Beautiful Iron
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Website has been upgraded to HTTPS. Huge amount of new material coming. I will be adding roughly 500 new photos over the next 3 months and some of these photos should be ready for viewing in a few more weeks.
FINALLY! I'm back. Biggest website updates in literally years coming soon. Added TWO new photos sets at The Post Drill page. Fixed photo links to some of the earlier photos on the Post Drill page and reformatted the page to make it easier to find the different drills. Also began replacing some of the smaller and lower quality photos. Do not take the fake vaccine.
Many of the older photos on this website will slowly be replaced with much higher quality versions. Most of the older photos on this website were made during the days when all I had was a dial-up connection, and thus the very low file size and low quality of those earlier pictures. I will be replacing many of these with much higher quality/resolution photos over time. As some of you already know, my old camera (used from around 2003 to around 2018) was a POS (piece of junk) - I finally bought a good camera. Massive collection of new photos coming.
I will be starting with one of the pages that hasn't been updated here for many years - the vise page. This was project I wanted to expand on but didn't have a good enough camera or time to for photos. This was, and will be a look at buying blacksmith leg vises. Everything from identifying salvagable tools to repairing and putting them back in service again. And links to vendors selling new tools and equipment.
This website was started 24 years ago using MS Frontpage 98. Frontpage has a huge amount of obsolete html code that was thought to be, at that time, the future of internet browsing. It wasn't. And some of that coding causes errors on some servers. All of that obsolete code must be stripped out of every page on this website before I can begin adding updates. These changes are extremely urgent. That 22-year old program won't run on my new computer - I'm using an old laptop to make these changes, and I don't expect this old laptop to last much longer - it's 12 years old. It is easiest to use FrontPage to strip out excessive FrontPage coding. Gotta get it done before I no longer have an old computer capable of running that old program. I am almost finished and should be ready to start adding new material after this coming weekend.
Fire & Roses is an amateur video documentary showing our team of blacksmiths forging a rose from a solid bar of iron. Using only the traditional techniques taught to German blacksmiths for hundreds of years. This is not a sheet metal rose, nor is it a bar that was smashed flat and rolled up as seen on other blacksmith websites. This is the real thing! Performed live for a small audience from Calontir in October of 2002. The Fire & Roses video DVD is now available for purchase by both internet and mail order. Click on the picture at left or follow this link: http://www.beautifuliron.com/events_zarchive_demonstration_iron_rose_video_forging.htm for more details on the video and ordering instructions.
Beautiful Iron (formerly known as Horsefeathers & Hammermen) is dedicated to the display of tools, work methods, and products of the blacksmith, and to the use of horses as the main source of power on a farm. The focus is on 'old technology' which I define as any tools, machines, and work methods used before the year 1915. This is a private website that is open to viewing by the public. There are no professional writers here. Many of the pages and photos on this website were created during the era of slow dial-up connections that most people had at the time. Most of the photos on this site have been replaced multiple times with higher and higher resolution photos as internet connection speeds increased. All remaining low resolution photos will be replaced with higher resolution photos as time permits.
With the first Coal Forge pages being written during the spring of 1998 and first
published to the web in May of 1999. Nowhere else can one find so many shops and
equipment showcased as they are on this
site.
With literally hundreds of photos of coal forges and blacksmith shops, a foundation
of knowledge was created to be shared and to support the forge designs and theories
described in the treatise on Forge Design for blacksmiths that can be accessed by
following the links in the Forge & Fire section. This site has grown to include
other aspects of work which I, or friends of mine, are involved in. There is something
for everyone from beginner to highly advanced ornamental ironworkers. Updates are
made as materials are gathered and time permits. This is a work in progress and
will continue growing as more photos and material is added, so visitors are invited
to check back often. Building on the history of the blacksmith's trade, this website
offers a tremendous amount of information and documentation to help other smiths
to build their own forges and to see forges other smiths have built.
Created by a blacksmith to help other blacksmiths, this website is unlike
any other. The photos of forges and design theories cannot be found anywhere else
on the internet. The photos show blacksmith's forges (hearths) from around the world.
Many professional shops and a few museum shops that tried to recreate period blacksmith
shops. Often people who have seen my work will ask specific details of how I make
my tools, built a coal forge, and learned the trade. More often still they ask me
how they can learn the art and where, how, and what to get to set up a little shop
of their own. The result was that I often needed to carry about 60 pounds of books
and photos and videos everywhere I went. Many of these photos and other references
are now posted here on this website so friends can find them at their own leisure
and I no longer must carry so much stuff around with me.
My
background. I'm an ornamental blacksmith or
gatesmith working on all sizes of wrought iron ornamental gates and railings and
other items. I am also a mechanic and for those of you who just have to ask, yes
I shoe horses- with a preference for heavy draft horses. Gates and decorative work
are my main focus along with draft horse shoeing and manufacturing heavy duty hardware
and repairing machinery used with draft horses.
UPDATES
May 29th, 2025.
Shop Update. Poured first half of the permanent concrete edging for brick floor.
