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Pictured here is one of the tools made by Emilio Carbajal, Jr., owner of Carb’s Customs in Weiser. Carbajal is one of the competitors who will be featured in this week’s new episode of ‘Forged in Fire,’ airing at 7 p.m. Wednesday on History.

Pictured here is one of the tools made by Emilio Carbajal, Jr., owner of Carb’s Customs in Weiser. Carbajal is one of the competitors who will be featured in this week’s new episode of ‘Forged in Fire,’ airing at 7 p.m. Wednesday on History.

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WEISER — If you’re a History channel fan, set your DVR for Wednesday evening. A Weiser man is set to compete in this week’s episode of the long-running reality competition series “Forged in Fire.”

Emilio Carbajal Jr., owner of Carb’s Customs, told the Argus in a phone interview Monday that his sister, Jessica Carbajal, gave him the nudge to try out for the program.

“When I got the link to [the contestant application], I didn’t really do anything with it. I saw it for a couple of months and then I was like, ‘You know what? I might as well just try it and see what happens,” said Carbajal. “The worst thing they can say is ‘no.’”

But when contestant coordinators got his application, they said ‘yes’ and reached out to him.

“I did a couple of interviews, showed them some of my work and I didn’t hear nothing from them for about a month or two … Then, just out of the blue, they called me up and they said, ‘We’re heading over to your place; Be there in seven days.’”

This timetable was close for Carbajal; He had just moved into his present home.

“I hadn’t set up my shop yet, so I had to go get all my tools and stuff, and set up.”

With that, Carbajal packed up his kit and set off for the east coast. According to Carbajal, “Forged in Fire” tapes in the village of Mystic, Connecticut, some 55 miles southeast of Hartford on the Mystic River. For Carbajal, the visit to Mystic saw him immersed in U.S. history.

“We filmed at the Mystic Museum, so they had a bunch of old ships out there … that was really cool to see.”

Although his interaction with host Grady Powell and the judging staff was limited during taping of his competition, Carbajal said they still radiated a fun, entertaining vibe.

“It was something I’ve never gotten to do; I flew across the country. I’ve never been on the … east coast,” he said of the experience. “It was all a blast. It happened really quick and I didn’t really get to soak it in until later, but it was quite the experience.”

He said he got his start over four years ago, doing woodwork as a hobby before trying out metal crafting.

“A friend of mine gave me a … wood lathe, and I didn’t have any of the tools for it and i couldn’t afford them. [I was] already learning from YouTube how to work on the wood lathe and wood work, so [I decided] I might as well figure out how to work with metal.”

One of the first tools he made to work with the lathe was a chisel, he said.

Carbajal’s advice to aspiring metal workers is to start now.

“The best advice I can give is just try it — go do it. I hear a lot of people say, ‘Well I’ve always wanted to’ and this and that. Just go do it.”

Examples of Carbajal’s work can be viewed on Instagram at @carbscustoms. “Forged in Fire,” presently in its ninth season, airs Wednesdays at 7 p.m. local time on History.

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