There are a number of finishes available for forged work including traditional finishes like paint or wax. The one we’ve found best for interior locations uses a mixture of raw linseed oil and beeswax. We mix the linseed oil and beeswax in the shop, blending them by heating them together in a baking pan over the forge. We use raw linseed oil because boiled linseed oil contains heavy metal driers which are toxic.

For larger items, such as latches, the forging is heated slightly over the fire and dipped in the warm, liquid finish. The forging is then held again over the fire to ensure that all surfaces are completely covered by finish. We allow the forging to cool to a temperature that is comfortable for us to handle before we wipe off excess finish. For smaller items, we apply the warm, melted finish (it feels like melted candle wax) with our bare hands. After a few minutes we wipe off the excess.

Temperature is important in applying the finish. The wax must be hot enough to be liquid. In the winter, the finish can solidify in less time than it takes to hear Ravel’s Bolero on our shop radio -- just a few minutes. If the wax is too hot, or the forging is too hot when the finish is applied, the finished surface has a strange “caramelized” appearance.

It is the linseed oil in the finish that transforms the gray scale on the surface of the forging to black. Beeswax helps create a barrier to the environment. Beeswax is extremely stable and has been found to protect items for centuries.

We let the finish dry for at least two days and then the items are given a final paste wax (using Johnson’s). A day later the items are given a second buffing. After a final inspection they are ready to ship to Horton.

Blacksmithing uses two operations to transform mild steel or wrought iron: forging and shaping. Forging is using a hammer and anvil to alter a piece of steel’s dimensions. Shaping is changing the piece’s lines in relationship to the air around it. A line becomes a circle, a spiral, or an abrupt bend. The tools employed in shaping can be as simple as a hammer and anvil or as complex as a series of blacksmith-engineered jigs. This post will be about the shaping involved in transforming a length of forged stock into a grip.

In this photo the ends of the piece of stock have already been forged and the hole punched for the screw before the shaping process begins.

Two work areas are involved. The primary work area is the forge, shown above. The forged pieces before being bent are to the lower right, beside the tongs. In the fire we have two groups of forgings being heated. The group to the left is being heated prior to the first bending and the group to the right is being heated prior to the second bending. Grips that have been through both first and second bending operations are out of the fire, to the upper right of the tongs.

In this photo the HF20 grip is being bent after being heated in the forge. A second bend is required to make the grip.

The other major work area is the vise bench, just a step away from the forge. The vise holds a special jig used for bending the grips. The vise table is used as a cooling surface and to support the metal block used for leveling the grips.

After reheating the stock, the second bend is made and the piece is measured to make sure it is the proper size, 2 5/8 inches long. We try to get the grips close to this size, plus or minus a little. Blacksmithing is not an extremely precise art.

Further heats for the grips are made in a “soaking” fire. This is different from a normal forging fire in that very little air is given to the fire. The aim is to achieve a gradual heat which soaks from outside to inside, producing an even heat throughout the piece. In this case we are using a soaking heat because we have 30 items in the fire at one time.

Coke is placed around and over the grips and they are left to warm slowly. We turn the blower handle only now and again to maintain the fire.

When heated thoroughly, the pieces are removed from the fire one at a time and twisted open using two pairs of pliers. After all the grips are opened, they are placed again in a soaking fire, this time with the forged ends downward for best heating.

Next the grips are taken from the fire one at a time and the forged ends are shaped over a tool held in the vise. We use a hammer to flatten the forged ends against the tool.

The rest of the work is primarily done cold. This is the process of getting the grips to sit properly upright on the forged ends without tipping or wobbling. Here George is leveling the grip by using a small French pattern hammer’s peen to strike a forged end. A master grip is sitting upright to the right of his hands.

We use forge masters and templates for all the production work we do. These provide a comparison. In the case of this grip style, the master grip reminds us how much to open the grip in the step shown earlier. Another template shows to what size the grip ends are to be forged. There will be variation, but we try to keep what we make within fairly narrow boundaries of size and shape.

A final soaking fire is used to reheat the grips before putting the finish on them. The aim of this heat is to create an even layer of scale to take the finish, without blisters or bubbles. For this heat, we first place narrow pieces of 16 gauge mild steel in the fire, to partially block the air coming up from the tuyere. The grips are placed on the steel pieces and covered with coke. They will sit in this reducing fire for about 20 minutes, and be given air only now and again from the blower.

There is a black rock that can catch fire and burn so hot it can make straight rods of steel bloom into latches, hinges, or even roses. That sounds like one of those teasing jokes adults tell kids. How silly.

But true. We use coal, the fuel that became the favorite of 18th century north American blacksmiths, in our shop to heat our forges. There is coal near where we live, but to get Sewell coal we have to hire a driver with a dump truck and go on a six-hour round-trip journey with him along twisting rural two-lane blacktop. The mine is underground in southeastern West Virginia, where the Sewell coal seam is wide. Sewell coal, with its low ash and sulfur content and its superior coking properties, is worth all the trouble it takes to get. Yet, because it is so hard to get and because we hope to make our carbon footprint as small as possible, we are glad that a little coal goes a long way in our forges. We are still using the four tons we bought in 2002.

In our shop, as we heat and hammer the steel, our fires are tools which must be used attentively. Without this attention the lower part of the fire could burn away, make cold spots, clinkers; gooey masses of impurities, and hot spots capable of burning tips off finials in an instant. We must consistently feed the fire, pushing pieces of unburned green coal close to the fire's edge where they can kindle and become coke. There must always be enough coke when the fire is pushed apart at the end of the day so that there is ample fuel to start the next day's fire.

Our shop has three forges, each with an anvil and complete set of tools. Each work station is devoted to a specific range of tasks.

Just behind the forge hood is the hand-operated blower used to blow air up through the bottom of the fire.  The air blows into the fire from the bottom of this cast iron firepot through the tuyere, which is connected by pipe to the hand-operated blower.

The firepot has a clinker breaker, shown at center. The border surrounding it is the opening for air.

We use Sewell coal, named for the seam underground where it is mined. It is bituminous coal with low sulfur and ash content. It burns extremely hot and readily forms coke.

Our coal fire is actually a coke fire, the coal we place around the edges becoming the coke that burns with great heat in the center of the fire.

This piece is half coke, half coal.

When all the impurities burn off, the coal has become coke. It is feather light and capable of heating steel to forging temperatures of 1,600 degrees fahrenheit and above.

Coke doesn't smoke or flame when it burns as coal does.

Each blacksmith has his or her own way to light a fire. Molly starts by emptying the firepot, then filling it with newspaper topped by twigs. During damp winter weather a candle lights it better than a match does.

Once the paper is burning well, we place coke and partially burned, partially coked coal on top of it, all the while turning the blower handle to provide plenty of air.

The smoke and flames are from pieces of fuel that haven't yet completed the transition from coal to coke.

When the fire looks solid and steady we add some green coal near the edges and start work.