Fire steel belt buckle

[Gailainne]

I've been on a few courses in the last year or so, some where everything is taken off you, and some where you make do with what you have on you.

On one course we had granite and granite quartz mix rocks available, what we didnt have and couldnt find was a piece of steel with the right temper to throw a spark, and it got me thinking, if we had had a belt buckle made from suitable steel, we would always have a means of making fire, theres always a suitable rock around.

So any blacksmiths out there think its a worthwhile cause ?

What I dont know is whether is should/could be dismountable, I suppose the belt could be connected with studs rather than rivets and oval ? I guess.

Welcome to my world

Stephen

 

[rancid badger]

Thats a really clever idea, in the same way that we have multi tools, we could have multi belts, not as multi use of course but with your buckle idea and the fact that you can use decent quality hide belts to strop your knife......

Seriously good idea, any chance of Mike Ameling knocking out some buckles?
I've actually been working on demountable buckle system for a belt my daughter has put together

R.B.

 

[Gailainne]

Cheers RB, I Pm'd Mike about it a while back but got no reply , hopefully someone else will take up the challenge.

PS My dolphins near the surface yet ?

Regards

Stephen

 

[clcuckow]

I would have thought that rust might be a bit of a problem, what with sweat.

 

[Harmony]

I collect brass belt buckles and change them daily.

The belt I wear has two snaps. the buckle goes on then the snaps close with a leather loop between them.

May have to add a fire steel buckle to my collection, it one comes available.

Harmony

 

[Gailainne]

I would have thought that rust might be a bit of a problem, what with sweat.

Hmm perhaps, but a touch of the girlfriends nail varnish would soon fix that, and also its your gear, you prep it and maintain it like all the rest of your gear, dont you ?

 

[rancid badger]

Cheers RB, I Pm'd Mike about it a while back but got no reply , hopefully someone else will take up the challenge.

PS My dolphins near the surface yet ?

Regards

Stephen

Ah its funny you should mention that!
they're.........coming along!
R.B.

 

[Gailainne]

Ah its funny you should mention that!
they're.........coming along!
R.B.

Mate I was up in Mull on holiday recently, on the whale watch tour we came across a pod off bottlenose dolphins, they are amazing creatures, so much fun in them, absolutley wonderful stuff.
Stephen

 

[g4ghb]

what a great idea - dave budd would be another good person to approach - and now he is back in production now he has a workshop again.......

 

[clcuckow]

Hmm perhaps, but a touch of the girlfriends nail varnish would soon fix that, and also its your gear, you prep it and maintain it like all the rest of your gear, dont you ?

I was think more about extended use. I am a bit of an FB and can sweat a far bit as I am out of shape. I use HC knives almost exclusively and don't have a problem them at all but then I always clean and dry them after use and put them back in a tight fitting water repellent sheath (usually hot dipped/cuir bouilli leather). But if you are away for a while and have use your buckle you have removed your lacquer (or ren wax) and now imagine getting caught in a down pore or built up a sweat under your jacket or your jacket is single layer Ventile which get damp on the inside. It would not take long for the striker surface to rust and we all know how hard it is to get a rust stain out.

 

[Mesquite]

I was browsing a few sites and came across this

http://www.shrewbows.com/belts/index.html

Hand forged buckle.... so there's your design anyway

 

[Mike Ameling]

Cheers RB, I Pm'd Mike about it a while back but got no reply , hopefully someone else will take up the challenge.

PS My dolphins near the surface yet ?

Regards

Stephen

Hi, Stephen, and ... y'all.

Hmmm ... I thought I had answered your PM. I know I answered somebody's PM about belt buckle strikers. Or is this another of those things my uncle calls a ... senior moment?

First, rust isn't a problem - except for the rust stains on clothes. If it rusts, you just clean it off with steel wool. That rust doesn't hurt the steel - only the "visual" appearance. So just dry it, clean it, maybe give it a light coat of oil every once in a while, and it will be fine. In time, the steel will develop its own "patina" of stains and polished areas.

The big problem is having a striker thick enough and tough enough to work as a belt buckle without having to worry about it cracking/breaking, yet heat-treated hard enough to work well as a flint striker. To work best as a flint striker, it should be heat-treated as hard as you can get it. But that makes it much more brittle, and susceptible to chipping/cracking/breaking from a bad "hit" on something hard enough - like dropping it on cement or a rock, or bumping/falling against a rock when out climbing. That direct hit flat against it is the problem, instead of that light ticking/glancing hit when striking sparks.

The other problem area is forg-welding that cross-bar in the middle of the classic buckle shapes - squares, rectangles, ovals. That crossbar would need to be of soft iron - to take the extra stress of having the one end of the belt lapped around it, and having the "tongue" pivoting on it for the other end of the belt. Soft iron (low carbon steel) would not heat treat hard, so that would be needed there.

But a thought just occurred to me. If a buckle is make with a short stubby hook/stud on it to catch the holes in your belt, then some other possibilities come up. One good version would be an Oval striker made into a belt buckle. Just punch/drill a hole through the middle of one long side for a rivetted pin to work as that hook/stud. Then loop your belt through and around the other long side. To use, just pass the other end aroung you and then in through the back of the center opening of the oval "buckle". Then "hook" the appropriate hole in the belt with that stud. And have a loop on the leather belt to keep that loose end from flopping about. It would then be a lot like those big rectangular cast brass belt buckles. The only other thing to do them is make sure to have that oval striker be extra thick to take the stress/strain.

