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#PhotoOfTheDay is something different - one of my tidier blacksmithing creations, a table knife that started off as a piece of a very rusty spring or something, that I found on the side of a road.
Beautiful! Now make 5 more duplicates as well as matching big forks, little forks, big spoons, little spoons. And then ship them to my PO box. THANKS!
/s
Still a beauty
That’s really cool! Do you do all your projects by recycling? I’m guessing if it was a spring then you melted it completely down before doing blacksmith-y things to it. It’d be really cool to see a timelapse or something!
@galaxia Definitely not all of them, but many. Giving a piece of trash a new life is weirdly satisfying.... One of my regular things is making old railroad spikes into heavy-duty bottle openers.
That is a great idea! I am a cosplayer and try to recycle stuff into props sometimes, but I don’t think I’ve completely turned something around into such a new thing. Usually it’s upcycling clothes or gluing things together lol.
@galaxia There are great opportunities for re-use/re-cycle/etc. in life. I've made use of some in props/cosplay stuff before. It's usually easier when you're creating something from scratch, rather than trying to duplicate an existing screen-used item for example. That's been my experience, anyway... Like ages ago I made up a scifi hand grenade and it was mostly constructed from a broken, modified toy. :)
@croyle Dang that's gorgeous, especially with the patination from its original life.
@AF0AJ I think it got a little heat treating color... Sometimes I will do that deliberately.
@croyle Sorry for the ignorance… I was referring to the occasional dark flaky spot; whatever it is, I love it. 
@AF0AJ No worries! The dark spots are what the whole thing looked like until I did the grinding and polish. The surface is slightly uneven from being beaten into shape with a hammer, so the low areas (dark spots) get missed during grinding... I could have ground it down until they vanished, but I don't like it when my work looks like it was made by a machine. Most of my stuff is much more "rustic" than this example!
@croyle I figured as much. I just love the character that they bring to the piece. Unfathomable amount of work, but several complete place setting that looked like that would not be something I'd kick out of my kitchen drawer. 
Holy man, that’s amazing! How long have you been forging/smithing for? Have any tips for someone that wants to get started?
@Pilferjinx Thanks! I haven't been very active lately but started a few years back... Tips, um... There's a lot to learn and investment in $, and set up. Taking in-person lessons if you can will help a ton with those things. Even informally. Start small, learn and obey the safety. There's very little rocket science involved but there is a lot of material to learn, so be patient and it will come.