That Time We Talked About Making Knives, Swords and Tomahawks...Oh My!

This is episode number 55 of The Homeowner Show. Whether you're DIY or looking to hire, we're here to help you find the best information and options for you and your home. My name is Kevin Hackett, and here with me is Craig Williams.

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to The Homeowner Show. We're glad that you guys could tune in. Turn the dial? No one has a dial anymore.

No, you just— swipe up.

Yeah.

You turned your phone on and we were there. Yeah, that's right. But we're glad that you could join us. If you haven't yet, the content today is going to be amazing. So go ahead and hit the subscribe button, hit the like button, the notification bell, whatever it is, whatever platform you're using. I think on Kevin's it's like a donkey head or something, but you can click on that. So, and it'll bring you new episodes, hopefully, whenever that app's working.

Yeah. It makes it super easy. That way you don't have to worry about whenever a new episode's out. It's just going to come straight to your phone. phone or whatever you listen, you know, to our show on.

Yep.

And so you can follow us there on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, all the fun places.

Yep, we're there.

So what's going on, Kev?

Man, I'm just— it's been a weird day.

Yeah?

Yeah, just around here. I mean, we've, you know, we're in Houston and we got tropical storm going on. There's flooding everywhere.

What was the official name of this tropical storm?

Ilima. Ilima.

It sounded—

I don't know. I don't know how to pronounce it. It starts with an I.

We're in the I's.

Yeah.

The next one will be an H. That's right.

And Hector. And so yeah, it's just been kind of a—

it was Imelda.

Imelda. That was close. I don't know what— we need to stop guessing. It was Imelda. I heard it like— but other than that, yeah, there you go. Other than that, I mean Things are good.

Yeah.

How about you?

Man, I am partially homeless.

Oh.

Yeah. The entire downstairs of my home is now completely gutted.

Oh, it's finally happened.

We have no floors.

OK.

No ceilings.

Oh.

Thankfully, no more surprises.

OK.

Yeah.

So, now, I remember last episode, you said you were going to move upstairs. Now, you've moved upstairs.

I've officially taken my in-trouble position on the couch as my regular sleeping arrangement, although I'm not in trouble.

This time.

I'm just voluntarily sleeping on the couch.

At the moment.

At the moment, until I'm told otherwise that it's the trouble position.

When everybody's living upstairs, it's not going to take long.

That's right.

It's close quarters. But like, so the bathroom's gutted, the bedroom's gutted, the living room's gutted, the entryway's gutted.

Okay.

Um, yeah, all new floors are going in, all new ceilings are going in. It's just a big stinking chalky mess.

Yeah, I bet.

So, but I did learn that my house has 3 slabs.

What?

3 slabs.

3 slabs?

Yeah, I found 2 expansion joints and like 3 narrow pieces of concrete running through the house. I mean, like, it seems to be sturdy.

Wow.

So that was a fun surprise.

So where is the 3rd slab?

Well, they're all like parallel.

Okay.

And so there's like kind of like a free-floating slab in the middle between 2 slabs.

Oh yeah.

So is this in the bathroom? Is it in your bedroom?

No, it just, it literally runs right. I mean, like they, they're of equal proportion.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

So, so what are you gonna have to do? Just pour new concrete?

No. Yeah, basically. I mean, because we're putting in new floors, they had carpet in before, so you really couldn't tell. Sure. Uh, and you had that nice bouncy padding. Um, but they're gonna caulk it. and then fill it with a floor leveler.

Okay.

Yeah, so because they're coming back through with some, some wood floors.

So we're talking like, we're talking like a quarter inch, half inch?

Yeah.

So, um, and there's some other stuff going on that's like, you know, it's not— you know, you always run into surprises when you're, when you're doing this major of an overhaul. But, uh, we're excited, man, because the upstairs is pretty much done. Um, remember when we put in the, the Homeowner Show wall outside the studio?

Yeah.

And Brandy got mad at me because I didn't do anything like that in the house.

I do remember.

So I finished that today in the house. I put that wall up in the house for my son's bedroom. So she was really happy about that. So things are progressing.

Yeah. That ought to buy you a couple of nights. Yeah.

I mean, you know, off of the couch.

Well, you're still on the couch.

Some credit for my couch time. There you go.

Yeah.

So anyway, we actually have a really, really cool episode. Uh, we, we have my new friend Jacob in studio. Yeah. And his wife, who is refusing to get on a microphone. So, but she's here. She just didn't want to talk.

That's right.

But we just wanted to acknowledge that because she got really, you know, testy with me about getting on the microphone.

You're making her blush.

I wouldn't push her, Craig. She'll make you sleep on the couch.

But, but you may know Jacob if you are familiar with the show Forged in Fire, and it's on the History Channel, right?

Yes, sir.

So, and from season 6, episode 15, episode 15.

Titled Nagamaki.

Yeah.

So, and, uh, we get— he brought fun props with him tonight. And so if you don't know what Forged in Fire— Kev, why don't you let everybody know what's going on here?

Well, so basically it's a, it's a reality TV show. And, um, you know, we've got so many different ones of those, but this one specifically is centered around forging, right? And around guys coming in. I don't know if it's all guys. I assume—

Well, there's a lot of ladies too.

Yeah, absolutely. I'm not trying to be gender biased here, but you were. I do it way too often accidentally, but I just use guys as like a general term.

Guys and gals.

That's right, guys and gals.

She won't be offended, she's a cool chick.

Okay, good. Well, there's listeners out there though that already hate me, so that's not helping. So anyway, so yeah, just the show is about guys coming on and gals coming on and, you know, forging different different things, and there's a contest, and whoever wins, uh, the show, the episode, win, uh, you know, wins $10,000.

Yep.

That's a pretty sweet deal. And, um, so yeah, Jacob, fill in the, fill in the gaps on what I missed.

Well, that's pretty much it. It's a competition show where either 4, or sometimes they do bigger shows where it's like master and apprentice, and they, I think they're coming out with one that's like husband and wife, and we didn't get in on that one.

Oh man.

Which would've been awesome. But, um, you know, it's about 4 competitors. They come in, they give you 3 rounds of competition. Um, you have to forge out a blade that they give you parameters on in the first round. The second round, you usually have to put a handle on it, and then they do a testing round. So if you're not eliminated by the first round because you didn't meet parameters, or they eliminate some— they eliminate somebody each round.

Okay.

So like, say you forge your blade out and everybody's is great, they pick the one that they like the least. Or say you didn't meet the parameters, it wasn't long enough or it was too short, you know, so on and so forth, um, they'll, they'll eliminate you. And then that's actually what happened in my episode. Uh, Steve Wayne, he's from New York, uh, upstate New York. Real cool guy, 30-year veteran of, uh, farriers. Now he runs Heather's Heart Forge, which is a school for, uh, bladesmithing there in New York. He's posting videos nonstop. I'm gonna give him a little tag here. Cool guy. Uh, he came up in like half inch to an inch short, uh,

in the first round.

Wow.

And I, I kept telling all of 'em like, measure twice, measure twice, measure twice. Well, he was burning an inch cuz they give you these big metal rulers and you know how it has like a quarter inch the end of the ruler, well, everybody burns an inch.

Yeah.

He burned that inch, but he didn't add it back. Add it to the other end.

Yeah.

So he, he wound up being almost an inch short.

Wow.

Um, so he was out the first round and then, you know, me, Braxton, and Kyle, um, made it through the second round putting the handles on, which was probably my toughest round. Uh, I had trouble, um, couldn't get my handle on to say the least, but I got it on there and it, it looked good. And then they went into the testing and Kyle's blade broke in the handle.

Oh man, it—

if his blade wouldn't have broke in the handle, he might have actually went to the finals over me because his was a better looking finished blade.

Okay.

Um, one of the things the judges said the most about my blade is how thin it was. It was a thin, narrow blade, and I forged it thinking I was gonna make it wider, but then I just kind of got carried away on the press because it was my first time using a big press like that. And I was like, oh yeah, this is awesome. And, uh, you know, I met the parameters. It just— they're like, oh, this We're gonna chop into a 45-pound dumbbell with this, and this is like a kitchen knife. And I'm like, do your worst. And they smashed it into the dumbbell, and all it did was take a chip, but everybody's took

a chip.

