Dirty boys

Angel

Šlakhamr in Hamry nad Sázavou is one of the most visited monuments in the region. In August, it will gain a new dominance - over two meters high angel made of metal and stone, which is the joint work of students - blacksmiths Tomáš Popela, Tomáš Nosek, Václav Trpišovský and their vocational training teacher Vojtěch Havránek. The event itself was preceded by a long preparation and many hours of work. Listen to one of the participants:

* How did it all start? For the first time, our blacksmith's paths intersected at the devil's forging (this is a regularly organized event for the public) in Brdíček's mill in Šlakhamr. This monument is managed by the Brno Technical Museum. And Mr. Aleš Wasserbauer works here, who is happy when the mill is knocking. It was he who helped us with organizing this event. We all tried to work together at previous blacksmith events, for example in Ybbsitz, Brtnice, Helfštýn and also at Šlakhamr. It went quite well for us, so we accepted an offer for a new contract. In 2018, the natives of Najdek, Šlakhamr and Hamry nad Sázavou planted a linden tree near the mill for the centenary of the republic. When we met Aleš Wasserbaur in early 2019, he shared the idea that we could forge an angel to be the patron saint of that linden tree. Mrs. Lenka Mičková from Velká Losenice drew several designs. We chose one that Tomáš Nosek adapted to blacksmithing, in short, to understand how the final work will look like.

We met in May and tried to make a model of an angel in the right proportions. After creating a model that was 60 cm, we decided to enlarge the body three times. And if we add the raised wings, because the angel is praying, we get to our 250 cm. We were a little frightened ourselves, but we accepted this challenge, we just changed the structure of the body and head a little more.

The first week in July, we met again in the blacksmith's workshop with Tomáš Popela in Bohdalov. The starting material for the wings and body was 100 × 20 webs. This project was a challenge not only for us blacksmiths, but also for the old hammer Ajax 2 from 1957. The body of the angel consists of three strips, forged vertically to get plasticity. We forged the outer straps into the lap and stuffed them to form the shoulders, the middle waistband is also pulled a little into the lap and here it forms the line of our necks. The webs are pierced in height. And the dies only intensified the plasticity of the forged web. After four days of forging in Bohdalov, we had a forged body, wings and half-shapes on the skirt. Then we moved to the mill in Slakhamr. The next day we could continue. We were waiting to save the whole body together. Tomáš and Vašek forged outside and rolled up their skirts. Inside the hammer house was Tomáš and Vojta, piercing their wings and fitting them to the angel's shoulders. On Friday we started riveting. As Vašek said: "It is a problem to properly rivet two pieces of iron, and we have nine of them." Yes, nine dies on one rivet, three times in a row. With the help of autogen, we managed to rivet the whole body. But it was After riveting the skirt to the body, we autogenously shaped it to form adjoining spirals, and on Saturday and Sunday we forged the angel's head and riveted it.

Many thanks to all those who participated in this project, especially the organizers Dáša and Aleš Wasserbauer, who took care of us.

Other big thanks go to the sponsors, without whom this event would not be possible: Fimas s.r.o., JPMS Stavební CZ s.r.o., the village of Hamry nad Sázavou, Cecho - Bohumil Cempírek s.r.o., Vlastimil Rosecký, Hubert Křesťan. And we must also thank our Academy, which lent us some equipment and where we actually got to know each other during our studies.

For the group of "Dirty boys" Tomáš Popela