It is Welsh you know....

  I am trying to get back to the blacksmithing especially with the end of summer in sight.  Blacksmithing in Florida during the summer is really, really draining.

  Today I decided to play a bit more with doing wings.  Since I've decided for the project that I am doing that I want Welsh dragons, I switch gears a bit and went for more of a dragon wing style than a bird wing style.  As a reminder, I am doing something similar to the Bok Tower gardens gates.

  So after playing around for just about an hour, the proof of concept game out pretty decent.  It doesn't look that great in this photo because I was rushed by the setting sun.  Since the test game out pretty good, I am going to try a more careful test later this week.  It is hard to see because of the lighting, but there are some well defined ribs.  I may go for a slightly wider piece so that I can add a rib to the wing.  Also, I am going to make some specialized fullering tools to help with the forming.

Still alive...

Just let me blow the dust off of this thing...

Finally got back to forge work after a many month hiatus.  I won't go into all of the reasons I was away but the biggest was getting married.

So, dragged the forge out today even though it was too hot.  Cleaned some rust off of the anvil and fired up the forge.  Since it has been so long since I've worked, I decided to take it a bit easy today and just do some basic stuff.  Started with making a new fire starter since I couldn't find my old one.  Nothing more than a piece of steel made from a file and used to start fires in a less modern way.

Inspired by a visit to Bok Tower, I decided to play around with making an animal head for a project that I am working on for a friend.  So this afternoon I worked on a wing to see if I liked the results.  Still working on it (in fact, plan to head back out) and I will post pictures of it if I like the results.  In the meantime, here is an example of the original.  Notice the tower in the back ground.  They are fairly basic and after a bit of toying around, I should get it.