Yeah.

When you take a piece of hardened steel and you smash it into cast iron, it's gonna chip or break.

Yeah.

But unfortunately, Kyle's broke in the handle, and, um, so that advanced me and Braxton to the finale. And so what we had to do from there is they flew us home. Uh, we had 4 days at our home forge to make the nagamaki. And I brought my sword thinking podcast video, but anyways, um, the nagamaki is a, is a type of katana. So in Japanese it means long-handled sword. So it's like, think of a katana and then think of the handle of the katana being the same length of the blade.

Mm-hmm.

And that's what a nagamaki is. And it was the biggest undertaking I've ever made. Uh, You know, trying to grind it on my grinder, I just kept hitting the ceiling of my 8-foot-tall ceiling. You know, yeah.

How long is this one?

This one is, uh, it was 30— it's about 5'4.

Okay.

It's a 5'4 sword or something.

It's like my height.

Yeah, it stands taller than my wife. So, um, it's, it's my favorite thing. And I, you know, we made it to the finale after we got it all back. Um, We did the final thing of testing and we went through all 3 rounds. He did extremely well. I did extremely well. He, the only thing that bummed me out is they cut through a boar carcass as the, the strength test and his chopped through it. And then mine hit the spine and I could hear it when he hit the spine and it didn't chop all the way through the, the boar. And it broke my heart cuz that's all I wanted to see was that half of that boar carcass.

That clean cut, right?

Oh, just fall to the ground. And it was a clean cut. Um, And then we had the strength test, was they had to cut through stalks of bamboo. And bamboo, if anybody knows, is a super hard, durable material.

Yes.

Both of our blades sliced through it like butter. And then the sharpness test was the last one. Obviously, neither blade took any damage, and, um, the sharpness test was a breeze for both of us. And it really just came down to the finite details that the judges, uh, Was the sharpness one where they're cutting—

is that melons that they're hitting?

They did cut melons. So they, they cut a tatami mat, which is like a traditional way of, uh, samurais or even people that are learning kendo, the art of sword in Japan, um, sword fighting, I guess you'd say. Um, it's how they demonstrate their, their swiftness and their accuracy. So I don't know if you ever watched videos. This— I've always been into that kind of stuff. I lived in Japan for 2 years when I was in the military, so I was super into all the martial arts and stuff. Um, you know, they take their sword out and like one swift move and in like a blink of an eye, this thing is cut in half twice.

And it's like Fruit Ninja.

Yeah.

Oh yeah.

But with an actual sword.

Oh, okay.

Yeah. These guys are bad dudes. So, you know, we made it through.

Less insulting.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I get you. I get you. Uh, I, I've only played the game like once, so I didn't even think of that reference. Um, so, you know, we made it through all 3 rounds. Both of our blades survived and it just came down to the finite details of the final, you know, sword. My wife's shaking her head right now because she thinks I should have won. Um, and his, his had a little bit more of a round handle. Mine's a little bit more oblong. Um, so it's kind of thinner on the sides and a little bit longer. I think it feels great for people with big hands. I think that they've all told me it felt great, and it's very well indexed. You always know where the blade edge is.

And then one thing I do really agree with him on is his finish grind on the blade was nicer than mine. I broke my first sword in my 4 days of, uh, forging. I broke my first sword on the second day, halfway through. So I had 2 and a half days to complete a sword, and I wound up forging it out and getting it heat treated all in the second day. So I kicked butt that day, and it was, it was a feat. Let me tell you right now, spending 35 hours in the forge straight, that's exhausting. It's exhausting.

Geez.

I mean, it's— and luckily it was, uh, November when we filmed, so it was nice and cool outside. And if it was July, I would have died. Yeah. I mean, I I forge nonstop all year round, and it usually gets up to like 120-something degrees in my forge.

Wow.

Um, roughly. And, um, it's brutal. I can only do like a couple hours at a time at most, especially standing in front of the fire. If I'm just grinding or doing something like that, but standing in front of the fire, it gets, it gets pretty brutal.

I got to tell everybody, like, before the, before the show, I got— I actually got to hold this one. It's, it's gorgeous for one, and it feels really nice in the hand. Um, but like Well, and we'll put some pictures up on Facebook and Instagram and so everybody can see what it looks like, because I mean, it's massive.

Yeah, I mean, but that whole sword weighs less than 5 pounds.

Yeah, no, it's like— and it was like, it was really well balanced in my hand. I was like—

And that's one of the things that Dave Baker, one of the judges on the show, he held both of our swords at the habaki and it balanced perfectly on his finger.

Okay, both of them.

And he was like, I'm impressed at how well you balance these blades. You know, people try their hardest to do that, and this one, both of these blades are just perfectly balanced. So we— it was a good head-to-head match. Um, I think he just came out on top because he had a little bit more time to do the finer finish work that I— if I wouldn't have broke my first one, I would have had the time to do that. Sure.

So what was this, your— was this one of your first swords?

Yeah, that's the first sword I ever made.

Wow.

So like the longest knife, I guess, you'd— I'd ever made. was 15 inches. And as a requirement for the interview process of the show, they tell you, you know, that you fill out a questionnaire. They ask you, have you made this? Have you done this? Have you done, you know, canister Damascus and stuff of that nature?

And, um, I have no idea what that is. What is that?

Canister Damascus is where you take like a powdered steel and other either high carbon or low carbon steels, and you put them inside of like a square tube and you weld up both ends. You make it airtight and you put it in the forge. You squeeze it and hammer it down, and then you peel the canister off and it'll display a beautiful, um, pattern. It really does. I mean, if you get it done right, like a lot of people like using ball bearings. So you get the ball bearings, you take off the outer coating of whatever zinc or whatever's on it.

Yeah.

And then you put them in there and, uh, with your powdered steel and it'll look like, like a little polka-dotted steel. It's awesome. It's a cool— I love doing canister Damascus. I don't do it often enough because I get busy with all my other projects.

But, um, it sounds time-consuming. Like, is it?

It's actually not that bad.

No.

Um, Damascus itself is time-consuming no matter what kind of Damascus you're making. Um, layered Damascus where you stack, you know, 2 different types of steel. I use 1095 and 15N20. 1095 is high in manganese, which is what brings out the darkness in the steel. And then 15N20 is a high nickel content steel, so it has the opposite effect. So it has this really pretty contrast and you can manipulate the layers, um, or you can manipulate the pattern a lot of different ways. One of my favorite ways is twisting it. You stack 'em up. I, I like putting it into a round bar, twisting it as many times as I want. Um, I recently did 31 layers twisted 31 times. Um, and it, it has almost like

a ladder look to it.

Mm-hmm.

But it's at an angle.

Okay.

So it, it really, it really looks sweet. And if you do it right and you know what you're doing, you take your time with it, you can produce— I mean, there's some guys out there that make mosaic pieces, which is, I don't know if y'all ever seen mosaic Damascus. Mm-hmm. They make, they make a pattern into a tile. And then like this pattern is an explosion pattern. Then they cut little tiles out of it, they stack those up, and they weld them up to where it's a repeating pattern. Yeah, so an explosion all the way down the blade. Okay, those guys sell those blades for like $2,500.

Wow, really?

Yeah, I mean, it takes a lot of time.

Sure.

I watched a guy— I'm always sucked down some YouTube hole, 40 minutes watching some guy make a sword. Uh, watched one guy, master smith, can't remember his name off the top of my head, Um, made a mosaic piece, uh, like broadsword or something of that nature. Beautiful. Took him 3 months.

Oh my goodness.

3 months to do it for one. Yeah, I mean, but this— I mean, this thing had gold inlay in it. It was gorgeous. I was like, I'm not— I don't have the time or the patience to do something like that. So yeah, um, I mean, if I— if that's all I did, like if I didn't have a full-time job and a bunch of other stuff, then yeah, I'd completely under— yeah, I could, I could squeeze out 2 hours a day to do that blade. Yeah.

