wulfgar

cant ice alone put out roughly 3000psi? well freezing water that is.

thanks guys. glad i asked on here health is always number in my books. and hey daryl, you say you work with diesel engines. a little off topic (or alot) but do you know or know anyone who does know a fair bit about the cummins 5.9?

i havent found anywhere that lists chrome in it. the most common and sought after ones are nickel, gold, silver, platinum, palladium and rhodium. and it is either platinum or palladium that is the real high seller.

So here it goes, I work at an auto wreckers. I have access to alot of catalyc converters. The price of them until about 2 months ago was at record highs. Okay enough random babbling, my question is does anyone know how to or where I could find out on how to smelt and seperate the precious metal out of the cats? Or am I barking up to big of a tree?

im new to blacksmithing as well. and i tried to make a sword right off the bat. not a good idea. it will be much wiser and worth while to even just pound out some random steel to get a feel for your arm, hammer, forge, and steel. but anyways welcome to IFI and good luck ;)

yes actually it was lol. he has a fair bit of stuff there and i took the best anvil that he had. i might go back one of these days and get some of the melting ladels (i dont know the proper term) that he has too.

lol. thomas ironically i am in the auto industry, so if youd like i could tell you ;)

Yesterday I just went and picked up an anvil. Its roughly 100-105lbs. I cant find a dent, ding or scratch on the thing, its in excellent shape. If its been used it hasn't been used much. I payed $300 for it. Sounds like a reasonable price? Im in Canada as well so Im not sure what the prices are like in the US. My camera is broken right now but I'll try and get some pics up. Thank you for whoever answers.

thank you for the helps everyone. i guess for my next questions...how does one obtain them....i dont need anything large.

i hear the word crucible used alot. can someone explain?

does anyone know where to find smelting pots? or of any books or information on smelting? any help would be greatly appretiated. Thanks.

P.S. i made mine from a brake drum from a semi. i used 2 1/2" pipe for the air tube. to fill the holes for the wheel studs and center hub i took a sheet of steel that was laying around and welded it to the bottom, then i cut a 2 1/2" hole in the plate steel and welded the pipe to it. all i have left is to hook up my hand crank forge blower and make legs for it to stand with.

you cant beat the wreckers my dad fortunately for me owns a large auto wreckers. have almost every type, shape, and size of steel imaginable. if you go to a scrap yard look for exhaust pipe off of a dodge cummins 89-01. they all ran 3". you might be able to find alot more useful thing there too. id suggest finding one and taking a look around ;)

Thank you all for advice and experiences. It helps alot hearing what others have experienced. I think my main problem with getting heat out of it right now is the grate that i built for the bottom is wrong. I cut 1/2" slots about 2" apart from each other and cut them 1" from each end of the slots and the whole width of the piece. All in all I think I am getting WAY to much flow through it and it is not able to centralize and concentrate the air flow into a central point. And it burns fuel like mad.

So I made myself a forge out of a brake drum off of a semi truck. It probably has about a 13-14 inch diameter and roughly is 8 inches deep. Is it to large a forge for smaller knives and such? I'd also like to be able to have a forge that I can use to forge weld with. What are you guys thoughts on it. Any advise on how to make it perform well? I'll try and post pics as soon as I find my camera. Thanks.