fandomhigh | Blacksmithing Basics - Thursday, First Period [06/13].

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Blacksmithing Basics - Thursday, First Period [06/13].

All things considered, Amaya thought it would likely be best if she got over her pride a little bit and had the class up in the old shop classroom. Sure, the forge was fine, once all those leaks were patched, but the kids' safety seemed pretty important. Amaya herself didn't really have a good track record with weird things being in town...at least twice now, she'd been attacked by something that left her either in the clinic or bound to a bed or locked in a jail cell...but those were instances where she didn't have the Crumbler with her and, just as she found out with that wasteland bit, the Crumbler was excellent at mowing down anything that might try to get in her way.

She'd just have to make sure to clean the rotorblades really well when she got back to the shop.

Either way, she sent out the message and brought with her their knives-to-be and a few other supplies, got in touch with her TA so that she could help with set up, and by the time class was ready to get going, she gave the students a nod.

"Morning, everyone," she greeted them. "As you can see, we're relocated to the shop classroom again. Now, the biggest issue with working in here rather than down at the shop was always the fact that the shop has forges. But, turns out, making your own forge for smaller projects like these knives really isn't that difficult. And it doesn't get much more basic than knowing precisely how to make the one tool that's arguably the most important part of blacksmithing. If anything, you can forge yourself something nearly anywhere after this class, assuming you've got the resources. To save time, I'll have you guys follow along, and once we get our new makeshift forges going, it's onto the next step of our knife-making, which is tempering and quenching our blades, or 'heat treating' as it's commonly called.

"Everyone ready?" She pounded a fist into her palm with a nod. "Let's get started, then."

[[ and the ocd is ~~on the way~~ up! Have at it! edit: heat treating vid switched out with a better one ]]

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DIY.

Norman Babcock

Juillenne Milone (and Camden)

Shuri

Less of a lecture, more of a preamble, but if there's any questions before getting to work, now that's time to ask them.

Norman was missing... most of this lecture, his head down, shoulders curled in a little bit, eyes on the floor.

The ghosts here were...

Well, on Monday, he thought he could handle it, but it hadn't taken them long to realize that he could see or hear them, and the ones who weren't still outright insane the same way the splicers outside were, were desperate, pleading, hammering at him from every angle. And there were so many. He'd contemplated just staying in his room, but here or there, it didn't matter. Ghosts could be almost anywhere they needed to be.

Especially desperate ones.

Time to get to work! Amaya's naturally ready to lead the students through the steps of their makeshift forge, explaining the importance of each step while she leads them through it, from the importance of air flow as they build up the manual blower, insulating the forge, choosing the air supply (she's got a few good old fashioned bellows, but these cranking fireplace blowers she found were just too good to pass up!), and, well, that was pretty much it!

"Nothing fancy," she explained, "but something functional. All we really need to do now is get the coal and the wood on there, get the fire going, and then use our air supply to pump air into to make sure it gets really nice and hot for us. Just like you don't need a proper anvil for a hammering surface, you can easily put something together in a pinch for when you really need to."

Because, yes, needing to whip up a makeshift forge is something that is definitely going to be something they'll use in everday life often...

Focus was... not... going to be Norman's strong point today. But at least he'd had the presence of mind to pull out his phone and just record every step Amaya took. It was like taking notes, but without having to hear Amaya over the wailing and screaming and threatening and...

He really should have been trying to follow along, but mostly just hoped that hanging around the back of the room and looking ill would get him a pass on that one.

"Onto the fun stuff!" Amaya said, grinning. "Now, first things first. I've had some iron heating up in my own forge for a bit now, so I'd like each of you to grab on of these rods with your tongs and put those in the buckets of oil you've got at your station. That's what we're using to quench the blades, and you'll have a much better time if you quench with warmed oil than cold. If you cool your blade...especially a thin blade like these ones, too fast, you're more likely to crack it, and that's no good. Anyway..."

So she had them heat their oil, then check their blades, and get started on the first step: Normalizing. Reseting and redistributing the steel to a more normalized state and relieving stresses. Heating it and then letting it cool in still air, repeating it about two or three times, and she showed them how to use a magnet to help determine if you're doing it properly, because heating it properly will cause the metal to become nonmagnetic which was just neat, when you got right down to it. You can also take color into consideration, but that's something that'll develop with experience, since there's a fine art to just telling it's ready by looking at it.