You know, so, well, I mean, here, here we are, we're about 15 minutes in and I imagine a lot of people are going like, why are we talking about forging on, on the homeownership? Oh yeah. And real, real quick, I mean, like, just so everyone knows, you do all this from your home.

I do.

You have a home forge.

Yes, I do.

That you built and, you know, got all the pieces and parts together. But like, take it, take us back a little bit. How did, how'd you get started with all this?

So I got started because of my grandfather. My grandpa Bob lives in New Waverly. Uh, he's a lifetime member of the Houston Area Blacksmith Association. Uh, they, they operate out of Magnolia now. And if anybody's interested, uh, look it up, haba-iron.com.

Mm-hmm.

Uh, they have monthly meetings. You can go down there, you can just watch, you can learn, you can join. Um, great. You know, they do a lot of ornamental stuff, so it takes you back to the basics of blacksmithing. That's where I started. I started— my first thing I ever made was at a HABA meeting, the first one I ever went to, I watched somebody make a wizard head. And then I went out to my grandfather's forge and anvil that he had mobile for me, and I did it. And some of the guys in the, in the, uh, association were like, man, this, this kid picked it up that quick. He's— he can, he can do something. So then when I told them, hey, I'm on Forged in Fire, you should watch it, they were all sending me messages like, man,

we knew you were gonna do something. You did really good. They're all really proud.

Yeah. Well, so what— real quick, When you say wizard's head, so like literally I took a piece of bar stock. Is it— I mean, we're talking about like the head of a wizard or like—

So like the face of a wizard.

Okay.

So I took a piece of bar stock, you, you round the end, and I can still do it. I just, I haven't done it in a while, but I could, I could do it in a heartbeat because it was that memorable to me. You round the, you know, you, you cone out the end of a piece of square stock, uh, you, you know, roll it towards like a, almost like a needle point, and you roll it over to where it kind of looks like a wizard hat, and then you cut the lines in. And then you, you know, you punch in the eyes, you, you cut out the mustache out of the corners to where his mustache comes out. You put a

little mouth and you cut in his little beard and it kind of looks like me, but with a bigger mustache. If anybody, y'all don't know what I look like, I have a huge beard. Um, and if it's, it's not wizard yet, but give me a couple years.

Oh no, you're close. Yeah. You're not Merlin yet.

I'm not a grand wizard yet, but, uh, it's not white yet either. So yeah. Well, I got some The stress of working 3 jobs is getting there, so they're getting in there pretty quick.

Yeah, I understand. I do.

Yeah.

Well, cool. So, um, so yeah, so you've— you started just because you had family connection, right?

My grandfather.

So, so you decided to, you know, this is something I wanted to do. Yeah, exactly. So, so what then did it take to get your forge set up and, you know, Did— is that something that just you, you were all in and you just immediately started getting it all, or you just kind of acquired over time?

It took, it took a long time for me to actually think, okay, I had it as a hobby and I did it, you know, a couple times a month. I enjoyed making knives and stuff of that nature. And then, uh, at the time, I used my grandfather's for a long time. He, you know, he had a forge and we accumulated stuff together— anvils, you know, tongs. He's, he's a collector. So this man would buy— I'm talking like whole estate sales worth of tools and stuff. So he, he accumulated a lot over his lifetime, and that's how I got started into it. So I was very lucky I didn't have to come out of pocket. Um, and it wound up, you know, he was like, all right, well, you're using all my materials. And, you know, I, I was like,

I'll give you money for it, you know. But anyways, so it came down to where he wanted to get rid of the blacksmith shop at his house because I guess he didn't want room or he didn't want me coming over there and making a mess or whatever. Regardless, so I wound up buying all that stuff from him and, um, I wound up keeping— I bought it all like wholesale because I got the grandson discount. Um, and I wound up getting rid of some pieces that I wish now that I wouldn't have got rid of, like a, um, a forging cone. A lot of blacksmiths won't know what I'm talking about. Perfect condition. I regret to this day that I

got rid of it. It's just a big cone that you can make big rings out of.

Mm-hmm.

And anyways, um, I wound up selling a lot of stuff to kind of compensate for how much money I spent on it. And I built a carport in my backyard just on the dirt and, uh, had, you know, a little coal forge, a little propane forge that I bought for like $150, an anvil and some hammers and a trip hammer. Uh, trip hammer was like hand actuated. I bought it from him for a good price. Um, But before that, I just used all, you know, all shoulder muscle, or— I don't want to get into that. But, um, then I really started thinking, well, I want to turn this hobby into something that can make me money, because it can be a

very expensive hobby if you're just doing it. You're not selling any pieces and you're just doing it to have fun. You know, the price of steel goes up every year, you know, coal goes up every year, propane goes up every year. And, uh, the better you get at it, the more tools you need because you're trying to do more and fancy stuff. And I'm still in that boat. I'm still in that boat. I'm trying to hide from my wife right now. Um, so my stepdad had a friend, Dana Turner. He lived in Northern California. He owned Fort Turner, which was all he did was make tomahawks and throwing knives. And, uh, he, he was out of the game for a long

time. Uh, couldn't forge cuz he had back problems and he's been looking for somebody to sell his company to. So. I got in touch with him, we talked for like 6 months, and finally I got a business loan. And, uh, my wife and I took some of the money from the business loan and completely built my whole shop. I mean, we did the concrete and everything. It was— I'm the only one that's ever done concrete out of the 6 people that helped me. So it was, uh, my 3— my 2 sisters, my wife, and then my 2 best friends.

And that's hard work.

Oh, that is brutal work, especially in the middle of June.

Wow.

So we said, you know, or was it May? I'm sorry, it was May. Um, it was a brutal, brutal day of work and we got a nice pad level enough. And, um, it was level.

Yeah.

Um, and we did a really good job. And then me and my wife took, you know, originally I'd taken my carport out of the way and we put my carport back. We put up garage doors so we can lock it up. We built an overhang on the back to where I do all my forging to where it's partially outside. I have 2 open walls, so I kind of get a breeze going through there. And, you know, it's, uh, we did it all together. And besides the concrete, it was just me and her. So it took many a night after work. You know, I'm, I'm a full-time electrical technician here in the Houston area. I work 40 to 80 hours a week

sometimes. So it was many nights and weekends and just brutal hot days in the middle of the summer. And, uh, I couldn't have done it without her. So Anyways, we, um, we got Dana Turner down. We bought all of his equipment, um, yet again wholesale, because I wasn't going to pay, you know, new prices for a bunch of old used stuff.

Yeah.

Bought all the equipment that he thinks— he thought that I would need in order to start making tomahawks. Uh, paid him handsomely for a month to stay with me and, uh, train me. I took a month off work, which I was so grateful that my bosses let me do this. month unpaid off work. Wow.

Oh wow.

Yeah. I mean, they knew that it was a passion. They knew that I was like, hey man, I'll do it unpaid. Just make sure I have a job when I come back. And, uh, I feel like I'm a valuable asset to that company. Um, apparently.

Yeah, apparently a month off. Yeah.

So, um, he came down, we spent a month just making tomahawks. That's all we did every day, starting at 7 o'clock in the morning. Um, when did we do that? In July. So this guy's in Northern California, you know, he's, he's just like, he lived in the mountains, a little bit of heat, you know, like 80, 90 degrees.

He didn't know this heat.

Oh my God. I was by like the 5th day. I was like, if he says it's hot outside one more time, I might throw him in the floor. And you know, he's, he's one of those like super nice charismatic guys.

Yeah.

But he's, he's at that level all the time.

Yeah.

At like 7 o'clock in the morning, he was, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go back from the mic cuz I don't wanna yell in everybody's ear, but good morning.

Yeah.

Across the house. And I'm like, I'm not a morning person. I have not even opened the coffee maker yet. I will cut you if you start doing that again. My wife is trying to sleep and And I don't want to have to deal with that. So it was, um, it was an interesting time, a month, but I learned a whole lot. And I really appreciate Dan Turner to this day because, uh, you know, I wouldn't be where I am without him wanting to get rid of his company and coming down and training me.

