Now you can design, forge, and fix your own tools, hardware and household accessories with master craftsman and teacher Alexander G. Weygers. For the first time ever, Weyger’s three classics, The Making of Tools, The Modern Blacksmith, and The Recycling, Use, and Repair of Tools, have been brought together in The Complete Modern Blacksmith, a book filled with scores of time-honored techniques, clear step-by-step instructions, and hundreds of the author’s detailed drawings.
The Making of Tools teaches the artist and craftsman how to make exactly the tool he or she needs: how to design, sharpen, and temper them, using only basic shop equipment and scrap steel. Dozens of tips and techniques are covered, from setting up a beginner’s workshop and learning to temper steel to making simple tools such as screwdrivers and carving, cutting, and sharpening tools.
The Modern Blacksmith demonstrates, with lucid text and beautifully clear illustrations, the basic tools and techniques that are available to the modern blacksmith. This fascinating book covers everything from developing the correct hammer and body motions for forging to creating tools such as pliers and shovels and hardware such as hinges and door latches.
The Recycling, Use, and Repair of Tools stresses the creative reuse of old materials, and features a wealth of easy-to-follow procedures for making, repairing, and maintaining a great variety of equipment and parts, from shovels and chisels to washers and bearings.
The Complete Modern Blacksmith is a unique resource for any serious artist or craftsman, or for anyone interested in the making, repair, maintenance, or arcana of tools.
About the Author
Alexander G. Weygers—scientist, inventor, artist, author, and raconteur—was a true modern Renaissance man. He was born in Java and educated in Holland as an engineer, a profession he practiced for some years in Indonesia and the United States before devoting himself exclusively to the fine arts. He was apprentice to sculptor Lorado Taft in Chicago, and then studied wood engraving in Paris, marble carving in Florence, and human figure drawing in The Hague. With his early school training in blacksmithing, he was able to begin making his own stone- and wood-carving and engraving tools, and soon he was making custom-designed tools for artists and craftsmen all over the United States. During the latter part of his life, he lived and worked in California’s Carmel Valley with his wife.
The Complete Modern Blacksmith
by Alexander G. Weygers
$19.95 quality paperback
304 pages, 8 1/2 X 11 inches
ISBN: 0-89815-896-0
Publication Date: March 17, 1997