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⚒️ Blacksmithing and Hand Tools

How to set up a simple forge, pick the right scrap steel, forge and heat-treat it, and make or repair basic hand tools — chisels, punches, tongs, knives, axes — plus how to sharpen and re-handle the tools you already have. The full books are in Blacksmithing-Tools\ (Blacksmithing, Heat-Treating-Steel, Hand-Tools); axe and crosscut-saw manuals are in Engines-Motors\Chainsaws-and-Saws. Farm blacksmithing (plow shares) and a short Practical Action brief are in Homestead-Skills\Food-Crafts-Tools.

⚠️ Rules that prevent the worst injuries

• Hot steel looks exactly like cold steel. Assume everything near the forge is hot; pick things up with tongs, and set hot pieces down where no one will grab them.
• Eye protection at the anvil, grinder and when quenching. Never use a cracked grinding wheel, never wear gloves at the wheel, stand aside when you switch it on. (Navy Steelworker, p. 22)
• Never heat galvanized (zinc-coated) metal indoors — the fumes cause "metal fume fever." Strip the zinc first (rule of thumb: soak overnight in vinegar) and work outdoors. Drinking milk does not help, despite old advice (TM 10-440, p. 60 still recommends it — ignore that).
• Quench oil can catch fire. Use a metal container with a close-fitting metal lid next to it, enough oil to fully cover the piece, and plunge it in quickly and completely. Never put water on an oil fire — smother it with the lid. (Rule of thumb) Oil fires usually start when there's too little oil for the piece. (Practical Action Blacksmithing, p. 3)
• A coal or charcoal forge makes carbon monoxide — work outdoors or under an open-sided roof.
• Fire season: Illinois Valley summers are dry. Keep a full water bucket or trough by the forge for embers as well as quenching (Practical Action, pp. 1–2), clear dry grass and leaves well back from the forge, and never leave a fire unattended. (Rule of thumb)
• Oily rags can catch fire by themselves. Throw them out or keep them in a bucket of water. (USFS An Ax to Grind, p. 34)

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🔥 A simple forge and anvil

Rule-of-thumb setups; the books have full plans.

• Forge: anything that holds a fist-sized pile of burning fuel with air blown up into the middle — a brake drum or steel tub lined with clay, or a brick or stone hearth with a pipe coming in at the bottom (the "tuyere"). The ICS Shop Equipment book and the Peace Corps manual show how to build forges and bellows. (ICS, p. 21; drawings: brick forge, tuyere, village forges, how a bellows works; Forge)
• Air: a hand-crank blower, homemade bellows, a hair dryer or a small fan with a valve or gate to control it. Too much air wastes fuel and burns steel. (hand-built fan and pump designs; a blower)
• Fuel: charcoal (easy to make — see Homestead-Skills\Fuels), or coal turned to coke in the fire. Keep the fire clean: rake out clinker (glassy lumps), and work in the hot center. Screen coke to get rid of dust before you use it. (Practical Action, p. 2; Charcoal, Coke, Clinker)
• Anvil: a real anvil is best, but a chunk of railroad rail, a big block of steel, or a sledgehammer head set in a stump works. Set the face at about knuckle height when you stand with your arm hanging. Practical Action also shows a stone with an iron insert and an old casting used as anvils. (Practical Action, p. 3; improvised anvils; parts of an anvil)
• First tools: a 2–3 lb cross-peen hammer, a pair of tongs (or make them — they're a classic first project), a bucket of water, a file, and a magnet. (hammer types; common tongs; holding work in tongs; Tongs)
• Water trough: big enough to sink the whole piece — at least about 25 litres (6½ US gallons). (Practical Action, p. 2)

Running the fire (TM 10-440, pp. 26–27; cross-sections of open and side-banked fires and a hollow fire; building the fire):

• The hottest spot is about 5–7 inches above the tuyere. Keep the fire just big enough to surround the piece with glowing coals.
• A thin fire lets unburned air reach the steel and covers it in scale (an "oxidizing" fire). A deep fire uses up the air first — slower, but it doesn't scale the steel.
• Pack wet, unburned fuel around the edges to keep the fire from spreading; it cokes there and feeds the center as you need it.

Coke burns in the center right over the tuyere; green (unburned) coal packed round the edges cokes slowly and feeds it (TM 10-440, p. 27).

