[TheForge] Re: Fwd: [Orchid] Working with old iron nails
Andy Vida
osan at netlabs.net
Sat Jun 26 16:26:08 EDT 2004
Hi Joanna,
If these are old hand made nails, they are almost certainly wrought
iron.
You don't mention your level of experience or even if you are a
blacksmith, so I will assume you are at best a novice. Please
correct me if I'm wrong.
Wrought iron is an interesting material to work. I happen to love
it, but most smiths hate it. It has to be worked at a bright yellow
heat most of the time. The less refined it is, the more this is
true.
Wrought iron is a mix of essentially pure iron with siliceous slag,
iron silicate, a glass-like material. It is added to the pure iron
to impart better strength characteristics as pure iron is very soft
and mushy. The slag, being a glass, also imparts very good corrosion
resistance to the iron. What happens is that as the ball of iron
comes out of the furnace, it is full of voids that are filled with
the slag and must be refined by hammering, which forces most of the
slag out of the iron, but some remains. During this hammering, the
iron and slag align themselves in the direction in which the material
is being drawn. In single-refined iron, the bloom is hammered basically
once and drawn into a bar that is often called "muck bar". If you take
a piece of this and etch it in acid you will see a beautiful wood-like
pattern in the grain.
Double-refined wrought iron has been folded back upon itself, re-welded
into a single block and then drawn into bar. This iron will be of a
better quality in that there will be finer voids in the iron and less
slag. Triple-refined iron has had this done yet again and has a
significantly finer structure. Then there is something called, if I
recall correctly, king bar or King's Iron, or some such, that has been
refined four times and it considered the highest quality.
Nails are probably either made from much bar or double-refined iron and
almost certainly not of anything better than that as the finer the iron
the more costly and there was no reason to spend extra money on nails.
You can work wrought iron cold in terms of bending it, but you do run
the risk of its splitting and fracturing if the bend is too tight in
relation to the stick size. If you are looking to make a ring, for
example, you may get away with it, but don't be surprised if cold
bending results in some failure in the material.
Hot working at the right temperature will also further refine the iron.
Wrought iron forge welds much more readily than modern steels, largely
due to the absence of carbon. A good smith can forge weld wrought
without using flux. When welding, make sure the iron is "drippy hot".
This is a high welding heat where the material looks almost oily on
the surface. That is the right temperature at which to weld wrought.
As for what you can make from these nails, that is really a very open
set of possibilities. You can weld many nails together to make a
larger piece of material and make something from that or you can choose
to make something from each individual nail, which may be what you will
want because it will provide more finished pieces. Another factor to
consider is how large the nails are. If they are large spikes, I might
consider making crosses from them, an appropriate thing perhaps, given
where they came from. You can weld two nails together in a cross or
if a nail is large enough you can make a nice cross (don't recall the
precise name offhand) by splitting each end at 90* to each other and
spreading the splits flat, resulting in a very nice cross.
If a spike is too long and not thick enough, bend it back upon itself,
weld it all together into a heavier bar and work from there.
You could make various hooks, 'J's 'S's, etc. as well. I'm sure there
are many things you can make that I cannot think of or don't know
about.
OR, you could etch the nails very lightly in acid or ferric chloride
to reveal the grain of the metal and offer them as historical artifacts
as they are. I would be inclined to this solution. They remain
original
and the hand of the smith is revealed to the observer. They are a piece
of history and are worth preserving as they are. You could even make a
small wooden stand with a plaque stating that it is a nail from such
and such a church t fancy it up a bit and to document the artifact so
that someone finding it in a garage sale 173 years from today will know
that this isn't something to be tossed away without thought... or
hopefully they will have that much sense.
That is my low dollar opinion.
Best wishes, and if you have any other questions, please feel free to
ask.
Regards,
-Andy Vida
jesse brennan wrote:
>
> >X-Originating-IP: [207.44.240.69]
> >Delivered-To: orchid-outgoing-jivo82 at luna.imagiware.com
> >To: orchid at ganoksin.com
> >From: "joanna francis" <francisjoanna at hotmail.com>
> >Subject: [Orchid] Working with old iron nails
> >Sender: owner-orchid at ganoksin.com
> >Reply-To: orchid at ganoksin.com
> >Date: Sat, 26 Jun 2004 05:39:15 -0500 (CDT)
> >
> >========[ Invite a Friend - http://www.ganoksin.com/invite.htm ]========
> >
> > I have been given some old iron nails from a cathedral in Vancouver.
> > They recently did a renovation and someone thought that the original
> > hand forged nails could be made into something interesting to sell
> > as a fundraiser. I've searched the archives but haven't found
> > anything very helpful on how to work with this material. I'm
> > wondering how much I can manipulate the metal - can it be annealed
> > and bent? - can it be soldered or should I be planning on cold
> > connection? and finally, how do I keep it from rusting? Thanks very
> > much
> >
> >Joanna Francis
> >
> >____________________________________________________________________
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> How about helping her a bit.
>
> jesse
--
-Andy V.
There's a brand new talk, but it's not very clear,
That people from good homes are talking this year.
It's loud and it's tasteless, I've not heard it before.
They shout it while they're dancing from the dance floor.
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