Hand forging chains (1) - Blacksmithing

[biclink]

Man if you payed a thousand dollars an hour today you still would not get people to work like that or have the skills needed.

[sythead]

Wow. Thats a hard way of making a living. Thats a great video, thanks very much.

[lucvernet]

That was the time of wooden ships and iron men!

[TheLordGenerals]

I struggle to forge weld 12mm bar!! Wow...

[Mumwaldee]

I bet these guys never needed ambien. Could probably fall asleep on a pile of rocks after a day of work like that. Of course a pint of painkiller would probably help too.

[ojii111]

this WAS the heart of USA, industry and hard work at its infancy then big business got greedy and caused the first crash and depression.

they say those that forget history are going to repeat it and they might be right.

[Mumwaldee]

@ojii111 You know the Netherton chain works is in Britain right?

[ojii111]

@Mumwaldee hehe..may have over looked that. what i ment to say still rings true. this kind of blue collar hard work was the stuff that makes a country great..you dont become great by becoming consumers

[kaizoebara]

It is truly amazing how so many of them instantly find their rhythm, eg when they rivet the shackle.

[QarbitraryQ]

4:58

MAN: Is that the clump of iron called you a bitch?

Man 2: yeah!

Mob of angry men: get em!!

++lynched++

[bluecollarboiler]

from the old days...when men were men and sheep were scared :-)

[1800wiggles]

Look how fast people moved back in those days! Heck, even the fires moved faster back then...

[MajorSeven59]

OK! I just moved a 200lb anvil from my truck to my shop. Am I a man or what?

Then I watched this video. OK! I'm weenie and now I need a nappypoo.

I reckon if I showed up to work wearing a hard hat, safety goggles and flame retardant underwear, those old boys would just beat the crap out of me. They all look like they are ready to mosey off to a church social right after work. A little after shave lotion and some hair oil and your good to go.

Amazing Video! Thanks for posting!

[addisondelisle]

This is incredible - thank you for posting this.

[ctempleton3]

that is just freaking cool.

[2xchrome]

I'll bet those guys never thought I'd be watching them a hundred years later on a 3.5 HD screen while sitting on a toilet.

Great video. Makes me feel proud to be a man!! Lol

[4inches4u]

Wow....... I would not want to mess with these dudes

[allistairc123]

un believeable, fantastic footage thanks for sharing

[ScoutCrafter]

Awesome! In my opinion my generation (today) just doesn't match up... Those guys were amazing! Thanks so much for posting!

[Hollrobb]

Great video, thanks for posting it.

[ridgetownpimp]

great post!!

thank you

[happylad]

Beauty and brutality of industrial labour.

Amazing video. Thank you.

[loyeti]

to think that now that very chain is the main source of wrought iron in the world

[MrThahey]

@loyeti I'm attempting to make my own wrought iron through puddling scrap and experimenting with the bloomery process, but it's still sad that wrought iron is no longer the common material of the smith.

[biggest23]

Perfect addition and use of youtube, thanks buddy. Also if I had to storm Draculas Transylvanian stronghold these are definitely the characters I would employ as the angry villagers. Un-freaking-stoppable.

[viol999]

That's back when men were men.

[archer82633]

I would love to see people like Donald Trump and suits like him do this job twelve hours a day. People that worked like the men in the video are the ones that literally forged this country into what it was and the suits are driving it back into the ground

[ANewNormalcy]

I'll bet that foundry ran at 130db.

[JsWay1897]

Thats an Amazing amount of work for an anchor. WOW

[sykop8ntballer]

I've always seen thoes old, huge chains at the docks, but have never thought about the work that goes into making a link, I had no idea it was all done by hand back in the day. Awesome video.

[sw8741]

what a bunch of slackers!! get to work dammit! i'll be at my computer, with a padded chair, a cold one and my A/C on! great video! wheres OSHA? Is that the proper swing? Safety glasses? Stop complaining about your back and why you are tired and sore. Where are the women?? Somebody call the EEOC!! I want 50/50 men/women dammit!! Bunch of male chauvinists pigs!! We all know how men have kept women down!! Where are the handicapped? Someone get a ADA lawyer on the phone!! Pronto!

[metalcrosss]

reading your comment made me want to step on a day old puppies head, SHUT THE F*&^% UP!

[rmcnabb]

Ha! Brilliant.

[Darthane]

Yeah, watch how much red hot metal sprays off when those guys with the sledges lay into that anchor, "aww you got some melted steel on your arm... lucky its not your eye lad NOW GIT HAMMERIN!"

When men were men not armchair sportsmen.

[blacksmither1]

@sw8741 what the hell are you talking about?!

[svartsot]

@sw8741 hahaha:)

[TheGooberment]

people should know how to make anything, this is a great video thank you for posting it.

[jrichtman]

WOW! Could you imagine working next to 10 other guys swinging hammers all at the same spot as hot metal splashes all over. These old videos always make me appreciate what my grandparents had to do and how much easier all work has become. Great vid.

[Maserati420]

Love to see how things were done some time ago. Thanks!

[turowilhelm]

i feel like a fat, lazy pig after watching those guys at work. thanks!!

[matty309]

nice

[blueshadow1996]

that is the best video I have ever seen on YT..Thank you for posting this..

[newmondo]

That's one massive rivet

[UberJapes]

Impressive, to put it mildly!

