Hoary

well the tuyere you could buy as black piping from home depot also, in fact it's pre treaded so you could attach the flange and the pipes together so you could take them apart if you needed to store it. I'm usinf 1" piping with one t pipe and a cap to catch the ash and release it after it.

why not go to home depot and buy a flange that's what I used and it seems to be working ok *shrug*

ok this sounds obvious as far as mixing wind and forging fire+wind= Charred Blacksmith or bush fire depending on your local ( no offense for the many in southern Ca. My prayers to them) but is there a max wind mph that would be deemed unsafe? or all? I'd like to hear about it before I try and add a newer reply for the Burn Post. Thanks :P

I have to agree with ApprenticeMan, Lavendar Oil does work and if I recall correctly from Massage School the origin of essential oils came from a man who massively burnt his arm and threw it into whatever liquid he could find which was of course a barrel full of lavendar oil. Aside from that the only burn story I've gotten was when a friend decided to brand my forearm with a windcover from a hookah bar, I decked him right in the jaw for that unecessary action, luckily I knew the owner and got off easy from the whole thing. yup that would be my burn story, still got a half circle on my arm :-/

what could I do with a 70lb anvil? is there a chart for reference for this kinda stuff?

I'm using hardwood charcoal and a 20lb sledge for an anvil, what would be the ideal stock to use for practice?

I actually used charcoal or left overs from when I used my fire pot from burning logs and stuff. not too bad I think, get fun out of wood burning once by marshmellows and twice by metal ;)

ok nothing too impressive, just had 1/4" metal bar from home depot sitting around and decided I was just going to play around, made it into a nice thin fire poker. created a handle and just bent the other tip down, I also twisted the metal just to kinda get a feel for it. Over all it was fun getting to know and test my forge. I'm actually quite excited! oh and by the way, I used a sledge hammer head for an anvil on this one Photo 1 Photo 2, Photo 3 aside from that my forge seems to be working nicely! got the metal to a cherry red and yellow. I'm pleased and aching to get some real stuff to manipulate!

Thanks for the offer but that's a bit of a drive for me right now :-p

Ok I know you can use a rail for an anvil, but how could I go about getting one of those? I know Ebay has them once in a while, but I was wondering if it would be possible to find one along tracks or anything like that. Any ideas?

I was reading The black smith's Craft by Charles McRaven and he mentioned a story about am early settler smith who had some guys who claimed they had the best mixture for quenching quicker and mixed it for him. Gave him the recipe but didn't do any good because he couldn't read it, but somebody did and said it was just salt in the water, is that actually a ways to go about quenching?

It was very helpful, I'm sorry having a bit of stress related issues right now lol kinda funny that I was a who's flame is bigger contest lol... yeah that sounded odd, but know it did give me something to think about and apply once I really get it up and running. Thanks I'll get a right start in the trade :)

I was just baking the clay in the rim holes, It's kinda hard to really black smith when my county is on a water restriction and the fire marshall is has issued a fire restriction so I had to keep the flames going in small sections.

I'll have to try that one too, sounds like it would be good in a bind :)

Well, first things first. Chances are you'd be better off sticking to fire pokers and small metal project to build up consistancy with your metal working before you should take on armor or shields. anyhoo, some cheap coal forge ideas would be from our blueprint section BP0484 BP0463 BP0238. You could probably find some of this stuff lying around your house or yard. that's what I have as my first forge and had only spent $20 on the whole dag on thing. as far as air supply is, see if you can get a hold of a hair dryer or an air pump ofr an air matress. there ya go. Good luck to ya!

Well, I had put clay in to stop up the holes in the rim then a lit the fire to bake it not too bad. it was actually funny, since I didn't have any base for the forge yet I just put it up on a ladder turned on its side in the shape of a v. I'm hoping to find a more perminate base for it. but anyways here it is...

