Horse Shoe Welding Project: Tools, Technique, Safety

There is a moment in every farrier’s day when the anvil goes quiet, the forge settles to a red-orange glow, and a pair of horseshoes comes out of the fire to be finished off with an arc welder and a length of mild-steel wire. Sparks bounce across a concrete barn floor, a Clydesdale shifts its weight, and a piece of hand-forged steel becomes a therapeutic bar shoe in about fifteen minutes. That moment is what a horse shoe welding project really is: a collision of two crafts, blacksmithing and welding, aimed at one very specific goal, a shoe that fits one hoof perfectly. Whether you are a working farrier adding a clip, a weekend welder turning scrap shoes into wall art, or a shop owner wondering whether MIG welding belongs in your service truck, this guide walks through how the work is actually done, what it costs in time and risk, and where beginners most often go wrong.

What a Horse Shoe Welding Project Actually Involves

A horse shoe welding project is any job where a mild steel horseshoe becomes raw material for arc welding. While the concept is simple, it actually breaks down into three very different paths. Mixing them up is often the reason beginners get frustrated before they ever strike an arc.

The Three Types of Projects

First, there is production farriery. This is the trade side, where a farrier shapes or selects a shoe to fit a specific hoof, then uses welding to add clips, bars, extensions, or heels, or to repair a cracked shoe.

Second, therapeutic and specialty fabrication is more corrective in nature. A base shoe can be welded into a bar shoe, egg bar, or heart bar to help accommodate a specific hoof problem. This work requires precision fitment above all else, as the modification is only helpful if the shoe sits flat with no rocking.

Third, shop and decorative welding is the most accessible for hobbyists. Scrap shoes can be transformed into wall art, candle holders, coat racks, and garden pieces. While still requiring solid welds, this route allows for creativity without the clinical responsibility of fitting a live hoof.

Welding is Not Shoeing

These categories may overlap in technique, but a horse shoe welding project is not the same thing as shoeing a horse. Nailing a shoe to a hoof is a clinical craft that takes years of apprenticeship to learn properly. Nothing in this guide replaces hands-on farriery training. If you are not a qualified farrier, your horseshoes should stay on a practice rig, a hoof model, or in your decorative pile. Never fit a welded shoe to a live animal based on instructions you read online.

The Industry Behind It

The demand for this work isn’t a niche fad. According to American Farriers Journal, there are an estimated 27,500 full- and part-time farriers in the United States, with no government agency tracking the occupation. The American Horse Council counted roughly 6.6 million U.S. horses in 2023, down from 7.2 million in 2016. Association membership sits at 2,332 members for the American Farrier’s Association, whilst the British Farriers Registration Council licenses around 2,450 farriers across England, Scotland, and Northern Ireland.

With a typical full-time farrier handling roughly 300 horses a year and resets every six to eight weeks, hoof work is recurring. This consistent cycle is exactly what makes welding modifications a valuable skill for those working alongside the trade.

What to Learn Before You Strike an Arc

Most horseshoes are plain low-carbon steel, usually between 3 mm and 6 mm thick. They weld very well, so the difficulty isn’t the alloy. It’s heat control. Thin shoe steel warps easily, and any weld added onto an ill-fitted shoe will only make its fit worse.

The fundamentals translate over from general fabrication. A solid MIG welding setup guide, knowledge of an SMAW setup, and careful rod selection all apply here. For cleanup, getting familiar with air arc welding and carbon arc gouging can go a long way. No matter the process, adhering to an up to date welding safety standard is non-negotiable in a dusty barn environment.

Whether you’re looking to assist in modifications or craft decorative pieces, focus on fitment and heat control first. Those two skills will carry you farther than any fancy bead ever could.

Shoe Anatomy and the Materials You Are Welding

Before you strike an arc, know what you are welding. A horseshoe is not flat generic steel. It has zones, a nail hole pattern, a thickness that varies with the job, and a shape that has to match a living hoof capsule exactly. Get any of those wrong and the weld can be perfect while the shoe still fails.

The good news is that farriers and welders share a vocabulary. A farrier’s shoe and a welder’s base part describe the same geometry, and that shared language makes a horse shoe welding project approachable for a shop welder.

The Five Zones of a Shoe

Farriers split a shoe into the same five parts they use for the hoof. Learning the zones is the fastest way to understand where a clip, bar or extension can go and why:

• Toe — the front center of the shoe, carrying most of the weight on a properly balanced hoof.
• Lateral toe quarter — the front quarter on the outside of the hoof.
• Medial toe quarter — the front quarter on the inside, which on most horses carries more load.
• Lateral heel quarter — the rear quarter on the outside.
• Medial heel quarter — the rear quarter on the inside.

Zones matter because a clip welded at the toe behaves differently from one welded at the medial heel quarter. Position, angle and weld size change with the zone.

Nail Holes and the Two Rules of Fit

Two things must fit before a shoe is nailed on: the nail holes have to sit over the white line, and the shoe shape has to fit the hoof capsule. Miss either and you get a shoe that rocks, one that pinches, or one that sits on the sole instead of the wall. The Rural Heritage guide to shoeing lays out the fit rules in useful detail.

The white line is the pale, softer band where the insensitive horn of the hoof wall meets the sensitive sole. Holes are punched or drilled so each lands on that band. A hole outside it means you drive into sensitive sole or the nail exits the wall, which is why farriers talk about breakover and balance before anything else.

Length follows a simple rule. The shoe must cover the hoof wall but extend no more than about 1/4 inch past it at the front, while a little extra length at the rear is acceptable. Too long at the toe and the shoe becomes a lever that rocks backward with each stride, loading the flexor tendon and the coffin bone.