Fire problem	Likely cause	Fix
Steel comes out heavily scaled	Fire too thin, too much air	Build the fire deeper; less blast
Fire won't get hot	Clinker choking the tuyere; wet or dusty fuel	Rake out clinker; screen fuel
Fire spreads and wastes fuel	Too much loose fuel, no banking	Pack damp fuel around the edges

Anvil, Tuyere, Bellows, Swage block, Hardy tool.

📚 Go deeper: ICS Blacksmith Shop Equipment — forges, blowers, bellows and anvil tools; Peace Corps Basic Techniques of Blacksmithing — building a forge and tools from scrap; TM 10-440 — fuel and fire management; Peace Corps Charcoal Making — making forge charcoal.

🌡️ Heat colors (in shade, not sunlight)

Color	About °F	What it's for
Dull red	1,050–1,175	Stop hammering — steel worked colder than this cracks.
Cherry red	1,250–1,375	Hardening temperature for most carbon steel; bending.
Orange to yellow	1,725–1,975	Normal forging heat — hammer here.
Bright yellow-white, "flowing" surface	about 2,000 and up	Forge welding (mild steel and wrought iron). A few sparks are normal at welding heat.
White, throwing a shower of sparks	hotter still	Burned. The steel is ruined — cut that part off.

(°F from TM 10-440's color table, p. 25; colors look different in different light and to different eyes, so learn them on your own forge.)

High-carbon steel burns at a lower heat than mild steel, so forge tool steel no hotter than orange-yellow. Burned steel can't be fixed by any later heat treatment. Keep hammering until the steel cools to a low red — forging refines the grain and makes it tougher. (TM 10-440, p. 24)

Basic moves: drawing out (hammering thinner and longer), upsetting (hammering the hot end to make it thicker), bending over the anvil horn or edge, punching holes hot, cutting on a hardy (a chisel set in the anvil), twisting, and forge welding. Ilgen's Forge Work and the Selvidge Shop Manual walk through each one step by step. Drawings: drawing out, upsetting, bending, hardy and chisels, top and bottom fullers; Blacksmith.

Punching a hole (TM 10-440, p. 33; drawing): center-punch the spot, heat to a good working heat, drive the punch two-thirds of the way through, flip the piece, and punch out from the other side over the anvil's round (pritchel) hole. Cool the punch often so it doesn't soften, and drop a little dry coal in a deep hole to stop the punch sticking.

Punch A: drive it about two-thirds through (B), turn the piece over and drive it through on the mark (C), then finish over the pritchel hole (D) (Selvidge, pp. 36–37).

Forge welding, step by step (Selvidge, pp. 45–47; TM 10-440, pp. 30–31):

1. Prepare: upset each end to about 1½ times its thickness, then hammer a scarf (a bevel) on each, slightly rounded, not hollow, so scale squeezes out from the middle. (good and bad scarfs; shaping the scarf)
2. Clean fire, clean anvil: rake out clinker, have plenty of coke ready, brush scale off the anvil face, and set your hammer where you can grab it.
3. Heat slowly under a covering of live coals, turning the pieces so both heat evenly. (both pieces in the fire, scarf up)
4. At bright red, sprinkle flux — borax or clean sand — on the scarfs; it keeps air off and melts the scale so it can squeeze out.
5. Keep heating until the surface looks wet and flowing. Pull both pieces, knock off loose scale, lap the scarfs and strike light blows first, then heavier. (laying the pieces together; lap-weld drawings)
6. Don't keep hammering once it drops below welding heat. If it doesn't stick, cut off the tips, re-scarf and try again. Use as few heats as possible.

Rounded scarfs meet in the middle and squeeze the scale out; hollow ones meet at the edges and trap it (a diagram drawn for this guide).

Forging problem	Likely cause	Fix
Cracks while hammering	Worked below dull red	Reheat sooner; stop at dull red
Sparks and a crumbly end	Burned	Cut back to sound metal
Weld won't stick	Not hot enough, dirty fire, no flux, scale between faces	Clean fire, flux at bright red, reach full welding heat
Weld lets go later	Hammered after it cooled; hollow scarfs trapped scale	Round the scarfs; weld in fewer, hotter heats
Thin tip burns before the thick part is hot	Fast heating	Heat slowly and keep the thin end back from the hot spot (Drew, p. 63)

Forge welding.

