Ken Kelley

Mine is based on a 7 gallon Walmart air tank. Lined it with 2" of inswool, two thick coats of satanite, and then a coat or two of ITC-100. The forced air burner is a Darren Ellis design. And yes, the blower is attached with duct tape since I have to be true to my humble roots. I was going to come up with a fancier arrangement but the duct tape worked so well I just left it alone. The forge will quite easily reach welding temps on 2 psi. I'm experimenting with smaller venturi burners to see if I can't get it to reliably run at 1500 degrees for heat treating 1084. Latest try was around 1600 so I need to go smaller than the 3/4" sidearm from the last experiment. I also built a small horizontal forge from an old freon bottle that works great for general heating chores. That one has a sidearm burner.

After I retired from the USAF I took some welding courses at Solano County Community College near Suisun City, CA. There was a bench outside the shop that we called the "Crying Bench". You went and sat on the crying bench when your welding wasn't going too good and you needed a break to regroup and try again. I was having a bad day one time so I went out and sat on the bench for a couple of minutes. It had rained so the bench was a little damp. Not enough to really get wet but enough to dampen the seat of my pants. I went back inside and sat down on the metal seat in my metal booth (the table and seat were all steel and the ground was connected to them). I grabbed my stinger barehanded and the shock hit me in the seat of the pants. Tingled something fierce until I let go of the stinger.

I stole this post from Ken Scharabrok over on the ABANA Forum. It might help you... The ABANA Forums

Shaun, On one of your other posts I learned you have an interest in making knives. Here are some web sites you can go to for an immense amount of information on tools, materials, techniques, and what have you. There is a lot of information to be had by browsing through them. Bladesmith's Forum Information on making knives British Blades Ken

I'm working on fullering tools. One to help in forging tangs on knives and another one to set the ricasso on the blades. I bought some steel for the project from my usual supplier a few days ago and the price for mild steel has gone up. I think this trend will continue as long as the fuel prices keep going up. Sad. Wish I was rich so I could afford a full tank of gas in my pickup.

Go here Information on making knives Look through the tutorials on the first page and you will find a whole section on filing. Good luck. Ken

Yes, a propane forge can get hot enough to forge weld or even burn steel. The forced air burner is the better choice for heat because the fuel/air mixture can be easily altered to be oxidizing, neutral, or carburizing. Venturi burners are limited in their adjustment and usually cause excess scaling. I have been experimenting with loading pictures into the Gallery and I'm going to try posting one of my vertical welding forge here. It's powered by a forced air burner built according to Darren Ellis' design. It will easily reach welding heat while just loafing along on 2 psi of propane.

I switched from venturi to forced air burners and will never go back. Forced air burners use less fuel and are capable of a wide range of adjustment for flame temperature and forge atmosphere. I keep the sidearm burner I started out with around for the odd fire brick pile heating chore but that's about it. For info on forced air burners go to Bladesmith Forum or check out Indian George's site. Ken

He was on Bladesmith today.

You might want to check out Larry Zoeller's sidearm burner Zoeller Forge. It's easy to make and will cut down on the flamethrower effect of your present burner. The ideal burner placement would be to come in from the side and aim the burner tube at a tangent to the interior of the forge. That will allow the flame to spirall around the inside and even out the heat. Ken

I get my forge materials from Darren Ellis Ellis Custom Knifeworks. His prices are as good as any and his customer service is top notch. I put a 3/8" layer of mizzou in the bottom of both my vertical and horizontal forges for flux resistance and resistance to mechanical damage. Then I coat the inswool with a couple of thick coats of satanite and follow that up with ITC-100 for improved heat reflection. Other people use other coating but this combination works fine for me. Read through Darren's FAQ section for more info. Ken

Thanks for you input everyone. However, since I first asked this question my electric motor education has increased by leaps and bounds through contact with a feller on Blade Forums and some judicious wandering around the internet. I found a forum site called the Practical Machinist. One of the subforums addresses the variable speed motor issue in detail. It seems that the best way to go for a variable speed set up is to run a 3 phase motor using a Variable Frequency Device. The VFD is a bit on the pricey side but the motors are relatively cheap. Too much detail to go into here but the VFD/3 phase motor combo definitely seems to be the way to go for my grinder purposes as opposed to the DC idea. Ken