Flatness, Thickness and Why Steel Wants to Move

A shoe has to sit flat. Warped, it will rock, load concentrates on one edge, and it works loose far faster than any weld would have failed. That is why farriers check the shoe on the anvil face after every weld pass.

Factory steel keg shoes are low-carbon steel, typically about 3/16 inch thick in the body, thin enough to warp from careless welding heat. Across most working shoes you will see roughly 3 mm to 6 mm (about 1/8 to 1/4 inch) in the body, with the quarters often tapering thinner than the toe. Thickness drives everything: wire diameter, amperage, travel speed and bead length.

A 1/8 inch plate needs a smaller wire, lower amperage and faster, shorter beads than a 1/4 inch plate. Run 1/4 inch settings on a thin shoe and you burn through before the bead has time to spread. Run thin settings on a heavy shoe and you get a cold, lumpy joint with no fusion at the edges. Match heat to section thickness, not to the machine’s dial position.

Steel, Aluminum and the Changing Shoe Market

Low-carbon mild steel is the default material and the easiest to weld. It is cheap, forgiving and predictable under a MIG gun with ER70S-6 wire. Most steel shoes arrive galvanized, so grind the zinc coating off before welding to keep fumes away from you and from the horse in the next stall.

Aluminum keg shoes are used by a minority of farriers and cannot be handled the same way. Aluminum conducts heat far faster, softens suddenly and will melt before you expect it to, so the welding process and the forge logic both change. You need a spool gun or a stick process with the right filler, lower heat input and a clean dedicated wire. Our guide to aluminum MIG welding covers the setup differences, and how to prep aluminum right is worth reading before you touch an aluminum shoe.

The trend in some markets is away from steel toward aluminum, largely for weight. A racehorse carries heavy ground loading and every gram on the shoe matters. For a shop welder that means your stock of steel shoes may not match what a local farrier actually uses, so ask before buying a pile of practice material.

Once you can read a shoe’s zones, thickness and material, the welding choices get much easier. That is the next step: knowing when heat is appropriate and when it is not.

Hot Shoeing vs Cold Shoeing: Where Welding Fits

Start with the farrier’s vocabulary, because most barn arguments about “hot” and “cold” are really arguments about heat thresholds. The key thing to hold onto: in farriery, “hot” does not mean “welding hot.” It means hot enough that the steel will move under a hammer. That is a completely different threshold from the one an arc welder needs.

Four distinct operations get collapsed into two words, and the confusion surfaces in nearly every search for a “horse shoe welding project.”

Term	Heat involved	What actually happens
Hot shaping	Yes, in the forge	The shoe steel is bent, cut, or drawn out with a hammer while red hot
Cold shaping	No	The same bending and cutting is done cold on the anvil, with the shoe as tough as it is going to get
Cold fitting	No	The shoe is hammer-leveled and the hoof is rasp-leveled until the two sit together with friction
Hot fitting (“scorching”)	Yes, the shoe’s own heat	The heated shoe is pressed onto the hoof and the hoof wall is imprinted by the hot steel

The distinction that matters most for a welder is the last one. Cold fitting builds a union through surface contact and friction. Hot fitting burns one. The cold shoeing tradition holds that a correctly fitted shoe should carry most of the load through friction, leaving the shoeing nails to do less work rather than more.

An argument that started before 1900

The debate has a paper trail. As summarized in the EquiWorld review of hot versus cold shoeing, Richard’s 1890 Practical Horseshoer argued for cold fitting in theory while working hot in practice, an admission that has rung true with farriers ever since. The modern form of the same argument appears in American Farriers Journal: Doug Butler’s principle that the goal of shoeing is to minimize the harmful effects of the shoe. Read that as a working rule. Any technique that risks the hoof for the sake of convenience has failed.

Reading the heat in the forge

Steel color tells you everything, and the Rural Heritage hot shoeing guide lays it out plainly. A black heat is too cold. The steel will not move and you simply deform the shoe by pounding on it. A red to orange heat is the working heat, the range where the metal moves under the hammer and takes the shape you want. A white heat, also called welding heat, is too hot. The steel burns, the grain structure is ruined, and the shoe is scrap.

Welding is the third path

Forging changes the shape of metal without joining it. Fusion welding joins metal without changing the shape of the finished part. That distinction explains how welding entered farriery. A clipped or bar shoe is not bent out of one piece of stock; it is a factory shoe plus an added component, permanently fused. Repairing a cracked shoe or extending one is joining, not shaping. And field repairs in the middle of a barnyard are exactly where a gas-shielded machine becomes a liability and something like SMAW stick welding earns its keep, because it needs no shielding gas and no machine settings to lay a bead.

Welding also lets a farrier skip a step. A clip welded to the shoe sits flush with the shoe’s outer edge, so it never has to be burned or driven into the hoof wall at all. That single fact is why so many farriers own a welder.

Cold shaping comes with its own rules, and they matter to anyone planning to weld a shoe that has already been worked. Hammer as little as possible, because distorted nail holes mean pritchel fitting and lost time later. Check that the shoe is flat and true before it goes near a hoof.

Horses that should never receive a hot shoe

Before you imitate any of this, know where the line is. The farriery literature is clear that some horses should not have a hot shoe applied at all:

• Young horses on their first or second shoeing
• Laminitic horses, whose soles are already compromised
• Horses with arthritic hooves or legs, where inflammation and heat are the enemy

Over-burning a thin, sensitive sole can cause severe pain and weeks or months of stall rest. For those cases, cold fitting is not a compromise. It is the standard, and a hot shoe is simply the wrong tool.

The Farrier’s Welding Toolkit: Machines, Wire and Setup

A welded clip is a small piece of mild steel welded to the side of a horseshoe. That is why the tooling is accessible, and why the margin for error is thin: get the heat wrong and the shoe bows, get the location wrong and the shoe will not hold. The equipment list is short, and most of it the farrier already owns.

