Blacksmithing for Beginners - The Best Cold Chisel

In this video I will be hand forging my favourite style cold chisel using a traditional blacksmiths forge .
Related video
Forging and Heat Treating your own tools from Scrap
• Blacksmithing For Begi...
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Thanks for watching - Denis

[@stevealford230]

Denis, on the subject of "not relying on color alone," the best trick in my experience (better than a magnet) is to sprinkle some salt on your workpiece in the forge. When the salt melts, you're at the perfect temperature for most common tool steels/spring steels/knife steels, about 1475F... and then let it soak for the appropriate time for the piece's thickness to ensure through-heat, then quench. That's going to give you the best results doing heat treatment in a forge. I'm relatively sure that you probably already know this, but I hope it helps. It might make a good video, along with other tips on HT and Tempering without a temperature-controlled oven. Thanks for the great content as always.

[@Cratercitysmith]

this is an amazing tip! gonna buy a box of salt for the shop now

[@stevealford230]

@@Cratercitysmith another tip that goes hand in hand with that one... is to get some blue Didymium filter lenses to put in a pair of goggles to slip on whenever you look directly into the forge. It's a glassworking thing, and I'm amazed that blacksmiths and bladesmiths haven't adopted it. We only glance into the forge for a couple of seconds at a time, but it adds up over the years and all that IR and UV high frequency light completely wrecks our eyes with cumulative damage, because the entire lining of the forge is radiating it, not just the burner, not just a single point like with a torch. You don't need a welding hood or a 14 shade... just a blue Didymium lens for your goggles. It's a wise and inexpensive PPE purchase.

[@Solais1019]

Huh...gonna have to remember both of these tips o.o

[@thedudeamongmengs2051]

I've never heard of that. That's really cool

[@Camper-kw5yr]

DF may have known. But I did not. Thank you for the tip.

[@markburd8541]

Thankyou Dennis for the "meat and potatoes" I sure do like your style of teaching.

[@75blackviking]

I listened to Denis for about 5 seconds and subscribed. This guy is the real deal.

[@littlepaddy7444]

Thanks Denis. Well explained.

[@cholulahotsauce6166]

I picked up a hi temp infrared thermometer for about 90 Cad and it has improved my heat treating a lot.

[@HomeEngineer-wm5fg]

I just discovered your channel......WOW!

[@yuyovich1164]

old achool,,,, gracias maestro,,,,,,abrazo desde argentina

[@garetkonigsfeld2]

Nice. Thanks for taking us along 👍.

[@jasonscott7803]

That for sharing your knowledge and experience with us mate, it has been a wonderful learning resource for me and great help. Best wishes from Australia.👍✌️⚒️

[@TalRohan]

Brilliantly demonstrated, thanks for sharing

[@25centsapop]

In the grinding phase if you have patience I love a good file to sharpen the chisel

[@thedudeamongmengs2051]

Really helpful little tutorial. I have a chisel i made in a similar way i use sometimes. Mine is shaped slightly differently though because I don't use mortise and tenons very often

[@michaelritter2180]

I love reading the comments I did not know about the salt trick

[@Smallathe]

awesome demonstration!

[@alejandroluer]

Super Nice!

[@mattw7949]

Nice vid. The color drawing sequence was fun. I rarely get to watch that from the comfort of a squishy chair in air conditioning. What was the metal you were working?

[@sirtan1159]

how much experience/trial and error did you have to do to know the exact color for tempering? its impressive.

[@df-intheshop330]

It's usually easier to start with the chisel a little hard because if the edge chips all you need to do is go to a darker (softer) temper colour. However if the chisel starts off too soft and the cutting edge deforms then you will need to totally redo the heat treat to get back to a lighter temper colour.

[@romandybala]

I like working with chisels and they have helped me thru some difficult jobs but your display is very limited in application. Only a very narrow piece of steel can fit in the depth of a vise. In something like a box or anything that isnt flat and accesible this just wont work as you need full holding power of a vise . A better way is to cut down onto a baseplate so minimal clamping is required. Many videos from India and other Asian countries show how its done .

[@markburd8541]

Thankyou for your constructive feedback, this kind of insight is the best of youtube in my humble opinion.

[@thedudeamongmengs2051]

Technically yes but this works for a lot of applications and if you arent working o. Boxes frequently, you can just set the box on top of the vice and use the vice as the baseplate. Some vices have anvils on them anyway. Or if you want to punch through and dont want to damage your vice or chisel, you can open the vice and set the box on top

[@user-xy9eb1ui4l]

❤❤❤ ❤❤ ❤

[@ryderphillips4464]

Now I know.

[@wesking5600]

During the grinding/sharpening phase I’ve noticed the cutting area will heat up to a blue color. Does this mean my heat treat is ruined and I need to redo the whole heat treating process again?

[@df-intheshop330]

That area has lost its temper. If it is localized to just a thin blue line on the cutting edge and you caught it ( cooled it ) fast enough you will be able to grind past that area and get to a section that was not affected by the heat. Otherwise it will be necessary to go through the whole heat treating cycle again.

[@lotty468]

I thought the quenching was important with the temper, that it should be in oil. I'm recalling from decades ago. Can someone say when water and when oil, please?

[@df-intheshop330]

The makeup of the steel determines whether it is oil, water or air hardening. With scrap steel you will need to test to see what works best. The reason I use springs or crowbars for my tools is because they tend to always be oil hardening ( so far ).

[@thedudeamongmengs2051]

A lot of the time you need to know the alloy youre using, or you can just guess. Some alloys use water, oil, or some mixture of stuff. Car springs are usually gonna be pretty similar i think. I have an app called heat treat that has a database of alloys and their heat treatment processes. Its a really incredible bit of informstion. Thats talking about ideal conditions though. For most purposes, just using oil is a pretty safe bet