Mm-hmm.

So now I sell tomahawks and throwing knives, and I do custom knife work, uh, all through Brave Hawk Forge. You can find us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube. Um, and we actually have bravehawkforge.com, uh, where we sell all our stuff through that, all our products through there.

So, uh, but yeah, that was—

and that was the other piece that you brought tonight was one of your, one of your throwing tomahawks.

This is actually one of my, uh— oops, sorry.

You're good.

Uh, this is actually one of my battle tomahawks. So we have 3 variations. We have a throwing tomahawk, and then we have— or sorry, 3 categories: throwing tomahawks, um, Pold tomahawks, which is like a utility-style tomahawk with a hammer on it on the back end. And then we have our battle tomahawks. Oh, I'm sorry, we, we have a 4th one now, uh, our pipe tomahawks, which are— if you're looking for a showpiece, you don't want to like beat it up or anything. If you've ever wanted to have a peace pipe and then also have a tomahawk, which was very traditional back in the day, you know, look us up because we make some pretty cool stuff. But, um, this one is

one of my battle tomahawks. This is a spiked Valkyrie. Um, I know we'll show you photos later of it. Um, it's, its design is one of my 4 base models, the Valkyrie. Uh, it comes from Norse, Norseman times. So all of my tomahawks are based in a, like the design form are based in a period of history. So we have the Buck, which is like a frontier style tomahawk. Um, we have the Valkyrie, which is a Norseman style. Uh, drawing a blank here. I know all these Iroquois, which is, um, from like the East you know, Eastern United States during the era of coordination. That was one of the designs we got actually out of a museum. Um, we have the Francesca, which is a 14th century

Frankish design. It's one of my favorites. It's one of my wife throws. I always try and get the ladies to, to, uh, buy it because it has curves, you know. It's super curvy.

It's pretty.

Oh, it, it's lethal too though, man. It's one of my favorites.

Just like a lady.

Yeah, it's, it's one of my favorite tomahawks just because of the way the blue— the blade swoops. If you know how to throw, you can stick that thing every single time.

Okay.

Yeah, if you know what you're doing. Um, and it— I mean, it's not that hard. I teach 4-year-olds how to throw tomahawks, so it's actually one of my favorite pastimes. I like—

I never want to teach at that preschool.

It's, it's usually the cool parents that bring their kids to knife shows and stuff. Yeah, the cool parents. Yeah, you know, get them in there young. Yeah, you got to start them early. You gotta, you know, in my opinion When it comes to like hunting and knives and stuff, guns of that nature, the earlier you get them in there and let them know that these are dangerous things and, right, like you got to respect these things, then the, the more— like, that's how I was. I started— I shot my first gun when I was like 6, and it was a shotgun.

Yeah.

And it knocked me over.

Yeah.

Um, but I respected that shotgun. I actually own that shotgun now. It was a little .410 shotgun. I was a little kid.

Hey, you won.

Yeah, eventually.

Yeah.

Oh, now I can be like But I don't do it, you know what I mean? So I, I love it whenever the parents bring, you know, the parents wanna come and play because everybody's a kid at heart and they wanna throw a tomahawk and feel like Braveheart. I'm sorry, not Braveheart.

Talking about the, the Patriot movie.

The Patriot. Yes.

I, you know how many times I get that?

It's, but it's Mel Gibson. He's in both of them. That's fine.

Exactly. Sure. Um, anyways, so everybody wants to come feel like the Patriot and throw it at a stump and they're all, they're all trying to be all cool and, um, Which I love because, you know, we, we do competitions. We charge, you know, a fee, $10 most of the time, unless we're working for a charity. If we're working for a charity, we charge a little more so we have money to give to the charity. Um, and then whoever has the highest score at the end of the day, uh, wins a tomahawk. So I mean, you're paying $10 and you're potentially winning a $100 tomahawk. So it, it's sweet. And then, you know, the kids were watching and they're like, oh, I wanna play. I wanna play. And

And they come out there, we have this little like 13-inch pup hawk is what we call it. And it's real light. And I go out there and I'm like, all right, you're, you gotta do it this way. And they do it a couple times and eventually they'll stick it. And the look on their face is like one of my happiest moments. Yeah. I'll wait all day just to have one kid come in there and stick one tomahawk at 4, 5, 6 years old. And they're just like, yes. And they have such gratification. And I'm like, man, could you remember whenever you were like so happy about one simple thing in your life? Yeah.

So, and being able to react the way kids react.

Oh yeah.

They're like, yes.

I mean, so one of my— It's such a, like, just supernatural, like, yeah, I, it's, yeah, I, I love those types of reactions.

It's awesome.

Yeah.

And that, that's the way that a lot of people are feeling when they're calling Drone Quote now.

Oh yeah.

Yeah. When they call 'em out, they're getting the quotes on the roof, they're getting the quotes on the solar, and they're getting 3 separate quotes from 3 different companies. And so like the, the competition's built in right there. You don't have to go through all the, the rigmarole of, you know, finding the right roofer, finding the right solar guy, interviewing them, and, you know, checking their materials and all this kind of stuff. They find the guy for you.

Yeah. And it's, I mean, I'm telling you, if you ever want an easy thing, this is easy. I mean, I, I tell you, one of the, one of the hardest things in my opinion to do is find a person to do a job for you because you don't know these people, you don't know their reputation. Um, and, and we've talked about that on our show before about how you go and, and try to find people that are reputable. Um, but this, this company, Drunk Quote, they take all the questions out of that for you. They're— they know who the reputable companies are. They're using them on a regular basis. They've got a relationship with them,

and they're going to bring you the best quotes. And you know that you're going to have that at your disposal whenever you're making a decision.

Yep. And, and actually, next week, uh, Insinuate and his business partner, they're actually going to come on the show and talk about how their business works and, and how they can help you find the right solar system, the right roofer, the right roof, all that kind of stuff. And it's just fun because, you know, they're gonna send that FAA-certified drone pilot out and they're gonna fly that high-tech thing up there and get some really cool photos of your house. And you get the photos. I get to get the photos for free, right?

Yeah.

Yeah. So awesome.

As soon as y'all started talking about roofers and solar panels, my wife ears perked up real quick because we actually had, we found out we had a leak in our roof this morning when this big storm came through.

Today's the day to know.

We've been talking about getting solar panels because we're tired of paying $200 a month in electricity bills minimum.

Well, not only that, I mean, like, and you get government incentives.

That's the whole reason I started. I saw some posts, I was like, oh, they give you a discount, huh?

Yeah.

Well, yeah, it's— this is the last year for the big incentive too, because like next year, I think right now it's— and don't quote me on this, I think it's 30%, something like that. And then like next year it's stepping down to like 26% and then 24% and then 20%. And it's like they're Stepping it down over the next 4 years, and then it's just gonna go away.

Wow.

Um, so it's like, if you're gonna do it, like, now's the time because you're gonna get the best tax incentives. Um, yeah, I, my wife and I have been researching it for a long time. We're probably gonna pull the trigger on it as well.

Yeah. And, and again, it's as simple as, is clicking on our link for DroneQuote and they're gonna give you the quotes. It's gonna be so easy. Yeah. Perfect.

And what is their, what does their service cost for them to come out and fly it over? Nothing.

Nothing.

Yeah, they get their money from the—

The best way I can like describe this to a person is it's very similar to Google Earth, like, like a travel agent. Okay, like a travel agent, you don't pay for a travel agent. Yeah, I mean, you walk into a travel agent, they— that's exactly right, they get a, they get a kickback from the hotel. And Drunk Quote is, is similar. They, they use their services as free. The company that, that winds up doing the work winds up paying them a percentage, and that's the way they get their money. So you as, as As the consumer, don't pay DroneQuote. And so it's, it's just like someone coming out and giving you an estimate. Yeah. Hopefully people are giving you free estimates. If they're not, then you need to

find someone else. And, and, and it's just a, it's a real simple process. They then go out, find 3 quotes for you, bring it back to you, and you have 3 quotes at your disposal to make a decision with.