Gas-Shielded MIG/GMAW: The Most Common Choice

A flux-shielded MIG/GMAW setup is what most working farriers run. It is fast, the arc is easy to control, and once the machine is dialed in you can make a clip in about five seconds. Richard Klimesh’s guide to welding clips notes that a single $20 spool produces hundreds of clips, pennies each.

The consumables:

• Wire: 0.030 in or 0.035 in solid ER70S-6, the general-purpose mild-steel wire most shops stock. It runs well on the low-carbon steel in factory and hand-forged shoes.
• Shielding gas: a 75/25 argon/CO₂ mix is the default because it balances penetration and bead shape. Plain CO₂ is cheaper and fine outdoors, where wind scatters an argon mix, at the cost of a rougher bead and spatter.
• Gun: a standard 250 A air-cooled gun is plenty. A separate spool gun is only needed if you plan to weld aluminum shoes.

One point from Klimesh’s method deserves emphasis: clips are made in advance in the shop, not welded onto the shoe after it is on the hoof. The steel is never reheated, and the shoe’s shape and levelness are never disturbed after fitting.

Self-Shielded Flux-Cored Wire: The Barn-Friendly Alternative

Gas cylinders are a genuine liability in a barn. A self-shielded flux-cored wire removes the gas bottle entirely, which matters when welding happens in a tack room, beside a trailer, or far from a gas supplier. The trade is spatter, heavier slag, and a higher price per pound than solid wire, but many farriers prefer it for the simplicity.

Stick (SMAW): The Field Repair Choice

For a broken shoe on a trailer road at 7 p.m., a stick welder wins on logistics. An E6013 or E7018 electrode needs no gas, no wire feeder, and no settings beyond a single amperage dial. It runs less pleasantly on thin shoe steel and puts in more heat, but it makes a sound repair with almost no setup. Keep both electrodes on hand.

Heat Control on Thin Shoe Steel

Shoe steel runs roughly 3 mm to 6 mm thick: thin enough that arc heat travels through the section and warps the shoe, thick enough that you have room to work. Use short beads, move constantly, and check the piece against a flat surface between passes.

Then run a test coupon: take an offcut of shoe steel the same thickness as your material, weld a few beads, then check penetration, bead shape and distortion, and try to peel the coupon apart. A sound coupon means a sound joint.

The Supporting Kit

The welder is the glamorous tool. The rest of the kit, much of it already in the shop, turns a weld into a shoe that holds.

• Bench and vise. A sturdy bench with a good vise. One that ratchets loose mid-weld is worse than none.
• Bench grinder with a fine sander. Cleans the weld zone, dresses the toe and heel, and grinds clips flush.
• Files and rasps. Rasp the hoof to seat the shoe, file the shoe to shape.
• Anvil with a solid face and a horn. The flat face is your level reference, the horn is for shaping. A dished face hides warp.
• Rounding tongs, hardy tool and punch. Standard blacksmithing hand tools for shaping and marking.
• Pritchel. The farrier’s tool for cleaning and reaming nail holes. Distorted holes from cold hammering force a pritchel and slow the job down, since an out-of-round hole will not hold a nail.

Consumables and PPE

Beyond wire and gas, budget for a grinding wheel, extra contact tips and nozzles, and a welding helmet with the correct shade. The OSHA welding standard at 29 CFR 1910.252 covers fume handling and protective equipment. It requires filler metals and fusible granular materials to carry the notice “Do not use in areas without adequate ventilation” and to reference ANSI Z49.1, Safety in Welding, Cutting, and Allied Processes. The American Welding Society publishes Z49.1 and also C2.1, the welding operator qualification standard, and it is the body named in OSHA’s hot work and fume provisions. If you weld commercially for others, C2.1 is the credential to look at.

The consumable math makes the case for welding: five seconds to make a clip, two minutes to apply it, and a $20 spool covering hundreds of clips. That is why welding is an efficiency tool in the shop, not a luxury. If you take on aluminum, read our guides to aluminum MIG welding and preparing aluminum for welding first: aluminum needs a different filler, gas and much lower heat input than any steel shoe.

Step-by-Step: Welding Clips and Modifying a Steel Shoe

Welding a clip onto a steel shoe is the most common job in a horse shoe welding project, and the easiest place for a beginner to waste an afternoon. The arc is simple. The judgment is not. A clip is only worth anything if it lands in the right spot, is thick enough not to bend under the horse’s weight, is tall enough to do its job, and takes five minutes rather than half an hour.

According to Klimesh’s notes on welding clips, that translates into four requirements: the clip must be correctly located on the shoe, strong enough not to bend or break, large enough to do its job, and efficient to make. Every step below protects one of those four.