📚 Go deeper: Selvidge Blacksmithing Shop Manual — every basic operation as a one-page job sheet; Ilgen Forge Work — drawing, upsetting, bending and welding explained; TM 10-440 — heat colors, forging and welding in brief.

🔩 Which scrap steel to use

(Peace Corps Basic Techniques of Blacksmithing, p. 31)

Steel	Found in	Good for
Low carbon — won't harden	Car body panels, most rebar (Rebar), nails, bolts, rail spikes (Railroad spike), pipe, drums	Hooks, hinges, brackets, tongs, anything that bends instead of cuts. Forge-welds easily.
Medium carbon — hardens	Leaf and coil springs (Coil spring), axles, torsion bars, shock-absorber rods	Chisels, punches, hammers, axes, hoes, pry bars, springs. The best all-round tool stock.
High carbon — hardens hard	Old files, saw blades, drill bits, dies, bulldozer blades	Knives, scrapers, wood chisels, plane irons — tools that must hold a keen edge.

Sources disagree on springs. The Peace Corps puts car springs, axles and torsion bars in the medium-carbon group; Practical Action calls coil springs, leaf springs and torsion bars high carbon. Test each piece and treat springs as hardening steel either way. Practical Action also warns that rebar often has a bit more carbon than true mild steel. (Practical Action, p. 5)

• Quick test: heat the tip to light cherry red and quench it in water. If a file skates over it like glass, it will harden. If the file bites, it's low-carbon. (Peace Corps, p. 32)
• Spark test on a grinder: low-carbon steel throws long streams with few forks; high-carbon throws shorter, bushier streams full of bright bursts; cast iron throws short dull red sparks. Practice on known pieces first. In the Navy Steelworker's pictures the low-carbon stream runs about 70 inches, high-carbon about 55 inches with more volume, and gray cast iron only about 25 inches, red near the wheel and straw-colored at the end. Watch a spot about a third of the way back from the tip of the stream. (Steelworker, pp. 22–24; the parts of a spark stream; spark patterns of common metals)
• Other clues (Peace Corps, p. 32): drop it on concrete and compare the ring with known pieces; see whether a cold chisel nicks it easily; and think about its old job — anything that had to be springy, tough or wear-resistant is probably medium or high carbon.

At the grinder (wheel on the right): low-carbon steel throws long, plain streams; high-carbon, bushy streams full of bursts; gray cast iron, short streams (Navy Steelworker, p. 23).

Spark testing, Leaf spring. More pictures: Carbon steel.

📚 Go deeper: Peace Corps manual, scrap identification — what's in scrap and how to test it; Navy Steelworker Vol 1 — spark and chip tests with pictures; Practical Action Blacksmithing brief — mild, medium and high carbon steel from old vehicles.

🧪 Hardening and tempering

1. Anneal (soften) old steel before reshaping it cold or filing it: heat slowly to red, then bury it in dry wood ashes, lime or powdered charcoal and leave it until cold. (Selvidge, p. 56; Annealing)
2. Harden: heat evenly to cherry red — rule of thumb: just past the point where a magnet stops sticking to it — and quench.
   • Plain carbon steel (springs, files, most scrap): water or brine (about ¾ lb salt per gallon) cools fastest and most evenly. Thin or very high-carbon pieces (files, knives) can crack in water — warm oil (80–150 °F; vegetable oil works) is gentler. (Steelworker, pp. 35–36)
   • Alloy steels: oil only.
   • Keep the piece moving in the quench. Steam and gas bubbles otherwise cling to it and leave soft spots, which can later crack or warp. (Selvidge, p. 57; Steelworker, p. 35; a quench tank; Quenching)
   • The steel is now glass-hard and brittle — temper it right away, before it's fully cold. The Navy Steelworker manual takes parts out of the quench at about 200 °F — still too hot to touch — rather than letting them cool through the "cracking range" below that. (Steelworker, p. 31)
3. Temper: polish a spot bright with sandpaper or a stone, then reheat gently (over the fire, on a hot plate, or in an oven) and watch the colors run. Quench when the edge reaches the color you want:

Color	About	Use
Pale yellow	430 °F	Engraving and lathe tools, scrapers
Straw	460 °F	Taps, punches, dies, knives for a very hard edge
Brown-yellow (deep straw)	500 °F	Wood chisels, drills, plane irons, hammer faces
Purple	530–540 °F	Light cold chisels, shears, axes
Blue tinged with purple	550 °F	Ordinary cold chisels
Blue	570–600 °F	Springs, picks

