I used to forge my tongs from a single piece of stock, but now I make them in two parts.

For the first five years in my shop, I always started with a long bar and drew out the reins from the same piece as the jaws. It took forever. Then, at a meet-up in Boise, an older smith showed me how he welds the reins onto pre-formed jaw blanks. I tried it and cut my tong-making time almost in half. It just makes more sense for volume work. Has anyone else switched up their tong method like this?

4 comments

4 Comments

julias443mo ago

Wait, so you're welding the reins on. What kind of weld are you using? A forge weld or are you just tacking it with an arc welder? That seems like the part that could go wrong if you don't get it right.

sethm583mo ago

Arc welding on a hammer handle sounds like a disaster waiting to happen. That's just asking for a crack to start right at the weld. The whole thing would probably snap the first time you miss a swing.

matthew_west3mo ago

But that weld is just another point of failure, and you lose the strength of a one-piece tool.

quinn34117d ago

Forge welding the reins onto a blank is one of those things where the old way isn't always the best way, just the most stubborn. It's like how people insist on sharpening their own mower blades when they could just spend ten bucks on a new set and save an hour. Sometimes letting go of the "right" method and accepting a good enough weld makes you a lot more productive in the long run.