The Shop-Floor Sequence

1. Select and check the shoe. Start with a sound steel keg shoe. Check thickness with calipers (roughly 3 mm to 6 mm) and drag a file across the shoe, especially the toe and heel, to hunt for cracks. A hidden crack will let go under load no matter how good the weld looks.
2. Cold-fit and verify level on the anvil face. Shape the shoe cold, set it on the anvil face, and check it with a straightedge. A shoe that is out of level at this stage will be out of level forever.
3. Clean the weld zone. Take mill scale, rust and any paint off the area where the clip will sit with a bench grinder, then wipe it down with a degreaser. Friction grease burning off under the arc is a foul, unhealthy mess.
4. Mark the clip location against the hoof wall. Fit the shoe on the hoof, or your practice hoof or hoof model, and mark where the clip needs to land. This is the step that separates a clip that works from one that does not.
5. Ground the shoe itself. Set the ground clamp on the shoe. Clamping to the shoe keeps the workpiece grounded and the current path short. Clamping to a random steel bench makes the bench the hot side of the circuit and can give you a shock or a stray arc.
6. Set the machine. Work from the manufacturer chart for your wire diameter and stay on the conservative side, because shoe steel is thin and a hot setting will burn through or warp it. If you have no gas cylinder on the trailer, the advantages of stick welding make SMAW a sensible tack-and-fill option; pick a rod from an all-position welding rod guide and keep the arc short.
7. Run a test bead on scrap of the same thickness. Scrap from an old shoe, the same steel and the same thickness, tells you instantly whether your heat input is right. It takes a minute and saves the practice shoe.
8. Tack the clip at two points. Tack at both ends of the clip, then check level against the shoe face before going further. Tack first, think second, weld third.
9. Fill in with short beads. Work in short passes between the tacks rather than laying one long stringer. Short beads spread the heat and reduce twisting.
10. Check flatness after every pass. Set the shoe back on the anvil face and confirm it is still true. If it has moved, stop, correct it, and let it cool before adding more heat.
11. Grind the clip flush with the outer edge of the shoe. Nothing may protrude past that edge, because the protrusion has to be driven into the hoof wall, and driven clips tear out.
12. Dress the toe and heel. Smooth any sharp edges with a file and rasp, and confirm the shoe’s overall shape has not crept during welding.
13. Final fit check. Re-check the shoe on the hoof model, practice hoof, or the horse’s foot. A clip that is off by a few millimetres changes the pressure on the hoof wall, and the horse will tell you about it in the next stride.

Why Welded Clips Beat Forged Ones

The advantage of welding the clip on after the shoe is fitted is that you keep control of the shoe’s shape. Pulling a forged clip from a hot shoe often changes the shape and levelness of the shoe, which means rework before the shoe can be nailed on. Welding it on cold, after fitting, avoids that problem entirely.

Welded clips also open up options a forged clip cannot match. They can be placed next to one another around the entire shoe, which is how a contiguous clip shoe used in treating a coffin bone fracture is built. They can be made in any size and shape, including tall clips suited to pads and weak hoof walls, where a forged clip limited by the shoe’s own steel cannot always reach. And because they sit flush with the shoe’s outer edge, they never have to be burned into the hoof wall.

Short Note: The hot shoeing guidance from Rural Heritage is explicit that the shoe should always be shaped to the foot, never the foot rasped to the shoe. That principle is the whole reason to fit the shoe cold, mark the clip, and then weld it on.

Warning: Do not strike an arc with a horse in the room. Arc light, the crack of the gun and the spatter of slag will startle an animal that cannot see the source of the noise. Weld outside the stall or in a quiet bay with the horse held by a handler, and never work underneath a standing horse’s feet.

Choosing Your Base Material: Steel, Aluminum, Synthetic and Weld-On Shoes

For any horse shoe welding project, one decision comes first: what you are welding. Steel, aluminum, synthetic and glue-on shoes each behave differently under an arc, and picking wrong means fighting a joint that was never going to work.

Material or Shoe Type	Typical Use	Weldability	Best Processes	Limitations
Factory steel keg shoe	Routine shoeing on sound hooves	Excellent; low-carbon steel, easy to fuse	MIG/GMAW with 0.030 or 0.035 in ER70S-6 wire, 75/25 argon-CO2; self-shielded flux-cored where no gas bottle is practical	Grind free of zinc coating and mill scale; thin steel distorts, so check against a flat jig or anvil face
Hand-forged steel shoe	Custom shapes; base for remedial bars and extensions	Very good; same low-carbon steel but thicker and rougher	MIG for tack-and-fill work; stick electrodes such as E7018 for field repairs on a hot shoe	Heavy heat input can warp a forged shape; more finishing work than a factory shoe
Aluminum keg shoe	Racehorses and sport horses where weight and shock absorption matter	Difficult for a beginner; needs a dedicated clean setup	MIG with a spool gun using ER4045 or ER5356 filler, or stick with matching electrodes	Lower heat input than steel; needs oxide removal and clean dedicated wire; cannot be forged or cap-to-thee hammered
Synthetic / nail-on shoe	Thin or compromised hoof walls wanting a minimal footprint	Poor; most plastic shoes will not fuse	No reliable arc process; bond with manufacturer adhesive or a mechanical attachment	Cannot be welded or forged; heat deforms it; fit depends entirely on hoof prep
Glue-on / adhesive-mounted shoe	Barefoot-trim horses and compromised walls where a nail is unacceptable	Not applicable, no metal to fuse	Adhesive bonding with the manufacturer’s glue and prep system	Hold depends on a clean, dry hoof and correct prep; can release in wet conditions, and the farrier’s read of the hoof outweighs the shoe
Weld-on modifications: egg bars, heel extensions, bar shoes	Remedial work for under-run heels, coffin bone fractures and weak quarters	Excellent when the base shoe is steel	MIG with the same wire and gas as the base shoe; tack first, check level, fill in short beads	Adds weight and leverage, so a badly fitted bar does more harm than a plain nail-on shoe

What the Industry Actually Uses

The American Farriers Journal business practices survey puts numbers on the market: steel keg shoes are roughly 77% of full-time farriers’ annual shoe usage, aluminum keg shoes about 8%, handmade shoes about 7%, synthetic nail-on shoes about 2%, and direct and indirect glue-on shoes about 6%, rising to roughly 6% to 10% among part-timers doing barefoot or trim work.

Steel is the default: cheap, forgiving to weld, and tolerant of heat and hammering in ways aluminum never is. Aluminum earns its share because a good aluminum shoe is roughly 60 percent lighter.

