Hit my 500th set of tongs today, never thought I'd count that high

I started keeping a log back in 2008 just to track steel usage, and the tong count got added as an afterthought. This afternoon I finished pair number 500, a standard flat jaw set for a guy who does farrier work. That number feels BIG when I look back at the rusty nail-and-strap setup I used for my first dozen pairs. The progress is slow but the stack of finished tongs in the corner tells the whole story. Anyone else keep a running count of a specific tool they make, or am I just weird about records?

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christopherb596h ago

Man that log from 2008 is probably worth more than the tongs at this point. Not the paper itself but the pattern it shows you, like when you had a run of bad jaw welds in 2011 or whatever and can look back and see it was that batch of steel, not you. Most guys I know who forge just toss stuff in a bucket and forget it, so they never catch stuff like that. I keep a tally of hammer heads on the wall in chalk, way less fancy than your setup, but same idea. That first dozen pairs on the nail and strap setup though, do you still have one of those around? Would be cool to set #1 next to #500 and see the gap.

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