Most of what I see about metal work in this news group pertains to work in English speaking countries, especially the US. I'd like to know about metal work in some European countries, particularly France and Belgium. For starters: (1) Has anyone traveled to Europe and spent their valuable vacation time looking up metal working clubs there? (2) There are certain writers in English about metal work that have a large popular following on this news group. What about corresponding writers in Europe (esp. France and Belgium)? I can read French and German and a few other languages, so I don't really care what language the books are written in. I'm just curious to know what kinds of books are available to people who speak those languages.
Ignorantly, Allan Adler snipped-for-privacy@zurich.ai.mit.edu
Allen, Your question is interesting, because metalworking is my hobby and has been all my life. I now reside in Germany and this is not a popular pastime in Europe. What there is of it are trade professionals that do this at home in the pursuit of other hobbies like steam, railroads, and model aircraft. I think the reason for this is multi-faceted. In Europe, you need a license to cross the street. Nobody here practises an endeavor that they haven't gone to school to learn and pass a formal test for. Secondly, space, noise, power utilization regulations, environment regulations and property costs all make this hobby difficult to practise. The most significant reason is mind set. English speaking populations do things first and ask for permission second and only if they are forced to. Europeans, ask first and do only when permission is granted. Just my observations. Steve
Your observations are completely correct for Germany, but not for the rest of Europe, with the possible exception of Switzerland. You need only step across the border in any direction to find a lot of enthusiastic hobbyists, inventors, and just plain loons doing all sorts of creative things with metal and other stuff. Check out the mud dragsters and tractor pulls in the scandinavian countries, or the auto/motorcycle fanatics in Italy, Spain, or the UK, just to name a few.
Germany is infamous for it's anal retentive laws, hell, you can't even wash your car in your own driveway there. Most of the rest of Europe does not share this attitude...
There must have been a certain period of adjustment as you realized that it would be harder to pursue metalwork and figured out how to keep up with your hobby. Was it harder to buy equipment and parts, for example? From your description of some of the obstacles, I would guess that you live in a house and not in an apartment, and that so do most of the trade professionals who do metal work in pursuit of other hobbies.
Am I correct in thinking that you don't need a license in Germany to do metal work as a hobby?
What are some of the regulations that have given you trouble?
Before I lived in Germany for a few months in the early 1980's, I heard a joke about the differences among England, France, Germany and Russia: In England, all things are allowed except those which are explicitly forbidden; in France, all things are allowed, even those which are explicitly forbidden; in Germany, all things are forbidden except those which are explicitly allowed; in Russia, all things are forbidden, even those which are explicitly allowed. My own impression, after dealing with various bureaucracies in Germany, was that the things which are not explicitly allowed in Germany are not at all forbidden: they are merely impossible. In the intervening 20 years, that impression has softened. Now I'm more inclined to think that all bureaucracies are difficult for novices to navigate and in Germany I happened to be a novice.
It does sound, however, as though you don't really like living in Germany, except to the extent that you've been able to provide your own environment which, at least in its psychic space, is not really part of Germany. From that, I'd conclude that the decision to live there was not entirely voluntary, but instead a corollary of a job or a relationship that somehow made it all worth it.
Ignorantly, Allan Adler snipped-for-privacy@zurich.ai.mit.edu
Gee, Allan, I really don't know what to tell you. I met many hobbyists when I lived in Italy, mostly by just encountering them at the suppliers, hobby shops, etc., or at various racing venues. Maybe a google of metalworking terms in the languages of interest would turn up some clubs or individuals.
Allen, That's a lot of questions. You are correct about the reason for being here is my profession, but there was no period of adjustment. I have been working internationally since 1966. Many of those years were in Asia. I bring my hobby with me and I like living in Germany actually. Interestingly, buying machines in pursuit of the metalworking hobby is actually better in Europe because there isn't the demand by hobbyists that is found in English speaking countries. I have what may be described as a model shop. In as much as I make 1 or 2 items, never 100 or 1000. The industry on the other hand has pretty much converted to CNC making all those professional manual machines surplus. These professional machines are all 3 phase driven and in the states, as well as most rural communities in England, 3 phase power is not available, but here in Germany, every house has 3 phase from the street. So that part is actually better. The problems arise when you wire these machines in and you have to have your wiring inspected and approved by the local power company. This can be a nightmare and rightfully so. Hooking up large inductive loads to a residential street transformer can potentially effect all the other neighborhood electric consumers. Cutting tools on the other hand are a real problem in Europe. Many industrial tool dealers refuse to do business with the individual. They wish to sell to companies only. Inch tooling is almost non-existent and I require both inch and metric tooling. However, over the last few years, eBay has made this hobby much easier everywhere. Many firms have found that the world is the new marketplace.
You are correct in that no license is required to do metalwork as a hobby in Germany. The problem starts when I am not the user of the manufactured item. That's when the licenses are required. Of course the noise laws here are very strict, so understanding neighbors are a prerequisite. Additionally, getting rid of your waste, metal chips, chemicals and oils are also an issue. Bob's comments leads me to think that he has confused the metalworking hobby and motor racing as being the same. It is not. Motor racing is alive and well in Europe. Metalworking is not. Over the years I have made noodle making machines, hamburger pattie making machines, special tools, like bearing removers and installers, molds, dies, presses, marine equipment, diving equipment as well as aircraft diesel engines. I cannot think of a hobby that is as personally rewarding as this one. Steve PS Please note that you will not find an equivalent NG in any other language except English. That pretty much tells the same story.