Aluminum Changes Everything

Aluminum conducts heat far better than steel, so the amperage that gives a healthy bead on steel will burn through aluminum. You need lower heat input, constant travel speed, a dedicated clean wire spool, and the surface oxide removed, as preparing aluminum properly for welding explains.

Our practical guide to aluminum MIG welding covers the spool gun settings, and aluminum flux core welding is worth knowing if the work grows.

None of the forge logic that built the shoe applies once it leaves the factory: no cap-to-thee hammering, no heat, no twist, no correction. You are welding a thin, heat-sensitive casting, and your job is not to destroy it.

Welded Modifications and What They Buy You

A 1/8 inch stock clip has kept a shoe on a draft horse with a reconstructed hoof until new hoof grew down. Welded clips can also sit side by side around the whole shoe, any size or shape, left flush with the shoe’s outer edge.

When is a welded bar the right tool? When the hoof needs geometry a factory shoe cannot provide and the problem is structural: under-run heels, a coffin bone fracture, a quarter that will not hold a nail. With sensitive walls, a mild laminitic sole or a thrushy white line, heat and nails are the bigger risk, so a welded modification or glue-on shoe is smarter. On a sound hoof, a plain nail-on steel shoe is cheapest, because a welded bar adds leverage the hoof was never asked to carry.

Welding Safety in a Barn: Fumes, Fire, Sparks and Horses

Welding in a barn isn’t the same as welding in a shop. Hay, bedding shavings, cobwebs, manure dust and dry feed dust can all ignite from a stray spark in seconds. Add a 5,000-pound animal that wasn’t expecting an arc, and you’re left with three hazards that clean fabrication bays simply don’t have: fumes, fire and a frightened horse. The key isn’t avoiding barn work, it’s managing all three from the start.

Fume Control: What OSHA Actually Requires

Welding fume contains metal particulates and gases that can irritate the lungs, even if the plume doesn’t look thick. Under 29 CFR 1910.252, mechanical ventilation is required where welding is performed in a space of less than 10,000 cubic feet per welder, where ceiling height is under 16 feet, or in a confined space. The minimum rate is 2,000 cubic feet (57 m³) per minute for each welder in that space.

If general ventilation isn’t enough, local exhaust must do the job. Freely movable hoods must pull air at a velocity of 100 linear feet (30 m) per minute in the welding zone, measured at the hood’s most remote distance from the arc. In practice, that means a flexible-arm hood or a dedicated fume extractor positioned close to the shoe to capture the plume before it drifts into the horse’s airspace.

There is also a paperwork side to consider. OSHA’s welding, cutting and brazing standards are built around a general-duty clause and the Hazard Communication standard. For businesses, fluxes, coatings and filler metals require a written hazard communication program with labels and safety data sheets for every employee. For hobbyists working in someone else’s barn, the practical minimum is to read the SDS for your wire or rod before you strike an arc.

Personal Protective Equipment

No amount of ventilation can replace proper PPE. For low-amp MIG and stick work on shoe steel, the specifics will vary, but the non-negotiables remain the same. Use the table below as a baseline for barn work:

Item	Why It Matters in a Barn
Auto-darkening helmet, correct shade	Protects against arc radiation and UV. Match the shade to your process and amperage using your helmet manual.
Safety glasses under the helmet	Keeps your eyes protected with the hood up, as well as for grinding and chipping afterwards.
Flame-resistant clothing	Cotton and synthetics melt when struck by spatter. FR clothing is the difference between a scorch and a burn.
Leather gloves	Shields against heat, spatter and sharp shoe edges. Thin cotton gloves aren’t sufficient.
Hearing protection	Protects your ears over years, and helps limit noise that could startle a horse.
Respirator, where local exhaust cannot capture fume	Only use particulate filters for metal fume. They do nothing for gases, so match to the hazard with fit-testing and a written program.

Fire: Hay, Bedding and Sparks

A hot shoe sheds slag, and an arc throws sparks that travel farther than most expect. Barns are built with combustibles and filled with more of them. Farriery guidance treats both as genuine fire hazards, and one of the best references to follow is guidance on welded clip work and shop practice. To contain them, use the following precautions:

• Screen the arc: Use a welding screen between your work and any hay, bedding, tack or other combustibles.
• Clear a zone: Maintain a ten-foot clear zone around the work area. Sweep up dust, shavings and cobwebs before starting, not after.
• Have fire gear: Keep a fire extinguisher on hand, in date and rated for ordinary combustibles, alongside a quench bucket filled and within arm’s reach.
• Work on a safe surface: Only weld on a fireproof surface. Never weld over a wooden bench, or over a concrete floor with straw under it.

The Horse in the Room

Arc light and the crackle of a welding gun can startle a horse, and a startled horse is heavy, fast and unpredictable in a tight barn. Weld at the far end of the barn from where the horse is tied, have a handler present for the first time it’s nearby, and never work under a horse’s feet or directly beside a hind leg. Keep your ground clamp on the shoe itself, not a fence rail or wet post, to prevent stray voltage from traveling through the animal. Route leads and hoses to avoid trip hazards, and never leave a hot shoe or bar stock on a rail where a horse could nose it. Place finished, hot stock onto your steel stand to cool.

If you’re running shielded gas, the cylinder needs its own strap or stand in a shaded, ventilated location, not next to shavings. For storage specifics, our Air Gas welding supply guide to cylinders and gas handling is a good resource. Above all, get ventilation, screening and fire gear right first. A finished clip is never worth a barn fire, or an injured horse.

Common Mistakes and How to Troubleshoot Them

Most welding problems on a horseshoe are not exotic. They are the same handful of faults that show up on any thin steel job, made worse by the small part, the thin material, and the margin for error measured in fractions of an inch. Knowing the fault before you strike an arc saves the shoe, the wire, and possibly the horse.