The further toward blue, the softer and tougher. Books disagree a little — one old table puts most chisels and knives at light blue — so test your tool and adjust. (Bacon, p. 263; Selvidge, p. 59; TM 10-440, p. 26)

One-heat method for chisels and punches: heat the working end to cherry red, quench only the tip inch or so (bob it up and down), pull it out, quickly polish the tip, and watch the heat from the shank run colors toward the edge. When the right color reaches the edge, quench the whole tool. (Steelworker, p. 34; Selvidge, p. 58)

One heat for a cold chisel: the colors creep from the hot shank to the edge, and you quench it all when purple arrives; real colors vary with the light (a diagram drawn for this guide).

Many pieces at once: temper them in a pot of oil over the fire with a thermometer instead of by color — steadier and more even. (Bacon, pp. 263–264; tempering kettle with its lid)

If the tool doesn't work right:

Problem	Likely cause	Fix
Edge chips or breaks in use	Too hard	Reheat gently to the next softer color and quench (Selvidge, p. 59)
Edge bends or dulls fast	Too soft — tempered too far, or never got hard	Re-harden and temper less (rule of thumb)
File still bites after quenching	Low-carbon steel, or not hot enough	Test the steel; heat to full cherry red
Soft spots	Steam pockets in the quench	Move the piece in the quench; use brine
Cracked in the quench	Too hot, quench too harsh, thick-and-thin shape, sharp inside corners	Harden at cherry, not hotter; use oil for thin or high-carbon pieces
Warped	Uneven heat or uneven entry into the quench	Heat evenly; plunge straight in, thick end first (Drew, p. 64; an axe going in thick part first)

Tempering colors. More pictures: Hardening, Heat treating.

📚 Go deeper: Bacon Forge Practice and Heat Treatment of Steel — temper colors and oil-bath tempering; Woodworth Hardening, Tempering, Annealing — deep detail on heat-treating tools; Navy Steelworker Vol 1 — annealing, hardening, quench media; Selvidge — annealing, hardening and tempering job sheets.

🛠️ Making basic tools

• Cold chisel (first real project): a 6–8 inch piece of coil spring or axle. Straighten it, draw one end to a wedge, grind or file the edge to about 60°, harden and temper to purple at the edge (one-heat method). Leave the striking end soft. (TM 10-440, pp. 33–34; forging a chisel; Chisel)
• Hot chisel vs cold chisel: a hot chisel is left soft and used only on hot steel; a cold chisel is hardened and tempered and used only on cold steel. Don't swap them. (Practical Action, p. 4; hot and cold chisels side by side; hot and cold cutters)
• Center punch / drift: same steel, drawn to a round taper; temper the point straw to brown.
• Tongs: two matching pieces of mild steel, forged with jaws and a boss, punched and riveted together. Richardson Vol 2 and Selvidge have patterns. (Step drawings: Drew, ICS)
• Knife: from an old file or saw blade. Anneal first, forge or grind to shape (on a grinder, dip often — blue on the edge means you've ruined the temper), harden in oil, temper straw to brown.
• Axe, hoe, hammer: the Peace Corps manual covers forging each from scrap, including punching the eye with a drift. (axe step by step; field hoe; cross-peen hammer)
• Fullers (grooving tools) and other top and bottom tools can be made of plain mild steel. (Practical Action, p. 4; the tools a smith needs; top fuller, bottom fuller)
• Repairing tools ("dressing"): reforge mushroomed chisel heads, re-point picks, and redraw worn hoes and drill bits — ICS Shop Equipment, Hand Forging and Tool Dressing.

Sharpening a plow share — gardens and fields here depend on it (Drew Farm Blacksmithing, pp. 62–64; drawing out a share's edge; Ploughshare):

1. Use a round-faced 2½–3 lb hammer. Draw the edge out by hammering the top side while the bottom lies flat on the anvil.
2. Don't burn the edge while heating — it's thin and heats fast.
3. If the point bends over, rest the edge on a hardwood block, not the anvil, while you drive it back.
4. Harden a good-steel share at full red, plunging it thick side first into water or brine. For stony ground, leave it less hard so it doesn't chip.
5. A worn-out point can be replaced by welding on a piece of old plow steel (not a rasp — too high in carbon to weld easily), using borax as flux. Practice on scrap first. Skip the old book's chemical hardening powder.