"Allan Adler" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@nestle.csail.mit.edu...
If you want to time a trip over to Germany, try September 14-18 to see the AMB industrial metalworking show in Stuttgart (Southern Germany). The show is put on every 2 years in a large convention center. Literally all aspects of industrial metalworking are represented, including the latest high speed CNC machines, many running, some as large as a two car garage. Lots of small stuff, including some hobbyworking is shown as well.
I disagree with some of the blanket statements made by previous posters about the state of hobbyist metalworking in Germany. It is certainly less visible than in the USA, and not as popular, but in Germany, many things are less visible (cows, for example, aren't seen grazing outdoors, however, there is a robust dairy industry). I've been living in Stuttgart for 4 years and have accessed many points of the hobbyist metalworking trade directly and indirectly. I have seen miniature steam engine exhibits put on by clubs, and by perusing ebay.de (German Ebay; extremely active) I see evidence of a lot of machinery and tooling moving from commercial settings into private hands. Many items, especially smallish vertical mills of the Deckel and Maho variety, sell for more than one would expect to pay for more capable machinery, yet aren't production machines by any means, both due to obsolesence and wear and tear. Although I don't have a clue where 'every' clapped out Deckel or Steinel milling machine is going, I know that German metalworking commerce is vastly supported by modern high-capacity techniques and machinery, hence my conclusion that the older stuff must be going somewhere, and probably not into the 'home garage' industry typical of lesser developed countries.
By the way, my German neighbors (and I) wash our cars at home, using the good 'ol garden hose or pressure sprayer and soap. It's not quite as constrained as was presented earlier in this thread. And I love the 3 phase power in my garage.
Also, I've made many purchases from industrial suppliers like Hahn & Kolb, who are more than willing to make 10 euro sales of bits and pieces to me, even though I'm probably below their 1 percentile in sales volume as a customer. Their sales manager even gave me a tour of their warehouse (wish I had a 5 minute shopping spree). I buy 1 meter lengths of steel from commercial suppliers and even recently established a relationship whereby I can 'dumpster dive' their cutoff bin, destined for recycling sale, paying the recycling rate.
And yes, the oriental tools are here in spades, sometimes hard to discern because the country of origin is almost never depicted on packaging or even on the item itself. One example is
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Guede, and Rotwerk (all way overpriced compared to Grizzley, Enco, HF, and the like).
If you find yourself in the Stuttgart area, send me a note and I'll buy you a beer (offer goes the same for all RCM folks).
A few months ago, I asked on this newsgroup about metalworking clubs and metalworking as a hobby in Europe. The answers I got here were very helpful. While I was in Belgium recently, I tried to find out what I could on my own.
At one library, I found a magazine called Modelebouw, for model builders. It is published by the Dutch model building organization NMV (I didn't write it down exactly but it is something like Neerlandse Modelebouw Vereenigen). On the back cover of one of the issues of the magazine was an entire page ad devoted to metal lathes. There was also a French magazine for model airplane enthusiasts. It seemed to go beyond just building stuff from kits. I also found the Belgian equivalent of Lowe's, right down to the store layout, more or less: it is called Hubo Doe-Het-Zelf. In particular, they had various power tools, but not lathes (neither does Lowe's, as I recall). There are also lots of home improvement magazines which seem to be aimed at the same market. A Belgian Google search at
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also turned up places in Belgium that sell lathes. The hard part was finding the Flemish word for lathe, which was something like draaien (like German drehen), in order to feed it to the search engine.
One respondent to my question mentioned local regulations about noise, but I stayed in an apartment where there was regular noise from work being done on nearby apartments.
Another thing I noticed is that a lot of houses have decorative metal artwork mounted on them, sometimes in the form of modern art, sometimes stuff like G-clefs, etc.
In Ghent, there is an old building that seems to identify itself as a metal arts building. I know from an expert that the building is not really medieval, in spite of its appearance. It has lots of metal statues of what looked to me like craftsmen on it that were intended to be able to rotate in the wind, but apparently they are stuck. That was as close as I got to finding a metal working club.
Now that I know a little more about how to go about it, if I ever go back to Belgium, I think I'll be able to get set up to do some metal work there with as little difficulty as I would have in the US or less. The place I stayed in Belgium had a kind of courtyard that I could have used for work space, whereas in my apartment in the US I have no workspace at all. The only problem with the place I stayed in Belgium is that the wiring is very old and I don't know how much electricity it can really provide, but there is probably a way around that, such as using the available electricity to charge a big storage battery and running the machines off the battery. I probably have a few years before I need to solve that problem.
Allan Adler snipped-for-privacy@nestle.csail.mit.edu
It might help if you look for model building, rather than metal woking. I don't know the current situation, but if you look in 1980's and 90's issues of the U. S. magazine "Live Steam," for example, you will find many connections to European folks/organizations with simialr interests in miniature locomotives and stationay steam engines--same must go, elsewhere, for internal combustion engines.
In GB, "Model Engineering" back issues might also have connections.
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