The Shoe Warps Out of Flat

The single most common problem in shoe welding comes down to one fact: the steel in a factory shoe is thin enough that a single heavy pass can pull the shoe out of flat. There is no thick plate to hide behind. The heat goes in, the shoe changes shape, and your carefully fitted shoe is now a twisted piece of metal that rocks on the hoof.

The fix is discipline, not a bigger machine:

• Tack first. Two or three tack welds hold the clip in position, and you check flatness before adding any more metal.
• Check on the anvil face between every bead. Set the shoe down and see if it rocks. A farrier shaping hot will watch the heat colour and work the steel hot for exactly this reason, and the same check applies to a cold shoe after each pass.
• Weld from the center outward so shrinking forces balance instead of one edge dragging the rest.
• Keep beads short and use the anvil as a jig. A backing bar or the flat anvil face supports the thin steel and keeps it from cupping.

A Cold or Unfused Joint

If the clip just sits on the shoe under a bead that looks like melted butter that never flowed, the arc was not hot enough or the puddle never got anywhere. Usually it is contamination.

Mill scale and rust are the usual culprits. A new shoe arrives with a light film of oxide from the mill, and a shoe that has sat in a damp barn picks up more. Weld over that and the arc chases the scale, the puddle refuses to wet out, and the cold joint peels off under a hammer tap.

• Grind or wire-wheel the joint back to bright metal. Do not just arc over the grey.
• Raise the heat slightly: more amperage, or slower travel at the same settings.
• Fix the wire-to-travel ratio. Too much wire with too little travel gives a fat, lazy bead that sits on top; too little wire gives a thin, wandering bead that never fuses.
• Check gun angle and stickout. A gun held too close or at an odd angle will not push the arc where you want it.

Undercut and Slag Inclusion

Undercut shows up as a groove along the toe of the weld where the arc bit into the edge of the shoe. Slag inclusion is old slag trapped under a new bead, usually because you welded right over it.

Both are technique issues on thin steel. Clean between every pass, watch the puddle rather than staring at the arc, and keep the gun at a proper drag angle so the arc pulls the weld back into itself instead of digging in. If you are constantly chasing slag, you are probably running too much wire speed for the amperage, or too much amperage for the wire speed.

Porosity

Porosity is the popcorn look on the surface of a bead. Gas got into the weld because the surface was dirty or the shielding was not doing its job.

• Clean oil, grease, and moisture off the shoe. A shoe that has handled a hoof all day carries more than you think.
• Check shielding gas flow, and check for wind. A barn door open in February will strip your shielding gas faster than any setting you change on the machine.
• Use a gas cup sized for the joint. An oversized cup on a thin shoe dilutes the gas and lets the atmosphere in. The OSHA welding, cutting and brazing standards set the broader safety frame, and AWS guidance on fume control and gas handling covers the specifics of shielding.

The Clip in the Wrong Place

This one is not really a welding fault. It is a fitting fault, and it turns a good shoe into a bad one.

Fit the shoe first, mark the clip location against the actual hoof wall, and only then weld. A clip welded to a shoe that was never checked against the hoof can end up sitting on a wall that has no business carrying it, so the shoe will not sit square and the job is wasted.

The design rule that prevents most of this: keep the clip flush with the shoe’s outer edge, so it never has to be burned into the hoof wall. That principle, described in detail over at Horsekeeping’s guide to welded clips, also lets you place clips next to one another around the whole shoe.

Burning the Hoof

Hot fitting with a hot shoe can imprint on the hoof, and on a thin or sensitive sole that can cause pain severe enough to require weeks or months of stall rest. The farriery literature on hot and cold shoeing is blunt about the cases where hot work does not belong: young horses on their first or second shoeing, laminitic horses, and horses with arthritic hooves or legs.

The better answer for most beginners is to skip scorching entirely and use friction-based cold fitting, where the shoe is hammer-leveled and the hoof rasp-leveled to create a union that holds by contact rather than by heat. It is more work per shoe and far more forgiving of mistakes.

Troubleshooting Table

Symptom	Likely cause	Fix
Shoe twists or cups after welding	Excess heat on thin steel, uneven bead placement	Tack, check flatness on the anvil face between beads, weld center outward, use a backing bar
Weld will not fuse, peels off when tapped	Mill scale, rust, or oil on the joint	Grind back to clean metal, raise heat slightly, correct wire-to-travel ratio
Groove along the weld toe	Gun angle too steep or too much amperage	Use a drag angle, reduce amperage or increase travel speed
Slag trapped in the bead	Welding over old slag, no cleaning between passes	Clean every pass, watch the puddle, manage wire and amperage balance
Popcorn surface, pinholes	Oil or moisture, wind breaking shielding, oversized gas cup	Degrease and dry, check gas flow and wind, use a smaller gas cup
Clip sits where it does not belong	Shoe never fitted or marked against the hoof	Fit first, mark on the hoof, keep the clip flush with the shoe’s outer edge
Hoof sensitive after shoeing	Hot fitting on a thin or laminitic sole	Do not scorch; use cold, friction-based fitting

The Mindset Behind the Fixes

Notice what every fix in that table has in common. Almost none of them are about buying a better machine. They are about preparation, heat control, and checking your work.

There is also one point the farriery literature keeps hammering home: without friction-based contact between shoe and hoof, the hoof wall takes more stress from the compression forces of the shoe and its nails. A sloppy fit is not a cosmetic problem. It changes how the whole foot loads.

And that brings us to the one line that should end every welding session on a shoe: a shoe that does not sit flat will not hold, and no amount of welding will fix a badly fitted shoe. Fit it right on the anvil first, weld it second, and the problem list gets much shorter.