A good option here would be to start with one of my "kid proof" oval strikers. They are a modern "alloy" steel, and are almost impossible to break once they are properly heat-treated. I took one that was fully heat-treated and threw great sparks, and then laid it on my anvil and hit it a dozen hard forging type blows with my 3 pound hammer - trying to break it, or at least crack it. I even turned it on edge and hammered it again a half dozen times. I managed to bend it a bit. And it still struck sparks just as well as it did before I started. So I call them my "kid proof" strikers. They are great for kids to learn with - as there is almost no way for them to break them instead of a regular flint striker with bad/poor "technique". I've seen kids who got ... frustrated ... while trying to get sparks, and ended up only remembering that if you BANG the flint against the steel you are supposed to get sparks. So they ended up BANGING the two straight together at arms length! A clear case of lack of proper one-on-one supervision while teaching those kids how to strike sparks with a traditional flint/steel.

So a belt buckle made from one of my "kid proof" oval flint strikers would be a possibility. Then it just becomes a matter of how wide of belt to fit. The standard size has a center opening around 2 inches wide. But the narrow ends could be ... squared up also ... then being about 1/2 inch wide for a "longer" belt buckle. (Could be made wider.)

Interesting possibilities. I may just have to ... tinker a bit.

I'm generally opposed to ... combo tools ... of most kinds. You tend to sacrifice the best qualities of each part of the combo tool, and end up with just "servicable" functionality for them. My opinion is to just get a good version of each tool, and hump the extra weight along. But I use my tools HARD. So they have to hold up well.

Well, I guess I know what my next bout of ... tinkering ... will be. Belt buckles. And I've told many people in the past that I don't want to make belt buckles. (usually too much work for what they are willing to pay - especially when forge welding)

Mikey - that grumpy ol' German blacksmith out in the Hinterlands
- who spent part of this afternoon making up some of those documented 18th century Irish flint strikers

 

[Celt_Ginger]

Mike, you are going to bankrupt me. First a new Irish striker and now a buckle/striker. What will it be next, lol

 

[Gailainne]

Hiya Mike thanks for answering, you put a doubt in my mind about the PM, so I rechecked, nothing there, but I do remember Tony saying some PM's were lost on a server change over, shrug, no matter.

On your second option, the leather could be thinned down to pass thru the narrow section, say an 1", in any case it would need some kind of welt on the inside, the leather rubbing against hardened steel it would'nt last long.

I was thinking about it while reading your post and a couple of things came to mind, whether they are feasible or not is another matter

1. Could 2 holes be drilled into the oval before its hardened and then use say brass for the cross bar and tongue afterwards ? The brass should be soft enough to deform without putting undue load on the steel.

2. Could the steel be riveted to a brass buckle, say just along the front edge, if it was 2"-2.5" long by 1/4" thick, that would make a good length for a striker dont you think ?

Look forward to seeing the results of your "tinkering"

Regards

Stephen

 

[Mike Ameling]

More possibilities.

Yes, two holes could be added on the other end, and a brass or even iron rod riveted in - like on the back of those cast brass buckles. And you would only need to make sure the place where the leather wraps around is smoothed/rounded over - no sharp edges.

And Yes, a properly hardened strip of high-carbon steel could be pre-drilled, and then riveted along the edge of an existing brass buckle.

A lot of the early "fancy" flint strikers were a steel bar attached to a cast brass handle. Those handles were cast in shapes like lions, dogs, birds, even mermaids.

I've been investigating working out a few with a sculpture friend I know. Have him carve up the correct shape, and then make a "rubber" mold off of it. Then use the Lost Wax casting method to pour up some bronze striker handles. (You cast a wax version of what you want in that "rubber" mold, clean up that "wax" version, and then pour plaster around it. Then bake it to harden the plaster, and melt the wax out. Now you have a one-time mold. Then cast it full of bronze. When cool, just break the plaster apart and clean up the bronze.)

There is a stylized lion shape on one of the oldest dated flint strikers I would like to start with - from a couple centuries B.C. found in a tomb in Afganistan. And then there are some hunting dog versions from the 1700's - and that mermaid one.

Fun little ... projects. And Yes, there are a number of people that will just Have-To-Have one of any of these if I get them made up. So it goes when you start ... collecting ...

Mikey - that grumpy ol' German blacksmith out in the Hinterlands

 

[basha]

How about a simple double 'D' ring arrangement? This may not be suitable for leather belts, but would be OK for canvas or nylon webbing.......

 

[woodstock]

Im sure I saw a buckle that incorporated a carbon steel striker I have tried to google it to no avail

 

[Eric_Methven]

Oh, I'm just going to have to play around with one of the ovals I got from Mike a while ago. I'll use a normal nail hammered to shape for the cross bar and use a wrap around leather belt fastened by two poppers on the inside with a small loop to keep them in place. That way I'll be able to un-pop the belt and use the striker freely. (I tried one once as a neck dangler and the cord kept getting in the way when I used it).

I'll have a wee play around and post the results.

Eric

 

[British Red]

Fascinated by this - it does sound like a useful thing! Please "colour me interested" if it goes ahead!

Red

 

[Seoras]

This one has my attention too.

Only because I have a selection of Mikes oval steels (all used at the Moot) and plenty of Leather.

I have found one that I think will do the job and shaped a nail (thanks Eric) to act as cross bar.

I have to find all my leather making kit now and plan the belt out.

The leather I have is 3mm veg tan and I think if it is constructed in your typical belt set up I think that the belt itself should be heavy enough so that it will not flick up and get in the way when striking.

Well thats the theory anyway and I am sticking to it (for now).

Cheers

George