the iron dwarf

bungee cord, maybe several pieces until the right spring is delivered

a friend has several machines for making rings, some hand operated and some hand, its not hard.

3 rollers, the middle one moves and at least 2 of them driven by a chain drive, adjust the middle roller with a small bottle jack, you can roll a 20 foot length is about 2 mins by hand easily.

I have thicker stuff done on an old lathe sometimes

if just bending them round a former by hand it is easier to do it cold and the scale flakes off

doing work with you hands will always have value, other jobs come and go, at the moment we are undervalued but when their are problems we can sort them out.

in the long term things will always need to be made or repaired, most things are made to last less and less but some people will always value quality

boiled linseed oil, though I might try lice oil if I can find some

for some years I have been making a wax for people here into reenactment, made from microcrystalline wax and white spirit.

people seem to like it and keep asking for more.

am going to try  white spirit, microcrystalline wax, carbon black and BLO for a blackening paste

there are also welding rods with a high nickel content

I have a nickel anode from an electroplating works, probably about 4kg

posting on another forum ( armour archive )

the glass like stuff is clinker, you get that when you burn metal, when you heat the metal and it is giving off little sparks that shows it is too hot and you have burnt it, it is the cause of the holes you have.

you need to remove any clinker as it will make a mess of your work.

in your forge there are different zones, assuming it is a bottom blast, close to the bottom the fire is mostly oxidizing ( more air than fuel ) here metal will burn away easily, above that the fire is more neutral and near the top it is more carburising ( more fuel than air ).

you should be using the upper parts of the fire more and watch for the metal getting too hot

was part of a team working on restoring an orangery, had hundreds of steel screws in cast iron, others tried and got 1 in 10, destroying the rest, I got about 98% out with no problems.

placed an 8mm  ( 5/16 ) not on the screw head or top of the tread if the head had gone and filled it with the mig, kept a spanner ready to turn the nut whilst it was still glowing, back and forth a few times and then out

on my forges I use a 1" ball valve to control the air, the big forge has 5 of them and another as a bypass and another to connect several more forges to the pipework

yes they work fine on the forges I sell, I also often have the blowers in stock.

the better blowers we use are called side channel blowers and are quieter and made to run forever, chinese plastic bouncy castles blowers will not last long with everyday use

both me and Dave Budd were on our own but we both managed a quick walk round but we did not know who you were, we both had out names on display on our pitches

was at an event last weekend with dave budd from here, he shown me some of the miniatures he had made, think the smallest knife has a blade about 1/8" long

here are some of the ones I supply, from 5" od to 11" aprox

I also have a couple of big shallow ones IIRC 17" dia and 11/2" deep made from 1" thick stainless, the hole in the middle has been ground now where a fitting was welded in place, 1/2" thick at the edge and 1" at the middle

back home with a much lighter van and trailer, sold quite a bit, met lots of old and some new friends, need sleep next

got a  112 lb PW here a few years ago for about 70 uk pounds ( just over $100 )

first day done, Dave Budd's work looks great, not met wayne yet.

saturday is normally the busiest

thank you for the reply.

I will only need to heat up about 2" of either 1/2" section,

was hoping for a faster result but will make a machine anyway and see what I can do.

it is still faster than lighting the coke forge to do just a few and cleaner.

I am sure you wont be taking many of them home Dave

was going to use a footswitch but as so much of the things I suddenly need to make another batch of are the same 2 items and each will need x seconds to heat being able to switch it to a fixed time may be useful, sort of press footswitch and release for x seconds but also be able to press and hold for other stuff.

the design im building has virtually no controls on it and uses a phase locked loop.

yes I will make it easy to change coils

the unit i am looking at was aimed at 70khz but turned out to be 66khz, as most of my work is the 1/2" i would make coils that are best for that size but I would have bigger for other stuff.

in the shop at the moment we have 14 coke forges so im not short of something for bigger jobs ;) 

one reason for 3kw is this is what we get from a normal  wall socket here in the uk, in the shop we have bigger including a lot of 415v 3 phase at 32a per phase but if it plugs into the normal domestic sockets it can be used anywhere.

looking for sources of the components now, have all the major ones sorted.

Im normally in the main building but you never know until you arrive, you will find me there with forges and tools

The Original Reenactors Market at Ryton on dunsmore near coventry.

opens friday, saturday and sunday.

I will be there and I think Dave Budd will be there too, come and say hello if you are in the area

there is also another event a few miles away on the saturday and sunday

smallest forge I have seen on here that worked was in a soup can, yes an ordinary sized soup can, there will be pictures of it here and details of how to make it ( try the forges section )