Next step: the quench! Amaya explained that quenching is basically what's going to harden your steel, and oil is generally better than water, and they were basically rapidly cooling the steel, changing the makeup of the steel to strengthen it. Heat it up, quench it to cool it, then heat it back up again. Heat and quench, heat and quench. You want to be quick about it; the steel cools pretty quickly even just in the air, and hten get it in the oil with a slight back and forth or slicing movement. Be careful of flare ups, and submerge the blade for about ten to fifteen seconds.

Do a file test on it, to see if the file bites into the steel. If it does, the blades not hard enough, time to go for another round. If it doesn't bite into the steel, your knife is hard enough, and you've got to finish it up with some tempering that's not dissimilar to baking. "Back at the shop," Amaya offered, "I'd usually use the top of my forge to do this step, but over here, we've got ovens, so we're just going to pop our knives in there to just sort of finish up the whole process."

Yeaaaaaaaah, this part...

"Can I make up this class another time?"

Norman sounded small as he asked that. Looked a little bit like he was trying to make himself small, too. He just didn't have the focus for this, all it would take would be one good startle from a splicer ghost and he'd ruin his work or, worse, hurt somebody. He really should have known better than to think that this would be fine, but he'd been hoping for the distraction, more than anything.

And, once Amaya was finished explaining, she was intending to ask after the fact that Norman was clearly not approaching class today with the same sort of gusto and determination as he usually did anyway. She wanted to get through the lesson first, though, make sure the other students were set and could started working, and offered a faint, sympathetic, maybe a little encouraging sort of smile.

If it was Norman asking to step out, it had to be something pretty bad...

"Of course," she said, nodding. "It's not the kind of work you want to try to do if you're not feeling fully up to it. If you want to use this workshop some other day of the week, just let me know, I can open it for you, or you can just come on down to the regular shop whenever you like, too, I'm usually around. Maybe once the island sorts itself back out again..."

She hesitated with the next part a bit; she wasn't really one for feelings, after all, but it was Norman, and he was her best...and, sure, probably favorite...students, so she figured she should at least venture, "....everything alright, though?"

If her mark was right, he probably wouldn't want to talk about it anyway, and she could mostly avoid it while still expressing concern.

Norman opened his mouth to reply. Paused. Closed it again. Flinched away from something, just slightly; a ghost, screaming in his face, crying about how she was going to be a star, a star, but her face, her beautiful face-- and then he shook his head.

"It's nothing anyone can do anything about," he said. In reply to Amaya's question. In reply to the ghost. As a reminder to himself. "But I'm not going to be of much use to anybody until things change again."

So many people had died here, sudden, violent deaths.

Rapture was thick with the dead, seething with them, and the only fix was to just not be here at all.

Amaya nodded, though her furrowed brow joined her frown in concern. Hard not to notice that flinch; a lot more difficult to pinpoint exactly what it was on his face just then.

"Did you want to call it a day and head out?" she offered. "Or you could just hang back and watch your fellow students. Still a lot of learning in just watching, that's what I always say. But...I understand if you just sort of need to...take some time."

Norman swallowed heavily, and then shrugged one shoulder lopsidedly.

"Can I stay?"

He might not pick up on much of anything, but he didn't want to be alone with this. Not right now. It was wearing on him, and for the first time in his life, being around the living seemed like the better option.

"Of course you can," said Amaya, hoping the faint grin that brought out of her didn't give away the fact that she'd been hoping he'd say that. "Whatever you think's best, since the only one who knows that is probably you, right? And we'll catch you up on it when you're feeling better. How's that sound?"

"That sounds kind of perfect," Norman replied, giving her a grateful little attempt at a smile. "I'm recording some of this, too, so I can go back over it when my head is in it again."

This was great. He could just pick up whatever he missed next week, and for now?

For now, he just didn't have to be alone.

She's definitely there if you need her, trying her best to not be distracted by Crumbling her way back to the shop after this.

When she pings in!

Quenching is just so coooooool ;_;

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Blacksmithing Basics - Thursday, First Period [06/13].

Sign In - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Sign In - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Sign In - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Sign In - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Listen to the Lecture - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Listen to the Lecture - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Class Activity - Forge Building - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity - Forge Building - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Class Activity - Heat Treatment - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity - Heat Treatment - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity - Heat Treatment - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity - Heat Treatment - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity - Heat Treatment - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity - Heat Treatment - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity - Heat Treatment - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity - Heat Treatment - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Talk to Amaya - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

Talk to the TA - Blacksmithing, 06/13.

OOC - Blacksmithing, 06/13.