[Bullettube]

" A Gang of men without counterpart in the country" That says it all doesn't it?

Despite this hot and heavy work, did you notice what they are wearing? White shirts, vests and various kinds of caps and hats. Very stylish!

[devel155]

Wow....

[leecustomiron]

Thank you so much for posting this footage - puts much into perspective.

[1423stuart]

brilliant footage i know the titanic chain and anchor was made in netherton ,pictures of it can be found with 20 strong horses pulling it through the town ,thanks again

[h1aa]

Terrific film. Should be pointed out though that the chain is of wrought iron which is comparatively easy to bend and weld as opposed to steel where the best that can be hoped for is a good glue job. The strikers appear to be using a double handled sledge. A favourite.

[mattchoo87]

'Iron and steel' by WKV Gale has some great chainmaking photos of this and more, as well as informed commentary. Apparently the double-handled sledge is called a johnny, and weighs about 37lb. The stud in the middle of the link is cast, not wrought, and is held in place by the link being hammered onto it.

[althesmith]

It's a myth that the best you can do with steel is a "good glue job". I've made swords with 300 layers of steel "glued" together that didn't come "unglued" through all the stress of hardening, tempering, and test cutting and flexing. Pretty good "glue job", I'd say. The notion that you can't do proper welding on steel was disproved by professional smiths by 1900.

[alexshefton]

yeah, I welded some steel last monday night.

really easy,

[althesmith]

Good going. Coal or gas forge? I found the whole trick with some of the alloys is to get all the scale off with a grinder before folding/welding. Some flourspar in the borax flux mix helps, too, especially with nickel steels.

[h1aa]

I've done quite a bit of fire welding myself over the years (iron and steel)including lifting slings from 3 inch diameter MS until the high tensile modular stuff made everything else obsolete in the 70's. We finished our slings under a 40 CWT B&S Massey arch hammer.I have seen laminated swords subject to the magnetic particle test and every one failed. This is not to say they were falling apart but put simply what appeared to be good welds were deficient.

[althesmith]

I'd have to know who the swords were made by. I've seen (and subjected my own) pattern-welded blades subjected to tremendous stresses and impacts in testing. Perhaps, as forge-welding in steel is a diffusion-bond process where the metals are never actually brought to the melting point, the magnetic particle test is simply responding to the lines of the diffusion bonds, which will have a certain level of decarb, and showing them up in the same way an acid etch will.

[althesmith]

Another issue is that many smiths, back when the whole pattern-welded thing kicked up again in the 70's, used combinations of steels or steel and iron that had vastly different heat-treat characteristics, thinking to go for the hard and soft alternating layer idea, which itself is flawed. Whatever the reason, doing this can and likely will result in serious problems during the heat-treat which may not be immediately apparent.

[SheffMick]

Great footage of the industrial past, those men were so hard-working and tough as well as skilled ! I would show stuff like that to people who take so much for granted these days.

[KholdAxe]

Safety glasses are for pansies.

[addisondelisle]

@KholdAxe Yep, right up until some slag fuses to your cornea.

[superfarrier]

I have the original cine film of this.

[aflacduky]

coolest thing i have ever seen!

i could almost here the steam hammer

[enwri]

what is the flash point of human flesh?

reckon some of those fellas would have found out.

[sonichedgie]

well, always wear safety glasses...

well this rule cannot be applied on these ages..?

[colliedogjoy]

Lost for words, straight to favourites.

[FEStanley]

This amazing film must have been shot at Hingley's Netherton Ironworks, Dudley, in the Black Country

[Krimzon07]

I would hate to have that chain fall on me =/

[71hawk71]

omg huge chain

[doorgone]

Good women insure a strong work ethic among a country's men.

[koliloaloa]

As an apprentice I spent 2 months in the blacksmiths shop, it is hard work and I couldn't wait to get out, they were all deaf for some strange reason.

[ChooChooMike]

Amazing !! Building that anchor, all those guys hammering/forging/welding it by hand. That "Riveting" performance - looked like a sea wave as the guys took their turn hammering - like a sledge hammer ballet !

[adderbrain5]

hah you could probly be working it on one heat for like 45 min

[adderbrain5]

jesus christ that is heavy stock to work. that just seems unnatural to me! i didint know you could move that much metal by hand

[Satakjar]

Extreme chain making.

[PAINTANK]

That is incredible.

[gocartking]

WOW how cool was that, again thanks!

[Anvilfolk]

I've been trying to find this video for ages! I saw it once while apprenticing in England!

The "Rivetting up the shackle pin" part is... well, there's no adjective for it! What men! What teamwork! Nothing like it nowadays!

[mrbonaparte]

how much does each link weigh?

[andhija]

It looks like the rod is 3" diamter. That would be about 24lbs per foot. Looks to me that the rod is 2.5 ft long so about 60lbs per link. Just a guess

[Fentanyl3]

Ive handled chain like this on the river, I could only pick up 5 or 6 links with all my might, it would take three guys to drag the chain only a few feet. We would take up the links using a winch, and then we would move the slack out of the way to pay down more.

[Fentanyl3]

the were 2.5 inch i believe, and we only payed out, or took up slack as the water rose and fell we had two of these chains that held our wharf on the bank, it usually took about ten of us total, plus the two or three boats/pilots needed to push or pull as us hands took up or payed out the slack