That's awesome. We'll be probably hitting them up next week. She's already on the phone.

Checking them out. Yep. No, they're good guys. We've enjoyed working with them so far. So yeah, but we actually have like some, some events coming up that you're going to be a part of. And like you do these so people can hire you to come do the tomahawk throwing.

Yes, you can.

Like for parties and events and all that kind of stuff.

If you want to hire us to come out for your birthday party, come out for your graduation party, whatever, hit us up on bravehawkforge.com. Either shoot us an email. It's actually under the Hire Us tab on our website. We're actually doing an event this weekend in Lake Striker Resort, which is in like northeast Texas. I couldn't tell you the name of the town.

Yeah. But it's beautiful.

Yeah. Hey, from the pictures I've seen, it's gorgeous. She, she found us through our website, and then she also got referred to our website by another blacksmith that was on Forged in Fire who lives in that area. So she wanted to have us come out, and she pretty much built a whole event around us coming out to do this tomahawk throwing competition. So, but I mean, that's— if you want to hire us to come out, come on, you know, give us a call.

And I gotta say, like, I've seen a lot of these axe throwing places popping up.

Yeah, it's like—

but the tomahawk's just cooler.

It's so much cooler. So my 2 cents on that, because I don't want to get on this soapbox too much, but, um—

We like soapboxes.

Oh hey, so at those axe throwing places, you're getting a hatchet that's bought at Home Depot, Lowe's, you know, weighs 4 or 5 pounds, meant for chopping wood.

Right.

Chopping limbs off of trees.

Yeah.

My tomahawks— this tomahawk right here that I'm holding weighs 1.2 ounces.

Ooh, let me hold that.

I'm sorry, 1 pound 2 ounces, not 1.2 ounces. That's just ridiculous.

Um, I can carry that backpacking.

Yeah. So we actually make— we make what's called the Trapper Tomahawk. It's one of our utility ones. Uh, we had sold one to a guy that lives in Las Vegas, a friend of my mom's. Uh, he's a big hunter. He took it into the Arctic Circle in his backpack, used it to butcher his caribou, used it to chop his firewood, used it to, you know, drive his tent stakes. Dude's bad. I mean, well, I don't know what I can say on here, but dude's an awesome guy. Uh, sent us a bunch of photos, and it's 16 inches. It weighs less than a pound.

Let me tell you right now, that thing is sharp.

Yeah, yeah, be careful. Sorry, I should have— no, forewarning.

I, I know how to handle knives. I'm fine. But that, that, that thing is super sharp. I mean, if you want to take that somewhere and use it, you can use it.

This is our battle one, so, um, Um, you know, like I said, the— I was telling Craig earlier that our Battle One, my predecessor sold a lot of them to, uh, the Rangers regiment in Fort Benning. Is that right?

That sounds right.

I always say Fort Bridger because that's like a big rendezvous that's in Wyoming.

Um, Fort Benning. I thought you were talking about Fort Worth.

No, no.

The Rangers.

No, no, no.

Arlington. No, no, no, no. Texas. Okay. Anyway, so.

Nobody likes them.

Oh, take that, Kev.

I got an Astros tattoo on my leg. Okay. Um, anyways, so he sold them to the Rangers Regiment and they used them overseas after they got trained. Um, they could use them in battle and the spike on the back of that tomahawk is battle proven to go straight through a Kevlar helmet.

Whoa.

So obviously we don't have any gory photos of that, but if I did, trust me, they'll be on my website.

Someone needs to test it out.

Yeah.

I don't wanna wear it. Put it, put a Kevlar helmet on a—

wear this helmet, Kevlar helmet.

Sure, Kevlar helmet, water will be great.

That's right.

No, so, um, yeah, our tomahawks, we do our throwing competitions. We actually had a partnership with a bar downtown. Um, I kind of jumped on the train of trying to make it more commercialized. Uh, had an event for a charity, uh, it was the Bearded Villains event, and I actually ended up—

That's an awesome name.

Oh, it's an awesome it's, it's almost like a motorcycle club. So in order for you to join the— join the— I guess it's the group— you have to be a prospect, just like a motorcycle gang.

Okay.

And you kind of got to show up to so many meetings and all this and that. But I'm so busy right now, I was like, I want to join really bad because I got a beard that's pretty fierce. It's not even tame right now. I usually get it trimmed.

But anyways, kind of reminds me of the one Kev got rid of this year.

And it was I had a good one. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I did. Well, anyway, we're not gonna get in that rabbit hole anyways.

Um, so we were down there at Pitch 25 for that event. The owner saw us, loved, loved what we did, saw how popular it was, kind of got on the bandwagon of, well, everybody else is throwing these up. I mean, there's like 4 or 5 places within a 50-mile radius here that's, that's all they do. They sell you beer, they make you sign a waiver, and they let you throw a hatchet That sounds awful. Oh, it's great.

Beer and hatchet throwing sounds like a problem.

Well, if you don't know what you're doing.

Okay.

Agreed. Okay.

Um, and you know, they, they give 'em minimal training.

Unsupervised, I think is what it is. Right.

Pretty much unsupervised. Um, you know, and whenever we do it, we, I set up a batting cage and I'll have 2 lanes in the batting cage, 2 separate targets. I do 2 people at once. I used to only do one, but it's way more cost effective and the line's not as long. Um, So I'll, I'll walk them through. I'll give each person 5 practice throws, training throws where I'm, all right, you're too close, you're too far back, you need to keep your elbow up. You know, you're, you're trying to throw it like a baseball, flicking your wrist. You know, I run them through all that and then they get 10 throws for points. And like I said, whoever has the highest points at the end of the night wins

one of our tomahawks.

Cool.

So it's, uh, it's much more hands-on. It's super exhausting for me, especially like an 8-hour event. I'm just beat afterwards and all I'm doing is teaching people how to throw tomahawks.

Yeah.

But I teach them the right way, the way I was taught. And, um, I'm pretty good at it. I mean, I could show you some videos where I can throw 2 at a time in one hand. I can throw 2 at a time at 2 different targets with one hand.

Wow.

2 hands, 2 targets. Um, I can throw from like, uh, 40 feet, which is about 3 rotations.

That's a good ways with it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's like 12 yards.

Accurately.

Yeah.

So that's a long way.

And I was gonna ask you, because I mean, like, and you were talking about like some of the forms Like people flicking their wrist and all the different ways that people try and do it. The other thing that I noticed, again, you mentioned this when you talk about axe throwing, is like, you know, when you go pick up like a hatchet or an axe, usually from the store they have like a curved, heavy curved handle to them. And, and yours have a straight handle.

Yep.

And it's— what, what's, what's going on? What's the difference there?

So the reason a tomahawk handle 9 out of 10 times will be, uh, tapered towards from the head of the tomahawk down is because these are what's called a tapered fit. Oh, sorry. It's, it's what's called a tapered fit. So on a hatchet, you put the— 90% of the time you put the head of the axe on top of the thing and put a wedge in there, right?

Yeah.

This is made to come out. So rather than breaking your tomahawk, or— it's not made to come out. Let me, let me rephrase that. So whenever I put my tomahawk in, uh, when I forge it, I forge the eye of the tomahawk tapered just like the tomahawk handle. So when I hammer it down in there, it goes in as far as it can and then it'll stop. And if I keep hammering, it'll crack. So at least So this is a super tight fit, and the reason we do this is because it's for quick handle replacement. The one thing with tomahawks is most of the time, if you have a really well-forged tomahawk, you're not gonna break the tomahawk metal head itself. You'll break the handle. And there's actually games in Renaissance— you know, not

Renaissance, um, it's not Renaissance— rendezvous, like old, you know, timey rendezvous where they dress up and you can't have a cell phone, all that stuff. Yeah, um, they play games where it's, uh, reenactments. Yeah, there you go. Uh, you got to cut the handle of the other person's tomahawk. Oh, so like one person sticks it up there and the other person has to cut it off. Well, if, if you had a hatchet, your, your hatchet's done, you know, without, without you having another handle and another swedge and a saw to cut off the top. And you know what I mean? Um, so with the tomahawk, you just pull the, you know, you knock out the old handle, put the new handle in, hammer it in, you're ready to go again.

