How to Forge a Fire Poker - Excellent project for beginners

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This is an excellent beginner tutorial. Master Blacksmith Daniel Lapidow from the Blacksmith of Trenton shows us from start to finish how to make a functional and handy fire poker. Most fire pokers are straight which makes it difficult to actually tend a fire. This one has a curve and a handle.

Special thanks go to Sasha who is the Blacksmith of Trenton. And to Daniel (also known as The Hebrew Hammer) for doing this tutorial for us!

There are several different techniques that he shows us during this video including:

At 1:31 notice how the first series of sttrikes are at an angle. These are called angle strikes. This gives us the taper.
At 1:40 he shifts the piece 90 degrees back and forth. This squares it. We get a square taper.
At 1:50 He uses a technique called near Half-face hammering. This is where the hammer is half on and half off the anvil. This causes the dent in the piece. Which is needed for an upcoming bend
I have a video tutorial on blacksmithing hammer blows right here: https://youtu.be/0GQl-oqFTnc

At 3:18 He does a targeted quench This cools just the tip of the poker so it can be hit with a hammer without being distorted. But the part we want to bend stays red hot so it can bend. This targeted quenching is a very important technique and it is used several times with this project.

At 4:40 another targeted quench. This time we quench so that cooled part of the piece doesn’t twist. Only the red hot part will twist which is exactly what we want.

At 4:58 Twisting with a tool.

At 6:06 It’s easy to miss this but at this point Daniel is adjusting the airflow to the forge with his left hand. You can see the variance in fire intensity.

At 6:29 more angle blows to taper the piece. This time we put a round taper in the piece.
At 7:02 Daniel is using the horn of the anvil to do a technique called “Drawing out” this makes the piece thinner and longer. Think of it kind of like stretching out a piece of taffy. It gets thinner and longer.
At 8:03 Notice the angle hammer blows to cause the end of the piece to curl.

At 8:33 Notice how Daniel uses the horn of the anvil to bend “up” the piece. Often beginners don’t realize this but the horn isn’t just for working “down” onto. It is also useful and often easier to use to bend the work “up”. This is because you can see the bend. If you were bending it down the anvil would block your view of the piece and the bend.

Want to get more out of this video?
If you are a beginner or new to blacksmithing I encourage you to watch this video multiple times. And in particular watch the off-hand. That is the hand that is holding the piece, not doing the hammering. Beginners often focus on the hammering. But a master blacksmith does a lot with the off-hand. It is critical but easy to miss. If you watch this video with that in mind you will see that there is a lot going on with the master blacksmith’s off-hand. Work on this in your own blacksmithing.

About Medieval America the series

Will is on a Vision Quest to see all of America – And this youtube series chronicles the adventure. Travel along with Will as he journeys all across America in search of medieval things like Castles, Blacksmiths, Meaderies, Museums, Stone Masons and much more. You can see the web version with lots more resources right here: http://www.stormthecastle.com/medieval-america/index.htm

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Resources:

Northlandz Model Railroad Website: https://www.northlandz.com/
Pax Amicus Castle Theatre: http://www.castletheatre.com/
Blacksmith of Trenton Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Blacksmith-of-Trenton/138187929561714

Journey Statistics:
States traveled to: 5 (Mass, Maine, NH, NY, NJ + Canada)
Mileage so far: 2160
Medieval sites visited: 15
Castles visited: 9
Blacksmiths visited: 3
Other stops and sites: 6
Motels/Hotels: 9
Days Traveling: 18