Experience days

Come spend an exciting day at Murrill forge with us on this practical introduction to knife making, pizza cutter or cheese knife/ board set and go home with your very own hand forged chef knife from high carbon steel and a beautiful handle!

You will experience shaping your own knife with hammer and fire, as well as learn a bit about the forge, anvil, tools and techniques used in blacksmithing.

This is the most involved workshop we have and includes forging your own blade, heat treating it yourself, grinding it to shape and attaching it to a pre-made handle.

This is a full-on day from 8 am to 4/ 5 pm consisting of:

  • Safety briefing, tool overview, hammer/anvil/grinder/heat treatment
  • Blacksmithing: Forging your own blade form high-carbon steel
  • Heat treatment: Heat to non-magnetic and quench your blade
  • Lunch break: hydrate after forging session and get some food into you
  • Grinding room: Safety, tool overview, grinder operation, blade grinding technique
  • Grinding the blade: profile to your design, grind bevels to sharp
  • Finishing the blade: Progress to high grit belts and finish with scotchbrite for a satin grinder-finish
  • Handle fitting: select a pre-made handle and attach this to your chef knife
  • Sharpening: we will sharpen your completed Forged Chef Knife before you finish for the day

1-day hands-on experience where you will make your own forged Chef Knife, pizza cutter or cheese board set.

Included:

  • All materials required (carbon steel, hammers, tongs, anvil, gas forge, PPE, grinder, abrasives etc)
  • Forging your own knife with hammer and anvil
  • Help with grinding bevels or forging as required, we are there to help
  • heat treating your own blade by heating and quenching in oil
  • All instructions and support required

Your day: 08.00 am to 4/ 5 pm with a couple of short breaks.

The day starts with a Safety Briefing and then we discuss what it takes to get into knife making as a hobby.

The tools required, where to source materials, safe working practises and an overview of the project of the day.

Skills you will learn on the day on your day:

  • hand forging to shape
  • hammering in bevels
  • drawing out the tang and turning this into the handle
  • heat treatment of carbon steel including quenching the blade and tempering
  • Completing the knife blade by grinding it to shape
  • Note: to complete the knife in one day, we will use pre-made handles and there is no handle construction component of this course.

 

 

Suitable For:

  • Anyone over 17 years (16 by request) old with an interest in blacksmithing
  • Anyone able to lift a 1 kg hammer over the head and hammer "for a while" (we will help if you get tired)
  • Anyone able to follow basic safety instructions as provided by your instructor who is with you every step of the way.

We recommend wearing full-length pants and closed-toe shoes on the day. We will provide leather blacksmith aprons and suitable eye and ear protection. Expect to get hit by some hot scale that might land on you from the forge, (long sleeves and pants is the way to go.)

The workshop is held at Murrill Forge in a farm setting in the heart of rural Suffolk, indoors with basic facilities. Lunch break will be around 12 to 1 PM, there are no local shops or facilities within a 5 minute drive. So please bring picnic type lunch (we do have a kettle and microwave).

UPDATE there is a burger van a few mins away some days.

**The small text: We may need to assist on some of the steps to get it all done in one day. For instance grinding the bevels, tempering the blade and sharpening we might have to assist you with. But we will aim to let you do as much as possible of this yourself. If you get tired of the hammering and we have to assist, we may have to help you with some decisions on how to complete your project, in order to finish on time.