📚 Go deeper: Peace Corps manual — axe, hoe, tongs and hammer projects; ICS Tool Dressing — reforging and re-tempering worn tools; Drew Farm Blacksmithing — farm repairs, chisels and plow work; Richardson Practical Blacksmithing Vol 2 — tongs and shop-made tools.

🪓 Keeping hand tools working

Hanging an axe handle (USFS An Ax to Grind):

• First check whether you need a new handle at all — often just a new wedge will do. (An Ax to Grind, p. 28)
• Line the edge up with the center of the handle. Laid flat, the blade should touch the table one third of the way from the heel. (p. 24; a correctly hung ax)
• Saw the wedge slot about two-thirds of the depth of the eye. Drive the head on by striking the end of the handle on a block, not the head. (pp. 30–31, photographed step by step: p. 30, p. 31)
• Drive a hardwood wedge in until it stops, leaving ¼–½ inch, then trim. No metal wedges, screws or epoxy. Soaking a loose head in water only works for a day. (pp. 32–33; wedging, pictured) Soaking the head in linseed oil is a better temporary fix. (p. 33)
• Good handle woods: straight-grained ash (Oregon ash grows here), hickory, oak. (Rule of thumb) The grain should run straight along the handle and in line with the wedge slot. (p. 26; good and bad grain; Oregon ash, Hickory)

Laid flat, a well-hung ax touches the table a third of the way from the heel (An Ax to Grind, p. 24).

Sharpening:

• Never sharpen an axe on a fast dry bench grinder — it draws the temper (the edge turns blue). Use a file (cuts on the push stroke only; lift on the return, wear gloves and use a knuckle guard), a slow wet grindstone, then a whetstone. File until a burr forms, then switch sides. Aim for about 25°, slightly convex. (An Ax to Grind, pp. 34–36; Handtools for Trail Work, p. 22; filing with a guard; edge-shape gauge to copy; field sharpening)
• If you do blue an edge, the temper is gone for at least 3/16 inch back — grind or file past it. On a pedal grindstone, keep it wet and turn it toward you, into the edge. File in a fan shape 2–3 inches back from the middle of the edge, and hone every morning you use the axe. (An Ax to Grind, pp. 34–36)
• Chisels and plane irons: grind at about 25°, then hone on an oilstone or water stone until a fine burr forms, flip and flatten the back, and strop. The grindstone shapes; only the stone sharpens — hone at a hair steeper angle than you ground. (Griffith Essentials of Woodworking, pp. 68–69; holding the chisel on the stone)
• Hand saws (Disston): clamp with the gullets just above the jaws. Joint the teeth level with a flat file, set them (never deeper than half the tooth), then file. Crosscut: every other tooth with the file angled about 45° toward the handle, then turn the saw around for the rest. Rip: straight across at 90°. (Disston, pp. 35–38; teeth and set, seen from the side and back; the two filing positions; Hand saw)
• Files: keep them dry and separate (files dull each other), clean them with a file card or a nail, and use chalk on the teeth for soft metals. (Nicholson Treatise on Files and Rasps, pp. 101–102; An Ax to Grind, p. 35)

Edge angles for digging and trail tools (USFS Handtools for Trail Work):

Tool	Bevel
Axe	About 25°, slightly convex, fan-shaped 2–3 in back
Pulaski	Axe blade like an axe; adze (grub) blade with about a ⅜-inch bevel (p. 25; drawing)
McLeod and draw hoes	45° on the outside edge; no need to hone (pp. 26, 28; hoe drawings; McLeod)
Mattock grubbing blade	35° on the underside (p. 27; drawing)
Shovel	About 45° on the top (inside) face, filed from below the foot rest to the point (p. 29; blade shapes)
Carpenter's adze	30° on the underside, then whetstone (p. 46; Adze)
Digging bar	Keep the factory bevel (p. 30)

Hammers and grinders (Army TM 9-243 Use and Care of Hand Tools):

• Replace a hammer with a chipped or cracked face — chips fly off. (TM 9-243, p. 122)
• Replace cracked handles. To get a stuck one out, saw it off close to the head and drive the stub out through the large end of the eye with a drift. Rub linseed oil into wooden handles now and then. (TM 9-243, pp. 126–128; handle-replacing tools and wedges)
• Before mounting a grinding wheel, tap it lightly with a mallet: a clear ring means sound, a dull thud means it may be cracked — don't use it. (TM 9-243, p. 185; sharpening stones and the bench grinder; dressing a grinding wheel; Bench grinder)
• Never grind brass, copper or aluminum on a steel-grinding wheel — it clogs and can unbalance the wheel until it flies apart. (Steelworker, p. 22)

Axe, Pulaski, Mattock, File, Whetstone.

