iron quake

I use reverse electrolysis and make items look like they are 200 years old in about 3 days. Get a plastic stock tank baking soda and a battery charger. Do a goog search on electrical etching. Nothing else even comes close to this method other that mother nature an she takes her sweet time.

Could be the OPD valve is stuck, and that could be because of the teflon tape you've applied at the fitting connecting the tank. This fitting requires NO sealant and NONE should be used ever.

Geoff, The kiln shelf is working well and no screwing around required. Thanks,

Thanks Frosty, It works well so far. It might look like a bit of over kill having three burners for that volume but with all three sides open I think I'll need them all. Have you ever used an electric carving knife to cut blanket? They work really well for that.

Well I guess if your making a spring from a spring and I see the value in reusing things and not waisting anything. I just can't get past putting a lot of time into making something only to have it crack in the first use. Anyone who has a computer can do their shopping online at the places I mentioned above, so no catalog is required, if you don't have a computer in 2014 that sucks . By the way a "8 x "12 ".032 thick piece of annealed 1075 is $16.42. that makes a lot of springs. And yep they are very stingy with there catalogs for sure.

Also I don't know why anyone makes anything that needs heat treatment from scrap. You have know idea what you'll wind up with. If you need a small amount of material order it from Mc Master Carr. If you need a lot order that from Hudson Tool Steel the best prices and high quality. Time is money and failed tools are a waist of both.

Temper in the wife's kitchen oven at 550F its a perfect spring temper "dark blue" I doubt you need to do it at all as there is very little deflection in a springs of those types. I temper all my 4140 hammer dies and many other tools as well in my honeys oven. it's not just for pie you know. Just clean the parts well with a wire wheel so you don't take any left over quenching oil with you a stink up the house.

I'm no expert for sure but I applied Matrikote over my 2" blanket and it seems to be fine. Its cracked but I don't think it matters much. After screwing around casting forge floors, I purchased a kiln shelf and cut it to size with a diamond masonry blade in a skill saw, it worked perfect. A tip perhaps many of you already know is using an electric carving knife "turkey carver" to cut and trim blanket. Really works slick I purchased 2" blanket and was able to slice off a clean "3/4 to wind up with a nice uniform "1 1/4 section to go below my floor.

Finish building my first forge. I like the features included: A burner idle circuit, a valve to turn off the third burner, front and rear doors that move up or swing out of the way, stand that has a moving front support thats part of the base for holding up long heavy stock. The side door is soft fire brick that when removed gives open access to the “8x4x24 clam shaped chamber. I used 2” blanket for the doors and body coated it with Matrikote. The floor is a zone 11 kiln shelf. I cast a couple other floors but really didn’t like them. The burners are from Thermal Art Design and very stable. I tried machining some myself, based on a design shown by Dave Hammer but I couldn't get them to behave through ranges of pressure and in idle. These from TAD are working very well.

I’d suggest you do this the old fashion way rather than speculate. Figure out what kind of force you'd like to apply and how much deflection you’ll allow and then calculate the structure. All the formulas are readily available on line. You need to know young's modulus 29 X 10E6 for A36 steel, the Moment of Inertia, (have someone calculate it after you decide a structure design if you can’t) plug this in to a beam calculator like engineers edge and walla. If you construct it correctly, which is a big IF, pre-heating the material, gouging the intersections of the welds, using multiple passes with heavy inter-shield wire, or the correct rod...bla..bla bla. You will surpass your deflection desired before it would ever fail “break” on you….most likely. You’ll be very surprised at how much deflection you get, from very little cantilever at the forces you are wishing to apply.

Well Thomas guess I thinking about getting parts in without stubbing a toe. I should rethink the idea perhaps as my current forge floor is 1" brick and I don't have any trouble, but they are on a steel floor so they set flat. Huummm!

