidentally broke the hay spike off into the bale, leaving behind a nice bar of high carbon steel.
Here, the tip of the spike has been cut off and welded to some forged stock I found in my scrap pile (an abandoned project of some sort I can’t recall). The tool (right) will serve to spread out holes in heavy stock for taper candles.
I rarely throw steel away (well it gets recycled at the scrap mill if I really can’t use it). I typically try to hold onto all scraps and drops.
Desperate for some scrolling tongs at one point, I forged this pair strictly from bits found in the scrap buckets.
While it may be obvious, it’s important to note that steel is a durable good, and nearly, infinitely reusable. In any case, these are just a few examples amongst many of recycling potential in metalwork.
Lastly, while blacksmithing is inherently gratifying work, the practice of reusing old materials through resourcefulness, adaptability and creativity is one of my favorite aspects of it.