[TheForge] question for part-timers & hobbyists

[Jerry Frost]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Fiorini & Skiles" <koka@acegroup.cc>
To: <theforge@mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Friday, February 28, 2003 6:50 AM
Subject: [TheForge] question for part-timers & hobbyists


> I've got questions for those of you who are part-time blacksmiths (have a
> full time job at home or out of home) or hobbyist blacksmiths.  FYI- I
> consider myself part time because I work part time as mother and household
> manager.
>
> Back to the questions.
> What are your personal goals for blacksmithing?
>

Be able to do anything that comes through the door.

> Are you more interested in technical skills, design skills, or equally
> devoted to both?
>

Not much difference from my perspective.

Design often depends on your technical skills. Design goes far further than
being able to draw a well porportioned piece. You have to design the
production steps not only with your skill level but your equipment in mind.
This is especially true if you have more than just a few of an item to make.

> Do you like to do projects or make up your own, or both?
>

Both but I prefer the look on a person's face when I take a coffee shop
napkin sketch and hand them the real item.

> How much time per week, or month do you set aside for your blacksmithing?
>

I don't "set" time aside. I'm a semi-pro hobbyist so I deform metal when I
feel like it and my paycheck job allows.

> How much time do you set aside for studying blacksmithing in other ways,
> through book research or your own sketching?
>

I don't. I read any book, news letter, etc. I come across then it sits as a
reference. On the other hand nobody can stop me from thinking about smithing
and metal working in general. I also spend several hours a week, mostly
lurking but sometimes participating on the lists. I also have a number of
"local" (local in AK may be several hundred miles away) newby smiths I
coach.

Sketching now is a different matter, I don't set time aside but I've always
got my graph paper and calculator with me and make sketches almost
constantly. For instance, as I sit writing this I have TurboCad running in
the background with my latest concept drawings on screen, the graph paper
sketches are laying in front of the keyboard.

> Do you set yourself certain goals in the shop?- for example, maybe in
June,
> you are going to work strictly on collars, or in August, you are going to
> work on perfecting scroll designs.
>

Nope. I pick ot take any project remotely within my level and teach myself
whatever I don't already know. I taught myself blacksmithing in a nearly
schizophrenic shotgun approach and continue this way. Still, I do have
goals. Say . . . . Something better than a tarp tent to work in. Perhaps a
smooth level concrete floor to work on. Heat! <grin>


> If you don't like to work with a goal system- then how do you decide what
to
> work on ?
>

I don't. Work decides it needs doing and elects me.

> What motivates you?
>

Do I wax philosophical or what?  Hmmmm. . . . Okay, can't separate the two.
There's nothing like blacksmithing for an ego boost. Iron and steel are the
symbols of strength, endurance and permanence in modern humanity's world.
Without it people live in mud or grass huts, eat what they can scratch from
the earth, admire the OLD (30 + years) elders and aspire to live more than
30 years. Steel is the backbone of modern civilization, you can point to the
bronze age civilizations but the economics of bronze wouldn't allow for
anything like what we have now.

Now, take this universal (on earth anyway) symbol, that which all things
modern depend on, add mankinds oldest tools: mind, eye, hand, a fire,
something to hit with and something to hit against and have your way with
iron and steel. Being able to do this gives a person a justifiable
confidence they can do nearly anything. Anything you can do with a hammer
anyway. <grin>

What more motivation could a person need?

>

Frosty
------------------------
If it ain't forged
it ain't real.
Wrought iron is.
The FrostWorks

Meadow Lakes, AK.