tlreif

Neat, I like it.

Just one question. I see that the stairs are bolted on the ring gripping around the post. Is that the only fastening for the stairs?

Yes that is the only thing fastening the stairs to the main post. Do you see a problem?

A welder friend of mine built one into his basement to save space. It was quite narrow. He then took out the regular stairs to gain space. A few years later he sold the house. Said to me, I wonder how long it will take the new owners to figure out why I left the washer and dryer in the basement. Whoops!

Yes that is one thing about these stairs not exactly user friendly when trying to carry large objects up them.

Hello friends. There isn't a whole lot of blacksmithing in these but I did have to fire the forge up for the railing cap. This was the project for the summer. I can tell you that it was quite hot and I didn't think I was having very much fun. But the results were good. And the best thing is I actually made some money on a project for a change. Got tired of doing all for peanuts. Enjoy. And as always questions or comments are apreciated.

Some assembly photos


Final and some details


View of customers back yard

My smithy is in my garage. I find that the neighbors are more fascinated at what I am doing to be concerned about complaining. As was mentioned I work at only reasonable time of day. When I get home from work i only smith till 8:00 p.m.. I figure the little ones are being tucked in at this time so I quit. I do have a power hammer and once they got used to the sound they are ok with it. The first time they thought someone was shooting a gun! Then they were like oh its only Todd. LOL.

One thing I might add. For the air valve a gate valve works better than a ball valve in this application.

Nice work!

That's a nice lot of tools. I hope you got some of it. Where was this?

Well this is just a note to warn everyone that with the heat be careful out there and listen to your body. I was working at the museum today and started getting weak knees and light headed. I recognized the signs and found a cool place. Remember work slow keep hydrated and find a cool spot to take a break.

Look up on the net Hi Temp Inc. They are out of Oregon or something.

I agree with Phil. I use 2 layers in both of my forges and it works very well.

Test firing of the burners of a two burner gas forge we are building . Next is to cut out the doors on the two end caps and add kaowool and ITC 100.

Your flames look good. If I may ask is that going to be the burner placement as far as how deep into the forge? It has been my experience that you should raise the burners up quite a ways. The way they are positioned now it will be an oxygen rich environment being that close to the floor. And also will create cool spots. Sorry if you already know this.

Several months ago I wrote in a thread that I had an Iron City vice with the screw and screw box wore out. A kind gentleman on this forum sent me some acme screw and a nut. I left the old screw and screw box alone and made new. So here is how I went about doing it.

I wished to remain true to somewhat "old school" lathe techniques so I started by figuring out a set of coordinates to make the ball that will hold the screw. After that I proceeded to start turning the rough dimensions. I made the screw ball as I will call it. In 2 pieces. The Cap and the Base. Here is the cap in progress.


And after filing down the rough out to smooth.


Next the Base








Here is the 2 pieces finished.




I next turned the acme screw to make a tight press fit. If you will notice I heavily chamfered the base to weld the screw in. I heated the base and then pressed the screw in the base. I then put the base and screw assembly on the oven for preheat in order to weld in place. Then put back in lathe and faced the base.




Then welded the Cap on and forged a handle using my power hammer.


Next the screw box. I turned the Base for it and bored a hole to make a press fit for the nut after turning the hex off 2 inches of it. Then I drilled through in 2 places for plug welding.


After welding the nut in I proceeded to forge the back cap to seal the screw from dirt. This was forged from 1 1/2 pipe.


And finally the finished product.
Sorry if this is too long but I wanted to show most all of the steps. It works great and is good as new. I put all my weight on tightening and it never made a peep. Hope this is useful.

Thanks for the reply. What exactly is kiln shelf? When I made this Isort of copied a forge someone posted. Theirs was similiar length, 6"X6" but only 1" insulation. Mine's 2" and only 2" higher.
Any experience with the hybrid burners? Are their really as efficient as claimed?
cheers ian

Yea the kiln shelf is a material that is actually used to place pottery items on in a kiln. My kiln shelf material is 3/4" thick. What I do is I simply put kaowool under it like 1-2 inches and then put the rest of the insulation in the rest of the forge and coat with itc100. It works very well and is very durable. On my 2 burner it is a 9 inch wide piece and I have done no damage to it.

As for the hybrid burners. I have one. It works very well. But after purchasing it and seeing how it is constructed I was able to make my own knock off version of it. It saved me many dollars. You may not have the means to make such a burner i don't know but I do recommend it. I know mine work quite well. If you search for a thread called my forge story you can see pics of my forge. If you are interested.

Cheers to you! (you must be English) Todd

I went with a mac about a year ago and I absolutely love it! Things just work! And it boots from a cold boot in about 60 seconds ready to use. I will never go back! Just my 2 cents worth.

Your burners are probably fine. Although you can use a .035 tip with the 3/4 pipe. You can only move so much air. But they are only good for about 250 cubic inches each. My calculations say you have 864 cubic inces. So either add burners. Or you could build a ribbon burner with a blower. Or make a smaller chamber.

Another thing you could do would be to take out the hard fire brick floor and put a layer of insulation down and then
a piece of kiln shelf. This will not suck up the heat like the
hard fire brick will. Just a few thoughts. Good luck! And keep us posted.

If you are a quick nail maker the kids love getting a nail from the smith. I have been doing that lately at the museum shop and it is a big hit. And you can talk about nail making history a little bit as you go.

When I started I made my propane forge from Ron rail's web site. Bought an anvil from harbor freight and I had all I needed to get started. I used a ball pien hammer that I already had and a pair of pliers to hold the work. I soon realized tongs were in order so I got some on eBay. I guess my point is start small, find a local club to helpout, and then you can decide how far you want to go. But be careful you will get hooked!

Thanks guys. They are fun to make!

Hi there. I make a knock off of the hybrid burners t-rex. If you lookup a post called my forge story on this site you can see some pictures of them. Anyway I bought one and then basically copied it. My reducing bell I machine out on the lathe. So mine looks a little different as i use a 45 degree angle on the outside. but the inside is 17 degrees. Cut 1/2 inch in on the inside diameter of 1 1/4 pipe and then transition to the 3/4 inside diameter at 17 degrees. My burners work beautifully. The other key is the nozzle. Good luck and I hope this helps.

Yes I would say so. Very Nice!

I received an order for a set of utensils to be used while camping. They had seen a spatula that I had made working from Mark Aspery's first book and liked it so much they wanted a set of their own. So here is the outcome.

Hey Mark. Unless you have a high pressure line Plummed to your shop you are stuck with using a blown setup. There is just not enough pressure to get a naturally aspirated burner To go. Look at blacksmith depot for your blower. Also put in a gate valve to adjust the air flow. If you do that you are golden.

Nice work! Nice anvil!

I take 2 heats to do them, and I make a crapload of em... While I can make them in a single heat, I find it takes just as long to do them in a single heat and more work... If you run your taper in heat 1, then cut and head in heat 2, you get more accurate results, and don't have the frantic hammering to get the taper followed by beating your brains out to get the head.

Yes thats exactly how I ended up doing them. I got to the point where I was getting very similar results. Thanks for the comments.

I decided to make an old school tool box to take my tools to old cow town museum when I work the blacksmith shop. So in that theme I figured why not make my own nails and hardware. I consider my forging skills to be decent. Not as fast as many. But certainly faster than a lot. And fairly acurate in getting the results i want. But I must say making nails is a very humbling experience. I have watched many videos on utube where it is done in one heat. Well I was unable to get it in one heat. It takes me 2 heats but I am getting accurate results. I guess practice will do it. I certainly can see that it is a great forging practice. Thoughts? Happy forging everyone.