The Creation of a Turret Clock

Good day...

  I spent most of today on the forge and made a lot of progress.  I continued work on the plate for the lock.  It was a lot of work but very satisfying.  I am really at the point where I can usually do what I want.  I was able to draw out the metal to the plate.  The following pics show the progress thru the day.


  This is fairly early in the day.  You can see the half inch stock metal on the lower left and how thinned out it is on the other end in the upper right.



Another pic, a little later in the day showing some progress.

This final pic shows the plate at the end of the day.



  Some notes on the plate.  It is about 22" long and 3 3/4" wide.  The final piece will be about 18 1/2" x 3 1/2".  It may not seem that big of deal to make a simple plate like this.  However, it actually required a lot of work and experience to have it come out even and straight.  I'm glad I did it.  My goal over the next week is cut the plate and punch the holes for the nails.  After that, the holes for the key and the bolt for the lock.


Finally, a picture of the actual chest(from http://www.greydragon.org/trips/stockholm/index3.html)



Notice the lock plate on the front of the chest, some of it lost to corrosion.  The nails are easily seen on the perimeter of the plate.  Also visible on the plate is the keyhole.  It is in the center and looks like and upside down "L".

A final note:  I surprised myself today.  I happened to look at how I was holding the hammer.  When I first started smithing, I simply wrapped my hand around the hammer handle when working.  I read early on that a better form was for the thumb to point down the handle towards the hammer head.  I tried that style but found it akward.  I noticed today that my thumb was positioned correctly.  I have no idea when I started holding it correctly...