So, so how do you— what's, what's the proper technique on throwing this bad boy then?

So So you, a lot of people want to choke up. I always tell people you want it at the very bottom. See, so it's tapered, so you don't have to open your hand when you throw it. All you have to do is go forward and just barely loosen your grip and it'll slide right out. So I always, when I'm telling people to throw, I have them start with a parallel elbow pointing at the target. Uh, you want your elbow to be parallel with the ground. You bend at the elbow to a 90, you raise the elbow, not all the way. You're not trying to stretch your back with it. You go about 4 to 5 inches,

6 inches if you're a big guy, and then you just snap forward.

Right.

And then you just let go. So you don't snap your wrist like you would pitch a baseball. You just let it slide outta your hand. And if you're at the right distance, the thing about axe throwing, tomahawk throwing, um, 90% is you need to know how far you are in order to know how hard you need to throw. Um, if you throw the same way every single time, you can throw it from multiple distances without even thinking about it.

Mm-hmm.

So I can, like right now I could go up and I can normally stick it on the first try from 7 paces or 5 paces, and then I can turn around and I can go, that's 1 rotation. And then I can go to 7 paces and I'll turn the blade around to where the blade is facing me and not the target. This will be 1.5 rotations and it'll land to where the, uh, the handle's pointing up in the air. And then I'll take another 2 steps back and I'll put the blade back forward. I'm at 2, uh, 2 full rotations. And then you just keep doing that math until, like I said, I can do it from about 4 rotations is probably my best.

Wow. That's impressive.

Yeah.

But that's like over my fence. I gotta like get way back and like throw it over my fence at my target.

Yeah, your neighbors are like, there he goes again.

We live on an acre, so, um, my neighbors are pretty cool. They're pretty laid back and they don't mind. You know, when I first built the forge, I was like, hey man, I'm gonna be making noise, but I promise to be respectful. I won't be doing it before 8 o'clock in the morning and I won't be doing it anytime after 8 o'clock at night. I mean, I have a Big Blue Max 110, which is a pneumatic trip hammer.

Mm-hmm.

The thing shakes the ground.

Wow.

Oh, it's so awesome. Um, if you, if anybody out there that has ever done forging or if anybody's ever even seen the show, so on the show they have Big Blue and they talk about it's a trip hammer and it moves metal about 10 times faster than a human can. Um, most humans, some people out there are just superhuman and they can swing a hammer all day and never get tired, but I'm not that guy. Um, I could do my fair share, but eventually my shoulder and my arm was gonna be beat. Um, but my trip hammer, it, it never gets tired. I just gotta get some more oil on it and make sure it has enough air and make sure all the things are tight, you know, nice and tight. I can stay out there and forge on that thing all day long. So,

but it makes a lot of noise.

Yeah. Well, you're hammering metal.

Yeah, exactly. What do you expect? And like I said, most of my neighbors are pretty cool. Uh, yeah, nobody really complains.

Yeah, slip them a tomahawk every once in a while.

Well, yeah, I mean, well, actually, one of my neighbors across the street, um, he's— he loaned us his tractor so we could dig out the foundation for our— our— Nice.

Yeah, it is a good neighbor.

Yeah, that is a really good neighbor.

I know, I was like, man, sweet, I don't have to rent one. Yeah, they're not cheap.

No, they're not.

I looked, and it would have taken me a lot more than a day, right?

Yeah, absolutely.

Well, so let's say like somebody listening to this is like, I'm, you know, I'm I've always been curious about getting into, into this, into blacksmithing, into forging, and, and I'm wanting to get started. Like, what would be like maybe the few key things that they would need to, to really get going, to, you know, start their career, whether it being making kitchen knives or tomahawks?

All right, the, the 3 things you need in order to be a blacksmith, and I mean, this is proven all the time, um, you need a heat source. Something that gets super hot. A lot of guys use propane.

You can use coal.

Coal's actually pretty cheap. It's about, I want to say, like $10 for like a 40-pound bag. Yeah, $20 or something like that. I don't know, I just buy it in bulk. Um, you can get coal forged, little air crank, you know, hand crank air. It's super cheap.

Not—

you can make one out of a—

No bellows?

Oh, actually, Cowboy, uh, over at Phoenix Knives, he has a giant bellows.

Oh yeah?

And it is awesome watching him use it because that And it has the most perfect tempo of a coal forge. Like, I have an electric fan on mine, so I mean, I can get my heat up going really good, but there's a point to where it gets too hot. With that bellows, he's in complete and total control, and it's just like one— it's one simple, easy hand move that he does with it. It's awesome watching him do it.

Huh.

Um, so you need a heat source, you need a hammer obviously, or something hard to hit it with.

rock.

Uh, you might hurt yourself. Um, and then you need something hard to hit it against. Yet again, I wouldn't use a rock because heat and rocks and hammer and stuff doesn't go very well. So a really cheap way to go is getting an old piece of railroad. Um, a lot of guys use that.

Mm-hmm.

Or, uh, if you can find just a cast iron block, that works great. Um, anvils can be pricey. The better the anvil, the more expensive it is. Uh, Uh, running rate a couple years ago was about $8 a pound. Mine is like $150, $165 a pound.

Mm-hmm.

So, and mine's actually like a really more expensive brand from Britain or Europe. Uh, it's called a Pendleton. It doesn't have like the normal flat, uh, end. It cones out at both ends.

Mm-hmm.

So it's like one flat cone and one rounded cone.

Okay.

So it, it, I couldn't tell you what they used it for, but it's a cool anvil. Um, I kind of wish I would've kept the other one I had rather than selling it.

So it's not an ACME?

No, no, I wouldn't buy any ACME stuff. I've watched too many cartoons.

Yeah, I mean, he dropped them all the time.

I'd be dropping that on my foot.

Good old Wile E. Coyote.

Oh yeah.

I mean, they obviously didn't work.

Well, they worked at being hard and heavy.

They never got the Road Runner.

But those are the 3 things you really need, and then you just really need the passion. You need the passion to fail. be able to get back up because I, there's, I'm still failing on a daily basis. I was telling him earlier that I had a client, I was working in the shop today. Me and my wife were finishing up some products and, uh, had a client's tomahawk completely done, did the heat treat and had a stress fracture all the way down the blade edge. And, uh, that was like 2 weeks worth of work down the drain.

Wow.

And the final step, and it's a crucial step. It's the most crucial step.

And it—

I had to start over from scratch.

Yeah.

So, you know, we had to really hustle to get this guy's tomahawk order that he's been waiting on for a while now. Um, but you just got to have the passion to fail and be like, all right, well, let me, let me regroup. And I've, I've ruined countless knives because I'll get too heavy on the grinder. My wife gets on to me all the time. I mean, it really has to do with— I have a really good grinder that I bought from my predecessor, and, uh, If I have it full blast with a full blast, you know, sandpaper, sandpaper grit on it, 36 grit, and it chews through metal like it's nothing.

Yeah.

And, uh, so you just gotta, you just gotta have the passion to learn, the passion to fail, and the passion to keep going, really.

Well, with the, the items that you mentioned, you know, the, the heat source, the, the hammer, and something to hit it with, I mean, what, what could someone reasonably expect to be able to make with that?

Oh, you can make— I mean, there's guys out there that solely make knives just on a, you know, a propane forge, which you can get for about $150, a railroad tie, which is like, you know, the flat part where the wheels roll on, um, and then just one hammer. I mean, that's—

and there's—

you could probably get all that for like $500, and they make some beautiful work.

I'm sure you can find lots of YouTube videos online.

Oh yeah, I mean, there's YouTube videos for days on how to build a forge and how to build a a propane forge versus a, you know, air assist forge, which I wouldn't suggest because you'll melt shit really quick when you start adding propane and air together. It's like you're getting into temperatures you don't need to get into.