One last note for anyone still learning the forge side. Farriers who shape shoes hot say the hardest part is planning ahead and keeping the forge lit before they need it, otherwise they waste time waiting on steel that is not ready. Cold shaping has no such bottleneck, which is another good reason to learn cold fitting before you learn to weld.

Therapeutic and Specialty Shoes: When Welded Horseshoes Change the Outcome

Ask a working farrier what the welder is for and you will hear something like this: the forge shapes the shoe, but the welder changes what the shoe can do. That is where a horse shoe welding project stops being a hobby and starts to matter. A welded bar can carry load across a hoof that has lost its own weight-bearing surface, and a welded clip can hold a shoe on a horse that pulls. A weld that goes wrong can turn a sound hoof into a lameness case.

Bar Shoes Built by Welding

An egg bar or heart bar shoe is typically welded from bar stock onto a base shoe. The bar runs across the back of the hoof between the heels, forming a closed loop or rounded wedge that supports the heel area and redistributes load over a damaged or under-run hoof. This is the classic application for coffin bone fractures and underrun heels, where the heel has rolled forward and the bony column no longer lands squarely. Because the bar is welded rather than forged as one piece, a farrier can size and shape it in minutes to match an individual hoof instead of working from a limited catalog of factory sizes.

Clips, Contiguous Clip Shoes, and Toe and Quarter Clips

The versatility of a welded clip makes it the most common shop modification. According to farrier Bill Klimesh’s overview of welding clips, clips can be made in any size and shape, including tall clips for pads and weak hoof walls, and because they sit flush with the shoe’s outer edge they never have to be burned into the hoof wall. They can also be placed next to one another around the entire shoe. That is how a contiguous clip shoe is built, with clips running together around the perimeter to treat a coffin bone fracture by bracing the whole hoof wall rather than a single weak point.

Toe clips are welded at the front for horses that pull their shoes, and quarter clips at the heel for horses with weak or thin walls that will not hold a nail. A weld-on clip gets its holding power from the shoe itself rather than the hoof wall, which is why it is often the better answer for a horse that has already torn out nails.

The Economics of Two Minutes

Klimesh puts a welded clip at roughly five seconds to make and about two minutes to apply. That is why welding is described as an efficiency tool rather than a luxury. Two minutes per clip means a farrier can add a full set of clips, a bar, or a repair in the time it takes to fit another horse, without a trip back to the forge for a re-forged shoe. For a shop doing eight to ten horses a day, that is the difference between finishing the route and running behind on it.

Aluminum Shoes and the Racehorse Question

Aluminum shoes are a racehorse specialty, valued for their low weight and how they handle the repeated impact of hard training surfaces. Aluminum changes the welding problem entirely, because it demands a spool gun or a stick process with the correct filler, much lower heat input, and a thoroughly cleaned, dedicated wire. If you are new to that material, our Aluminum MIG Welding: The Complete Practical Guide covers the machine setup, and Aluminum Flux Core Welding: What Actually Works in 2026 covers the flux-cored alternative many farriers prefer for larger aluminum sections.

Step back from the specialty cases, and the numbers stay stubbornly traditional. The American Farriers Journal business practices survey puts glue-on shoes at only about 6 to 10 percent of annual shoe usage for part-timers, and synthetic nail-on shoes at roughly 2 percent. Steel and nails still carry the overwhelming majority of hoof protection in the United States.

Weld-On and Braze-On Concepts

Shoes fixed to the hoof without nails exist as a real but minority practice, typically used where a horse cannot tolerate nails at all. The concept is simple and the execution is not, because the joint has to carry load and resist shear without a nail going through the hoof wall. That is work for an experienced farrier working closely with a veterinarian.

Where Heat Must Stop

Farriers report hot shoeing horses with weak shelly walls or thrush in the white line as an option they use, while deliberately avoiding heat on young horses on their first or second shoeing, laminitic horses, and horses with arthritic hooves or legs. The hot or cold shoeing debate in the American Farriers Journal covers that reasoning, and the historical record summarized in the EquiWorld discussion of hot and cold shoeing points the same direction. Expert guidance also warns that most competent farriers use heat to seat a shoe rather than cheat with a deep impression into the hoof, a warning worth repeating in any article about fabrication: heat is a fitting aid, never a shortcut around correct fit. Thin soles, shelly walls, and thrush are exactly the cases the literature says to handle cold.

Who Actually Makes the Call

Shoeing is a clinical decision made by a qualified farrier, with veterinary input whenever lameness, hoof trauma, or radiographic findings are involved. A farrier judges concussion, breakover, medullary and lamellar conditions, and the hoof’s capacity to carry load. A welder supplies the fabrication step. Knowing where that line sits is not a limitation, it is the safety system. If you are a welder without farriery training, the honest contribution you can make is a clean, accurate, well-finished weld on a shoe a competent farrier has specified, and the knowledge to say clearly when a problem is not a welding problem at all.

Beyond the Farrier: Decorative Horseshoe Welding Projects and the Business Side

While the majority of hoof care revolves around function over form, not every horseshoe welding project has four hooves attached to it. For many hobby welders, the appeal is in repurposing scrap horseshoes into something that can last for generations. Whether it’s for your own home, a gift, or a small local sale, there’s plenty of room for creativity outside of the farrier trade.