📚 Go deeper: USFS An Ax to Grind — hanging and sharpening axes step by step; USFS Handtools for Trail Work — using and sharpening digging and cutting tools; Disston Saw, Tool and File Book — jointing, setting and filing hand saws; TM 9-243 — Army care and repair of every common hand tool.

🖼️ Pictures & diagrams

Look before you try it. 🖼️ = drawings in the books on this drive; 📷 = photos in the offline Wikipedia.

Forge, fire and anvil

• Brick forge and tuyere — ICS, p. 12; TM 10-440, p. 8; Forge; Tuyere
• Village and hand-powered forges — Peace Corps, p. 27; p. 28
• Bellows, fans and forge pumps — ICS, p. 21; Peace Corps, p. 63; Practical Action, p. 2; Bellows
• The fire in cross-section — TM 10-440, p. 27; p. 28
• Anvil parts and improvised anvils — Selvidge, p. 129; ICS, p. 37; Practical Action, p. 3; Anvil
• Hammers, tongs and holding the work — TM 10-440, p. 13; p. 14; Selvidge, p. 18; Tongs
• Hardy, fullers, swages and swage block — TM 10-440, p. 15; p. 16; p. 18; p. 19; Hardy tool; Swage block

Forging operations

• Drawing out — Selvidge, p. 24; TM 10-440, p. 28
• Upsetting — Selvidge, p. 31
• Bending — TM 10-440, p. 30; Selvidge, p. 26
• Punching a hole — Selvidge, p. 36
• Scarfs for welding: rounded, not hollow — Bacon, p. 41; p. 42
• Taking the welding heat and making the weld — Selvidge, p. 46; p. 47; Drew, p. 41; Forge welding

Steel and heat treatment

• Spark testing — Navy Steelworker, p. 21; p. 23; Spark testing
• Quench tank; dipping the thick part first — Navy Steelworker, p. 35; Bacon, p. 257; Quenching
• Oil-bath tempering kettle — Bacon, p. 264; Tempering colors

Making tools

• Hot and cold chisels; hot and cold cutters — TM 10-440, p. 18; Selvidge, p. 136; Chisel
• Forging a cold chisel — Drew, p. 53
• Making tongs — Drew, p. 43; ICS, p. 120
• Axe, field hoe and cross-peen hammer from scrap — Peace Corps, p. 68; p. 73; p. 80
• A smith's basic tools at a glance — Practical Action, p. 4
• Sharpening a plow share — Selvidge, p. 109; Ploughshare

Axes and hand tools

• Parts of an ax; a correctly hung ax — An Ax to Grind, p. 9; p. 24; Axe
• Hanging a new handle, step by step — p. 30; p. 31; p. 32
• Filing an ax; the edge gauge — p. 35; p. 36; File
• Trail tools: Pulaski, mattock, hoes, shovel — USFS, p. 25; p. 27; p. 28; p. 29; Pulaski; Mattock
• Honing a chisel — Griffith, p. 69; Whetstone
• Saw teeth, set and filing positions — Disston, p. 34; p. 38; Hand saw
• Grinder, grinding wheel and stones — TM 9-243, p. 185; Navy Steelworker, p. 22; Bench grinder

🔗 Related guides

• Engines, motors and generators — chainsaws, crosscut saws, and motor repair.
• Fuel guide — charcoal, wood gas and keeping fuel safe near a forge.
• Make-do household guide — mending and making what you need at home.
• Horse guide — working animals that need shoes, harness hardware and tools.
• Illinois Valley start here — the local picture and where everything is on the drive.

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The old books use coal forges and some chemicals now known to be dangerous (cyanide for case-hardening, asbestos). Use their methods, not their chemicals.