Yeah.

Um, you know, if, if you wanted to do it at very cheap, you can go that route. If you wanted to spend $1,000, you could still get a really good startup forge and, uh, be able to make whatever you wanted. It just really has to do with the passion And how, how do I say it? Um, ingenuity.

What's the word?

What would be like the ingenuitive? That's not the word I'm looking for. Anyways, how creative. There we go. How creative you can be on making your own tools. Um, because blacksmith tools, like really professionally made ones, are expensive.

Yeah.

Um, and Yes, please. Um, it would be, you know, it'd behoove you to buy the better stuff, but at the same time, if you wanted to go cheap, you can. It's not going to be a big deal.

Sorry.

Well, we're all thirsty over here. We're drinking, drinking some water, so sorry for the pause. Yeah, well, I've, uh, I've recently watched a guy do some forging, uh, over the course of a week, which was, which was really a lot of fun. Um, and it's just a, you know, you mentioned the word creative, and that's really what it— I mean, what it really boils down to. I mean, this is an art.

It's an art form. And honestly, before Forged in Fire came, it was a dying art form. Um, now Forged in Fire has just ignited the bladesmithing portion of it, and I feel like the, um, there has been a couple show, uh, different shows that have stemmed from it, more ornamental. Um, there's one that was like Detroit Steel or something like that, or Philadelphia. Anyways, there's been a couple blacksmithing shows on TV that have gone away from knife making and more into ornamental stuff. Not competition shows, but like family shows. Like these— it's a reality show of this family that's— their whole family's blacksmiths, and all they do is they make expensive art pieces or, you know, a

fence gate for somebody. So it, um, I feel like the ornamental part is thriving, but it's still kind of lingering at the backside to the knife making because knife making has become so mainstream because of Forged in Fire. Everybody loves the show. I've known countless, countless bladesmiths that have just started bladesmithing because they love the show so much.

Okay.

And I'm like, man, take some time, make those knives, you know, make your money, do whatever you want, make knives, have fun, but take some time to learn some ornamental stuff. You know, make that little wizard head, make a scorpion out of a railroad spike, or, um, you know, because when you do that stuff, it's, it's like little trinkets. I know a lot of people don't want all that little trinket stuff, but it, it's cool. You made a little piece of art, and it may look like crap, it really might, but to you it's an accomplishment.

Yeah.

You know, you can make a beautiful knife, but you can't go out there and you can't, you know, make a pineapple twist on a square stock, or, you know, um you can't make a little face in something. And most of the guys can. Most of the really good bladesmiths have been doing it for a long time. They can, they can make pretty much whatever they want.

So that's cool.

Before the show, you and I were talking about, uh, that bourbon company that was talking about coming to the Knife Show that we're gonna get into in here. But I don't know if you know, it's called, uh, Heaven's Gate.

Yes.

And the reason it's called Heaven's Gate is because it's Bob Dylan's label.

That's what we were talking about.

And he's now gotten into gate making.

Yeah.

And he make— he makes metal gates now. That's cool.

Yeah, I didn't know that.

So, uh, which was why he was interested in coming to the show and that whole thing coming together.

We would love him, especially if Bob Dylan himself came out. Oh yeah, have him as a guest judge.

So I haven't, I haven't gone down the rabbit hole, but I really want to find like some pictures of some of the gates that he's made.

Okay.

Because that's, I mean, like, that's apparently like he's not making music.

So Mike will kill me because I've gone like 50 minutes without even talking about this show, uh, just talking about myself. Sorry, Mike. Uh, Mike's my partner. Um, we are putting on the Texas Custom Knife Show It's gonna be November the 16th at Southern Star Brewery. It will be from 12 PM to 8 PM. The significant thing about this event is I have 28 Forged in Fire finalists, champions, contestants, you know, guys that are on the first round and out. I have 28 of them coming, and they're gonna be setting out their knives. Some of them are gonna be doing demos. The real big thing that we're really excited about is we're gonna be doing a mock Forged in Fire competition.

Oh.

So I have 4 to 6 guys already lined up. We're gonna have equipment out there for them, forges.

Do you know who it's gonna be yet?

Yeah, I've got a few of them.

Can't announce it.

I won't divulge that information yet.

You gotta come.

Yeah, we're gonna, we're gonna save that information a little closer so that we can kind of, you know, jump up the, the excitement for the event.

Must be good, y'all.

Yeah.

Um, so we're gonna, we're gonna have 4 to 6 bladesmiths do a railroad spike knife. And, uh, that's a pretty simple knife. Most of the guys can do them pretty quickly. Uh, we're gonna give them a very short time frame, just like they'd have on the show. And then we're gonna have a panel of judges, 3 judges. We're gonna do very minimal testing. We haven't really decided on what we're gonna do. We don't want to damage these blades. We're not going to be hacking them into elk bone or anything that would just destroy it. Um, the reason that we don't want to destroy them is because all the blades that are going to be made in the bladesmithing competition are going to be

put into our live auction, which will be directly after the judging. Um, so anyways, we'll, we'll pick a winner. Uh, the winner will get you know, something, and we'll— we're gonna be cool and give like 2nd and 3rd place something. Um, not everybody's gonna get a participation trophy. Um, I'll give 'em a pat on the back. That's not this kind of— it's not this kind of an event.

A lot of sad blacksmiths, y'all.

Hey, it's not this kind of an event, and they know that. Um, so after, after all the judging and everything's done, which we have actually Alex Middleton from 94.5 The Buzz, the Rod Ryan Show, he's gonna be one of our guest judges. Uh, He does Pass the Gravy podcast. I don't know if y'all ever—

oh yeah, yeah.

So he's gonna be one of our guest judges. We might have somebody from the Chamber of Commerce on there. And then if Bob Dylan comes, I'm serious as a heart attack, you let him know I want him as a judge because that would kill. That would kill. I would blow Mike out of the water.

Wait, if I get Bob, do I get to come on as—

Yeah, okay, why not? All right, I'll let you do some of the testing. Yes, I'm the host of this event.

I'm gonna be the Will Will So just have the ambulance standing by.

Just call him Fruit Ninja.

That's right, Fruit Ninja. Um, so after the judging, we're gonna do a live auction, which all of the benefits of the live auction— we have a bunch of bladesmiths donating, uh, Big Blue, the, uh, the trip hammer manufacturer, they donated a bunch of tongs and stuff. All of those proceeds are gonna go to Casualties of War, which is a Houston area Um, veteran-based— sorry, I'm tripping on words— veteran-based charity. Uh, they pretty much help veterans, first responders, um, active duty, anybody that's kind of— how do I say this? You get what I'm saying. First responders, veterans, they— anybody that's having troubles like paying bills or anything of that nature, they reach out and they help out. Uh, either they get them with an organization that can help or

they give them the money themselves. So all of our proceeds are going to them.

That's awesome. So Yeah.

You know, right now we're looking at, um, thousands of dollars. If, I mean, if people bid like I think they're gonna bid. One of the guys, Dwayne Bennett, he built this hammer and I would bid $300 on it, but my wife would kill me. Um, uh, it's a beautiful piece.

Okay.

So, you know, people are gonna be donating all kinds of stuff and we're really gonna have fun with that. And then, you know, throughout the day we're gonna have live bands. Um, obviously it's Southern Star Brewery, so there's gonna be beer.

There you go.

Um, a lot of really good beer. I don't know if y'all have ever been over there, but they, they make some pretty sweet beer. I know y'all are much closer to B-52, but we're not gonna get into the— we're not gonna get into the Conroe Beer Wars. Okay.

Um, well, I'll, uh, I'll go ahead and throw this out. I didn't even talk to Craig about this. We could donate a podcast subscription to anybody who wants. We'll go ahead and, uh, throw that in for free.

That's right. Okay. Put it on the auction block.

People could bid on it and, um, Yeah, that ought to be a hot piece.

Yeah, let's do it.

