From The World Newspaper, Coos Bay, Oregon
By Jo Rafferty
Michael Bell started up the electric motor on a gigantic press he uses to shape the blades of Japanese swords.
“Bam! Bam!” The dies clanked together on the approximately 3-foot-long flat piece of steel, turned red from the heat of the forge fire.
“It’s 1,500 degrees, but it will go all the way up past 2,000 as it warms up,” Bell, 61, said loudly over the hissing of the forge, which sounded like a heavy wind storm.
The warmth of the fire quickly spread throughout the cold workshop.
The press is one way of shaping the hot metal. The other is by hand, using a hammer on an anvil.
Read the rest of the article online at The World Link.