my hobby : A Young Mans Passion For Metal

Metal is wonderful stuff isn't it, you can bend & twist it into all kinds of shapes, you can draw it with dies, cut, drill, and mill & turn it, weld it, and off course melt it and pour the molten metal into moulds of all kinds.

There are few other materials where you can do all of the above, and I've probably omitted some of the metal forming/shaping operations.

Have you had a life long passion with metal?

I know many people who have, generally the passion for metal can start from a very young age, especially if you once had a father or grandfather who introduced you to the blacksmith forge, this simple piece of equipment is always a total source of fascination, especially the way it could build so much heat using a simple fuel such as charcoal and air blast created with the hand operated bellows.

My guess is that many people must feel this way about metal, otherwise you wouldn't be doing what you're doing right now in your workshop. Just the other day I exchanged a few emails on an Australian based hobby foundry group: http://groups.google.com.au/group/The-hobby-foundry with a young fellow whose name is Ryan.

Ryan lives in Queensland Australia. He is only about 17 years old and still attending school, but has discovered metal casting. He creates some amazing ceremonial swords. It is great to see someone so young involved in a metal craft hobby such as metal casting, I'm sure Ryan wont ever have time to get bored with life while being involved with an interesting metal craft hobby.

Many other young fellows could take a leaf out of Ryan's book and get involved with practical hobbies like metal casting or some other form of metal craft. It is not hard to do once you have a little guidance and instruction and the hobby provides immense personal satisfaction and reward.

Boredom is a general malaise with so many young people these days, and there is really no need for it when there are so many great practical hobbies to do in your spare time. Too many people take the easy option to veg out in front of the T.V. idiot box.. what a terrible waste of time that is.

Ryan will never be bored, he just doesn't have time for boredom, he is such an adventurous, energetic young fellow. It reminds me of my young days when I would wander down to the old farm blacksmith on a wet miserable winters day to light the old forge then heat up a few bits of metal and just generally tinker around, that's where my passion for metal started, it has never really stopped. I hope you don't let your passion for metal ever wane.

The word boredom just doesn't exist in the metal workers vocabulary. Honest.

By Colin Croucher