[TheForge] Grape Leaves

[Chris Worsley]

Bob,

I would suggest that you pick a leaf  pattern or two that you like and fax or
email the pattern to someone that can laser cut them from the material that you
would need. All you need to do is vein, forge edges,  and shape these leaves and
weld them to the 3/8" stock you are using for the towel bars. Be sure to have a
stem on the leaves you have cut. Forge weld or mig and  reforge the mig weld for
a smooth transition.
If you are going to add these to your product line, the time saved alone will
more than pay for the cost of the leaves.

Chris
Alexandria VA


Bob Ehrenberger wrote:

> I recently had a request for some towel bars with grape leaves on the ends.
> I had never made a grape leaf so I started doing resarch on the form and
> discovered that there are a dozen different varieties.
>
> I picked one of the simpler ones and started banging away. I started with
> 1/2" sq stock to make sure that I had enough material.  The first one didn't
> come out so nice and had to be salvaged with a lot of grinding and fileing.
> Since the towel bar was going to be out of 3/8" sq I decided to try folding
> the end back and welding it. This was not quite enough material so on the
> third leaf I folded it back and welded it, then I spread it to about 3/4"
> wide and folded it back and welded it again. This gave me a good amount of
> material and was roughly the right shape. The third leaf came out much
> better than the first two. But unless I get much faster there is no way I
> could make this a regular part of my product line. Of course as with most
> new form it takes for ever at first and then with practice gets faster and
> looks better.
>
> Have any of you made grape leaves? Do you have any pointers on the process?
>
> Bob Ehrenberger
> Shelbyville, Mo
>
> _