I’m looking for suggestions on casting a large 12” X 24” floor in a new forge. I’ve cast a floor in Resco Vibracast 60PC and it works and is very strong but has to high a thermal conductivity 14 BTU/ft2/Hr/°F/in. I see the Kast-O-Lite products are in the 4-4.5 range. Can I cast a floor this size a 1.25” thick and have it stay together? It will be on top of 1” of thermal blanket. Is there a better product to use? Should I include stainless needles in the mix to increase the strength? I don’t forge weld so I don’t care about flux issues. Thank You, Quake

The other thing to consider is, rarely is ANYTHING built for the first time as simple as it first appears. So if your time is worth something, take your estimate of how long its going to take and double or triple it and you might be close. I have a lots more than three years of building equipment to know this to be very true.

I’m a rather a new smith of about 3 years. So here is my 2 cents. I started out buying an old crappy anvil that some dude took a torch to. A small two burner propane forge and a hammer. This was just to see if I’d like it. Well, lots of equipment and tools later I guess I sure do, but not without all these other tools. I could never do what I like without a power hammer and the other machines. All the other tools just make is faster, funner an more efficient, thats just me. So if you can afford it, get to beating on hot metal ASAP, you might think the whole blacksmithing thing sucks. Oh and the crappy little forge just got replaced with a larger 3 burner unit I designed and built, but I heated lots and lots of metal in the first one.

ACME anvils for sure! :)

The hull on the battleship Missouri is "12 thick, so thick plate has been around a while I think. How would you have gotten a top tool to the work with the form it warped into, I guess you could have. I think some dope just wanted to see it they could do it. That's was a nice big old anvil, that any good smith would have loved to own. Just a shame to see.

This has to be a case of more money than brains or just a need to be destructive. If you really really needed a form like that, and I can’t imagine why you would, you’d have it burned out of “6 or “8 plate in that shape. Might be the first prize for a blacksmith Darwin award! I hope the idiot dropped it on his toe after wrecking it.

Strong work there Karn, really nice. I thought only dyslexic left handers like myself put things together sdrawkcab though!

Getting stuck keys out can suck. You might try driving the keys in, like you were trying to tighten them. If your lucky the bulged end might come through enough to cut them off with a cut off wheel in a right angle grinder. Then drive them out in the correct direction. Get some new keys from LG and hot fit them when you reinstall. Ask Peacock if you need any help, he know all the tricks.

Birchwood Technologies Presto Black Gel work well for me for large furniture parts, if you want a black finish. I really like the Japanese Brown from Sculpt Nouveau, a really nice brown, and their Clear Guard in matte finish is very good product as well. I like turp / linseed oil and bees wax too, as long as I can heat the part up which on large items can be a lot of trouble. Good luck.

Now Dan that's funny!

Nice idea if you like cutting meat with a stone ax, clumsy, slow and dangerous!

I sure hope this young man can come up with a product because the value of having my system now can't be overstated. Something at a price point that more folks could afford would be wonderful. However, I'm not sure that this is planned to be a kit or plans. Daniel's last post mentioned his brother finishing up doing some coding. That means software or firmware to me and how you sell something like this as less than a complete system is difficult for me to imagine. I'm not trying to pour cold water on anyones hopes but having been in the business of designing and manufacturing very complicated equipment I'm not sure it's possible. Product liability, UL, documentation, warranty among other things, a HUGE can of worms. Just my 2 cents!

Frosty, I wish everyone who wanted one of these systems could have one, I really do their just that good. I’ve not made any really odd shaped coils. I have used the heater with other tooling to heat and roll up long lengths onto a removable mandrel like a coil spring. Most of the heating is done in rather short sections of about 6” or less. For making upsets, mortise, tenons and other short heats you just can’t beat it. Not only do you get the heat just where its needed but then being able handle the part without tongs is really nice. The process is so fast too its just crazy. I never got the chance to work with Grant as he passed away a couple days after my email to him about a system. He was a special fellow and I know many folks still miss him. I was able to work with Larry at Monster Metal, he was very helpful and I’m completely satisfied with my purchase. Given the direction propane prices are heading, he might see a lot more business coming his way.

I got the belt for the brake I made on my 100lb LG from Peacock and it works very well.