Popular Decorative Projects

If you’re just getting started, some projects are far more forgiving than others. A few of the most tried and tested ideas include:

• Wall art and wreaths: One of the easiest entry points. Bent horseshoes can be layered or formed into a circular wreath to add a rustic touch to any wall.
• Candle holders and sconces: By welding shoes to a flat steel base plate, you can create stable holders that are both decorative and functional.
• Coat hooks and racks: Arguably the most practical build. Upturned shoes welded onto a steel bar make for incredibly sturdy hooks that will last for decades.
• Coffee tables with horseshoe feet: A much more advanced build. This project requires careful bracing, leveling, and a lot of attention to weight distribution.
• Garden trellises and plant supports: Perfect for outdoor use, however, any raw steel will need to be coated or sealed to combat rust over time.
• Door mats: By arranging shoes into a framed grid, you can create a tough, farm themed mat that can withstand the elements.
• Key hooks: Small, cheap to make, and some of the easiest pieces to sell locally.
• Chandeliers and jingle bells: Eye catching, but due to their weight and hanging safety concerns, these are best left to the more experienced fabricators.

Sourcing Horseshoes Safely

Before striking an arc, it’s important to know where your material comes from. New keg shoes can be bought from farm and tack stores, whilst used ones can be found at auction barns, farm sales, or scrap piles from farriers.

That being said, hygiene is non-negotiable. Always clean and disinfect used shoes before welding, and avoid shoes from horses with thrush or other hoof disease. If a shoe is caked in manure, remove it mechanically first. For heavily contaminated shoes, it’s almost always safer and more cost effective to simply start with new ones.

The Business Reality

With how eye catching these builds can be, it’s tempting to treat them as a full income stream. However, the numbers paint a much more grounded picture. According to the American Farriers Journal‘s 2026 business practices survey (604 responses out of 8,991 farriers emailed, noting it is not scientifically based and only represents those that chose to respond), full-time farriers averaged 39 hours per week and $135,736 in gross annual income, or about $71.03 per hour. Part-time farriers averaged 17 hours per week and $41,696 in gross income, roughly $50.06 per hour, with 53% of their work being trims only. Average “trim only” charges have risen from $19.94 in 1996 to $57.80 in 2026. By their estimate, farrier earnings account for more than $2.25 billion in total gross income in the United States.

With that in mind, decorative horseshoe work is best viewed as a side project, not a business on its own. The market for these pieces is small and heavily local, with profit margins often being eaten up by steel, consumables, and the hefty amount of time put into larger builds.

Tools, Resources, and a Final Word

You don’t need an entire farrier rig to get started. For most steel decor, a versatile MIG setup, a grinder, a bench vise, and proper PPE will cover the vast majority of builds. If you ever plan to branch out into aluminum builds, guides such as Aluminum MIG Welding: The Complete Practical Guide and Aluminum Cleaner for Welding: How to Prep Aluminum Right are great places to expand your knowledge. For sourcing cylinders and consumables, a resource like Airgas Welding Supplies: The Complete Buyer’s Guide can help you compare options. Be sure to check for a buying guide or product page on weldgallery.com for any gear that you may be looking into.

Affiliate Disclosure: Some links throughout the site may be affiliate links, meaning weldgallery.com may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. All recommendations are made with balanced benefits and limitations in mind. No product will ever substitute for correct safety practices or your own due diligence.

At the end of the day, the greatest reward of these builds isn’t always a sale. Sometimes, it’s simply watching a pile of scrap steel become something that’ll be passed down for years to come.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I weld a horseshoe myself, or do I need to be a trained farrier?

You can weld a shoe in a workshop, and many farriers do exactly that for clips, bars and repairs. You cannot safely apply a shoe to a living hoof without training, because shoeing decisions involve hoof balance, concussion and load distribution. Treat any welding project as metalwork first and farriery second.

What is the difference between hot shoeing and cold shoeing?

Hot shaping bends or cuts the shoe with heat applied in the forge, usually to a red-to-orange working heat. Cold shaping does the same work with the steel cold, and skilled farriers use it to avoid heating sensitive feet and to preserve the shoe’s existing level.

Is welding a clip onto a shoe better than forging one?

Many farriers say yes for speed and consistency: a welded clip takes about two minutes to apply, can be made in any size or shape, including tall clips for pads and weak hoof walls, and sits flush with the shoe’s outer edge. The trade-off is that the clip still has to be positioned correctly and the shoe still has to be fitted properly before the weld goes on.

Why does my horseshoe warp when I weld on it?

Shoe steel is thin and full of residual stress, so uneven heat input twists it. Tack first, check the shoe on the anvil face between passes, weld from the center outward with short beads, and keep the work supported so the shoe can only flatten, never twist.

What welding process should I use for horseshoes?

Most farriers use gas-shielded MIG or flux-cored wire feed, with self-shielded flux-cored wire preferred when there is no gas bottle in the trailer. Stick with a 7018 electrode is a good field-repair option, and the deciding factors are your shop ventilation, whether the horse is present, and how thin the shoe steel is.

Can I weld aluminum horseshoes?

Yes, but the process is completely different from steel. Aluminum needs a spool gun or a suitable electrode, a much lower heat input, and a thoroughly cleaned surface, and it cannot be reshaped on the anvil the way steel can. Most farriers reserve aluminum shoes for situations where lightness matters, such as racehorses.

Is it safe to weld in a barn with a horse in the stall?

It can be done safely with controls: weld outside or in a well-ventilated bay, use a screen to contain sparks, keep a fire extinguisher and quench bucket close, and have a handler who knows the horse. The arc flash and the sudden noise can startle a horse, so give it time to acclimate and never work under a horse’s feet.

How much does a professional shoeing job cost, and is it worth learning to weld shoes yourself?

Industry surveys put average trim-only charges at $57.80 in 2026, with full-time farriers averaging about $71.03 per hour, so professional hoof care is a meaningful recurring cost. Welding skills pay off if you are already shoeing; if you are a hobbyist, they are best used for shop projects and practice before a real shoe is on the line.