That's all I got, man. Well, what else have we missed? I mean, is there anything that, that you were kind of hoping to talk about that we hadn't asked you about?

Nah, man, I talked about Forged in Fire. I talked about the event at the very end there. Sorry, Mike. Um, I talked about my business and I pretty much hit it all.

Well, cool. Yeah, and we already, uh, asked you how you can get a hold of you, and, uh, we'll, we'll throw all that up in the show notes. And, uh, so you'll be able to just, you know, swipe up again and, uh, find all that stuff's on Facebook as well too, like the Texas Knife Show.

And the—

yeah, the Texas Knife Show is actually on the stickers. It's @tckas or whatever.

It's on the—

somewhere on here, @TexasCustomKnifeShow. Um, and it's on Instagram. And then you can find me on Facebook and Instagram, YouTube, all at Bravehawk Forge, Doc, or Bravehawk Forge. That's hawk, not heart. Hawk, like, ah, caw caw. Yeah, let's all start making bird sounds. My wife is cracking up.

Can, can they buy these cool hats that I, that I got?

Yeah, we sell these. We sell t-shirts. Uh, my wife makes custom t-shirts. She'll do it any size you want. She'll put something goofy across the back. And, you know, if depending on what it is, we might charge you more, but that's just because vinyl is not cheap. Yeah, no, neither is her time.

That's right. Yeah. So awesome. Well, cool. Well, we only have one last thing to do, Craig, and that would be the Final Four.

Final Four.

last 4 questions— last 4, I don't know why I said last 4— it's the only 4 questions that we ever ask our guests, uh, at the end of the— of each and every show. So, uh, these are just, um, hopefully not too difficult. We'll see if you pass. Uh, first question is this: what's the must-have tool you won't leave your house without?

Um, my, my knife.

Okay.

Yes.

Do you have a specific style? Or do you make your own? I made them. Okay.

Um, it's like a gym.

I made a Damascus knife.

Oh, there you go.

It's a little short with a little short with deer antler. Uh, I guess it's like a little short hunter. Sorry. Um, Damascus knife. I made 3 for our wedding. We got married in January. I made one for me and one for each one of my best men, and it snowballed, and I made one for every male in our family.

Nice. So, um, that's exciting for them though.

Oh yeah, they loved it. The dads and the grandpas My grandpas loved it. I made them little boxes and stuff. They all idolize it. And I'm like, that was good, but I could make it better. I was in a rush.

Awesome. Cool. All right, second question. What's a job you walked away from?

Well, we started to put up a new fence in our backyard so that we could get goats and chickens. And now all the fencing material is piled up in the backyard. They're like big cattle panels. piled up with weeds growing all throughout.

They're still there.

They're still there.

And I don't know the good suggestions.

I haven't walked away from it. Well, we're not sure if we're allowed to have 'em with our HOA. And yet again, HOAs telling me what to do.

Yeah.

My house.

Um, no, it's cool. I, I love the HOA concept. Keep, yeah, keep everybody from making the neighborhood a trashed place.

Yeah. So yeah, like weeds growing up over wood and stuff.

Oh yeah. Or just car, cars on blocks.

Hey, you're right.

They can't see it. Uh, it was not wood, it's metal fence cattle.

Oh, okay.

The wood would have rotted away by now.

It's been forever. So it's been a while.

It's been a while.

Okay. You walked away from this job a while ago.

I almost poured some gasoline on it so I could just burn all the weeds away, but I was like, nah, that's probably a bad idea.

HOA would probably get you for that.

No, I put burn piles in my backyard.

Oh, there you go.

So they wouldn't know.

There you go.

They can't see it from the road.

They don't care. They would all just be going, what's he forging now?

Yeah, that's funny. That's funny. Okay. Okay, cool. Uh, well, third question, what's, um, well, that's not the question at all. I'm turning to Craig over here. He doesn't know the questions. Here's a question. How do you wind down at the end of a long day?

I usually sit on my either sofa or my chair and watch TV with my wife. Like, okay, we're supposed to be watching Big Brother right now.

Big Brother.

We're gonna go hit that up as soon as we get home.

Okay.

Yeah.

All right. So is that, that y'all's thing is—

That's our show. I mean, we just—

Reality shows. I mean, Forged in Fire, Big Brother. Oh yeah, pretty much.

Um, have you, like, have you watched your episode? Like, how—

Oh yeah, many times.

Do you have a hard time watching yourself or do you enjoy it?

Oh, I enjoy it.

You enjoy it?

I think I'm hilarious.

Okay.

I think I'm one of the funniest people in the world and I'm, I've been really like toned here. Okay. I haven't been too mouthy, I guess you'd say. I have a dirty mouth and, uh, I've been trying to hold it back.

Um, you were by far like the best dressed in that episode.

Well, thank you. I appreciate that because I was so disappointed that Braxton won in a— and I'm sorry, in a freaking hoodie.

You wore a hoodie, dude?

You wore a hoodie? You wore a hoodie and you won? Come on, man.

Yeah. Who are you, Bill Belichick, right? No, you're not Bill Belichick.

No, a lot of my coworkers gave me a lot of crap about that. Um, see, y'all catch it now. I was consciously thinking about it earlier and now I'm not.

Um, they get—

yeah, they get—

They gave me crap about it at work, like, oh, you wore a vest, you wore a vest to this Christmas party, remember that really frosty blue one you wore to the Christmas party a couple years ago? And they're like, that was so gay. And I was like, nah, that thing was sweet. It was Christmasy themed. I couldn't find a red or a green one, so I got a frosty blue that looked like ice. And they're like, you looked so— you were wearing denim jeans, I looked awesome. Forget y'all, I look good. All the females in the office were like, nah, he looked good. He looks super stylish. Like, y'all need to, y'all need to take a note from him. And I was like, see what, what? Yeah, I like to wear a vest. Okay. Get off my

back. That's funny.

That's good. All right. Last question. Um, what's one of the best pieces of wisdom or advice you've ever received?

Um, it would probably be from my mom and it's, uh, it's going to sound super cheesy, but you can do anything. You know, I've, I've gone through many careers and jobs and everything, and she's always believed in me pretty much.

You can do anything.

That's good.

Just stick with it.

Yeah, absolutely.

And I've done it, and I own my own business. I've been on TV, and you know, we're killing it.

Yeah, well, you said it earlier. I mean, and I think this is like a really, really important life lesson, which is don't be afraid to fail.

I mean, man, that, that one is— that one I had to learn on my own.

Yeah.

And my mom told me that when I was younger, but it didn't click, you know what I mean? Um, that one, you just kind of— I'm only 30, but I feel like I'm aged well beyond my years because I've had, you know, you have hardships and some people have more than others.

Yeah.

And, uh, I had my fair share.

So, well, well, it— I mean, I just feel like that really goes hand in hand with you can do anything.

Yeah.

And then don't be afraid to fail.

Yeah.

If you're willing to fail, And willing to learn from those things, you can do anything.

Yeah, absolutely.

Exactly. So cool. Awesome. Yeah, Craig, what are we missing?

Dude, that's it.

That's it.

I'm gonna go make a knife.

Okay.

Yeah. Hey, y'all are more than welcome. Come over to the forge. Speaking of which, I do classes.

Okay.

Um, I mean, we charge for the classes, but if y'all want to come over and just hang out in the forge sometime, by all means.

Well, I'll stand outside of it.

No, you can stand in there, dude. I'm super safe. I only cut myself.

Hey, I'm in. I'm in. Let's do it.

It's a lot of fun. Uh, I mean, make a farrier's rasp knife in like a day.

Okay, I'm in.

Uh, yeah, absolutely. Let's, let's make it happen.

Of course.

Cool.

I got my information.

All right. Yes, we do. We're gonna give it to everybody that's listening right now. So, uh, thank you for downloading the episode. We hope you enjoyed it. We enjoyed it.

I enjoyed it a lot. I enjoyed it a lot.

Yeah, it's been fun. So, uh, yeah, thanks for, thanks for downloading the episode. Share it with your friends. And we're here every Tuesday, so until then, we'll see you later.

See ya!