Safety tips

Below are some safety tips. It's far from complete, so only see it as an addition to your own safety precautions.

Heat

- Keep hot things low to the ground and in far in front
- Forge/furnace fire spits sparks and charcoal can explode like firecrackers. Keep flameable material at least 2 meters away.
- Safety goggles are recommended
- Keep a bucket of clean water and a fire-extinguisher ready, and have an escape route if things really get out of hand

Fumes

- Work in a well ventilated area (coal monoxide, other toxic fumes)
- Metal fumes can be deadly, either instantly or build up irreversible damage eventually. Avoid inclusions as berylium (berylium bronze), zinc (brass), lead (brass, "gunmetal"), arsenic (natural copper). If you do not know your bronze, don't melt it, unless you have a proper air filtering system over the furnace! Pure copper (from electric wire f.e.) and pure tin (such as lead-free tin solder) are recommended for bronze.

Dust

Any dust is potentially harmful to the lungs. In particular harmful are dust from bone, horn & antler, as well as sharp dust from metal, stone (flint f.e.) and grinding bits result to an irreversible deterioration of your lungs. In my experience charcoal dust is very bad to the lungs as well, so take care not to breath it in when emptying charcoal bags or cleaning up the workshop. Use a dusk-mask as much as possible. Wet grinding also prevents dust from getting airborn.

Light

The hotter the fire, the more damaging the light to your eyes. So avoid staring into the furnace/forge for long periods.

Sound

The sound of hammering on metal, either with forging or coldworking is damaging to the ears. So earplugs are highly recommended.

Clothing

Don't wear any easily flammable clothing, especially synthetics. Wool and leather are recommended.

For authentic bronze casting, I hardly wear any protective clothing. This is my personal choice, and I accept the risk that come with it. However, think for yourself what you need to perform casting/forging safely.

For forging (expecially welling), a leather apron and closed shoes are unavoidable.

Miscellaneous

Keep in mind that safety equipment can fail! So don't do anything you wouldn't if you weren't using the safety equipment, like picking up burning hot material with gloves. One of the few times I burned my hands was when I was wearing gloves, and one just happened to have a hole in it.

Make your setup fail-safe. This means that if something goes wrong, it can go wrong without causing any problems. If a crucible breaks f.e. make sure the metal won't fall on any limbs etc.

If something has never gone wrong yet, don't forget the "yet" part. Some day things may be slighly different, and it will go wrong!

And at all times, use your common sense. Metalworking is 90% thinking, 10% doing. Go through every process many times before you actually do it. This helps keeping things safe, and gives you the best chance of success!