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Blacksmithing the curls

I met a blacksmith called Andrew Kimpton a while ago and asked him if he could help me form the curly bits on the heads.

Last week I went out to his place in Yandoit, an area full of history, old stone houses dot the roads as they curve through the rolling hills.

Blacksmithing is another very old trade and once again I learnt lots from a master craftsman.


The steel rods were put into the forge which Andrew made. There is an air pump underneath which blows air mixed with LPG, and in about 10 minutes they were cherry red and ready to go.










This great contraption is a power hammer, again home made. This mimics the action of striking with a hammer onto an anvil, and saves the blacksmith from manually hammering the hot steel himself.

It is a noisy and potentially dangerous process, you need to keep your wits about you.






It is quite an art to bend and shape steel like this. I was witnessing many years of knowledge and experience coming together, he made it look easy, but I sure appreciated the skill involved.









I now have all the pieces of the puzzle and am very keen to get it all together.

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