All floor dimensions and angles are measured from these floor boundary edge
lines. Photo shows sandbags holding the large wooden form in place for pouring
the concrete floor edges.
It takes two
weeks for sack concrete to fully cure so it was important to get this work done
as soon as possible to avoid delays later when there is time to work on the
floor again. See the rest of the update on the
Latest News Updates
page.
May 19th, 2025.
Shop Update. At right are photos of the new concrete subfloor in
the front of the shop. Concrete floor on a well-drained base now extends
from front doors to the rear of the shop. There is still a 6' x 7' section of
floor underneath the air hammer that needs to be finished in the front of the
shop but this will wait until next year. The wet muddy
nasty floor and humidity problem is finally eliminated in full. Concrete sealer
was rolled onto the central sections of concrete for the purpose of making it
easier to keep clean. Concrete edging for the
brick floor will proceed when I have time. Shortages of construction supplies
will become a probem soon so I must
immediately finish some of the planned electrical renovation in other buildings over the
next month or so. This other work is urgent and must be done ASAP, so brick
floor work in the shop will be slow for a couple months. See the full update at
the Latest News
Updates page.
May 3rd, 2025. URGENT MESSAGE: ...
As I write this, warehouses still have inventory and there are no shortages of anything in stores. A storm is brewing. Imports coming from China are shutting down until the trade problem is solved. One report says Seattle ports have little or no import container volume. Another recent report says Los Angeles ports total import volume are down 33% (running at 67% of normal volume) and are expected to drop to 20% of normal volume in approximately 10 days. At that point we have only what is in warehouses and that inventory will last only weeks. Even if trade were to restart immediately it would take weeks to refill the gap in inventories. This means short temporary shortages and increased prices by this summer, and that is an optimistic view. If the trade shutdown persists, the shortages will be severe and take at least until the end of the year to backfill. Prices will remain sky high even after trade restarts because there will be huge backlog of items waiting to be shipped and huge demand placed on shipping vessels and ports. This will keep prices high and severe shortages lasting until at least the end of the year.
If you are planning any construction projects or improvements for this year, make a list of needed supplies and get them bought now. Read the whole update here: Latest News Updates
April
21st, 2025. Shop Update. Front right side floor
has been replaced with new concrete. Photos show the
prep work to get ready for pouring concrete. New concrete sub-floor is now poured all the way
up to the front doors of the shop. The wet muddy floor problem has been
eliminated. Cats keep walking all over the new concrete so I immediately shut
the doors to keep the little vandals out. Photos of the finished concrete will
appear in next update for May. See the full
update on the Latest
News Updates page.
January,
16th, 2025. Shop Update. Large floor upgrade in progress. During
the past fall and Christmas season, stone forge construction was temporarily
stopped while approximately 2/3rds of the shop floor was dug out and replaced
with a new concrete subfloor in preparation for building a permanent brick
floor. See the rest of this large update here:
Latest News Updates
page.
October 29th, 2024. Added Old Threshers 2024 highlight photos to Steam Power & Antique Engines Shows page.
October 27th, 2024. Updated Steam Power & Antique Engines Shows page.
October
23rd, 2024. Shop Update. Changed priorities, now replacing
rotten old floor. Will finish chimney after floor problem is fixed. See the full
update at the
Latest News Updates
page.
September
9th, 2024. Shop Update. Chimney foundation is now complete and
ready for construction of the smoke box and flue sections. Earlier I wrote about
the need for creating a hollow section under the smokebox to bring air into the
fire from behind the chimney. Photos in this update show this hollow channel has
now been built into the lower chimney before the smokebox construction covers
the top of this hollow tuyere tunnel. Slip form construction was used to build
this section of chimney foundation. See the rest of the photos with this update
on the
Latest News Updates
page.
August 18th, 2024. Shop Update. Chimney base has been
built. The chimney base is heavy and tedious work. This is due
to the huge mass of stone and mortar that are put into the base. Finished lower
section section of chimney base is shown in photo at right. Roughly 4-5 hours
after stone masonry work is finished, mortar is still soft enough to allow it to
be scraped and brushed off of stones and out of joints to expose the stones. To
further clean any mortar that might still be clinging to surface of the stones
as a thin film, a good mosonry sponge is soaked in water and used to gently wash
the mortar film from the surface of the stones... See the rest of this update at
the
Latest News Updates
page.
July
25th, 2024. Shop update. Base
layer of chimney and front pedestal started, and concrete subfloor layer poured
and ready for future brick floor shop upgrade. Another milestone event because
this ends the problem of dirt falling in and caving in from the sides of the
trench. Chimney construction above ground can now begin in a few more days after
the concrete cures...See more of this update on the
Latest News Updates
page.
June 16, 2024.
Shop update. First layer of rock has been layed down. This is a milestone event
because after spending 5 weeks pumping water out of the trench every day, the
top surface of the stone masonry is now above the ground water level, and ground
water flooding is unlikely to impose any more problems. Construction work can
finally proceed witout any further delays... See the rest of this update at the
Latest News Updates
page.