mia442•5d ago

That welding class at the Pittsburgh steel museum wrecked my technique

I went to a weekend forge workshop there last spring. Instructor walked over, watched me hammer a twist, and said "you're fighting the steel, not working it." Made me slow down and pay attention to heat color instead of just banging away. Anybody else had a teacher call out a bad habit you didn't know you had?

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hayes.oliver5d ago

That teacher calling out the heat color thing is the real secret nobody talks about. Most beginners focus on the hammer swing and miss the fact that the steel itself is telling you if it's ready. I had an old timer tell me once that every bad weld he ever made came from working metal that was too cool. He said if you can't see the color shifting from orange to red in the corner of your eye, you're probably forcing it. Makes you wonder how many guys out there with perfect hammer form are still struggling because they never learned to read the metal. Did your instructor show you how to gauge temperature by the shadow it casts under shop lights? That trick saved me hours of frustration.