I watched the program, it was quite informative and entertaining but there was something I did take note of...about capturing the carbon in the blade. how do you know, aside from breaking brittle iron, if you've over carbonized the metal? Is there something I could read that would help me get a better undersanding? I'm sure that carbonizing metal can go further in smithing things, I was just trying to see if there was a better way to know rather than trial and error and error ect. okie dokey thanks! :)

It was the angle at which I took the pic, but everything is level as far as I could tell. I'll see what's going on when I fire it up the first time. I know better than to use cement b/c I asked that question a while back and got resounding no's to the idea :-p but all is good. I'll use the clay to cover the holes up then just refill it with ash and stuff. Unfortunately there's a drought in my area that has a no open flame policy or you could face 25k in fines and a year in jail, not the kind of bars I want to play with... but soon enough! ;)

Yeah I created my first forge maybe about 5 mins ago... well without the stand just yet. I'm thinking I'm just gonna dig a pit and sustain the fire pot with cyderblocks until I can find a suitable base for it all. Aside from not filling everything with clay and dirt is there any advice? Just let me know and thanks!

Ok that's all I really needed. Actually the tuyere, well hmmm. ok imagine the forge is a tire rim the tuyere is a series of black nipple piping with a flange acting as a catch through the hole in the rim the problem is that I needed an extra small sheet of metal I can cut a hole through and place under the flange to ensure that there is no spots in the tire rim (ie. where the rotor bolts would go) which coal and clinker could fall through. I guess saying a heat sheild wasn't the proper terminology for what I was looking for. I guess I could try my set up as is for now and hope I could fill in any extra openings with clay, I just wanted the extra security ya know. But computer metal is galved so i'll stay away from that. Thanks!

I'm looking to use a piece of metal from a computer casing for a heat sheild for my tuyere.The casing is most likely from the pentium 2 days. I was wondering how could I tell if the metal is galvanized? IT doesn't appear to have the powdery white looking coating on the inside and the outside is the beige looking kind of painted look. My dad says paint wouldn't stick to galvanized parts but I'm just trying to be cautious.

Well, I'm making a tire forge and am pretty close to finishing it. I used black 1 inch piping for the tuyere with a T adaptor to allow for air blasting and ash resevoir w/ plug for easy clean out. an air matress fan is my air source and would connect nicely to the inch diameter. Inside the Tire Rim is a mixture of clay and kitty litter the fire pot is an old brake rotor. I'm thinking I would like to place the set up on top of cyderblocks in a squared U shape while digging out a pit underneath where my tuyere would protrude and pileling dirt around the cyderblocks. The set up would look like this... Ooo = Dirt N= cyderblocks I was wondering would the cyderblock blow from the heat if they held up the tire rim? ___________ |//////| ___________ NN /////NNNN O NN ////NNNNooO NN /////NNNNooooO I hope this works!

Evfreek, Thanks for the research into it. It was actually something I thought of as a possiblity from myth Busters. Of course the subject was apples and oranges compared to this, but they created Ancient Eygptian batteries using a ceramic pot and a copper and iron pipe in a liquid of various at home acids ( ie. lemon juice, vinegar etc.). they tested the voltage by hooking their battery to a copper disk and placed it in water and it looked like it caused some corrosian. From there I figured acid can conduct as well as be a source of electricity but would it speed the acid's productivity. Just a thought but you've gone ahead and found this stuff out, which forgive me if I'm wrong, sounds like it makes a safer and beneficial method of degalvinzing metal. I'm glad I could contribute an idea, that's all it was for me, but how excited I am to know it might have produced a positive result. Thank you, but of course I do acknowledge this as being a risky business no matter what you do for safety. I do listen to wisdom when there's more than my eyebrows at stake :-p.

I know you can de galvinize metal by using acid, but it is possible to speed up the process using a low electric current? maybe it would speed up the acid reaction? Just a random thought looking for some wisdom.

Ok... Now that I've got it... I realize that my sense of imagination is way out of proportion for rationality. I thought my i beam was loud.. anyways at least I gained some fire brick for free.. lol but it is a good wood stove.