lonewolf74

Thanks! I will definitely look into the AFC. And I have always been a bit of a scrounger. Seems like as soon as I get rid of something I find a new use for it and want to kick myself!

Hi all, my name's Adam and I'm in Elmore County, Alabama. Just started attempting to smith and found these forums. Certainly a wealth of knowledge here!
Made my forge from "junk" from around the house. Previous owner left an electric, shop-vac, leaf blower half buried in mud; which I stripped and cleaned for my air source. Runs great, but I had to make a sort of extension cord/ dimmer switch to regulate the airflow or my coals just get blown everywhere. The forge itself is a conglomeration of a satellite dish, spare car wheel, bed frame, and rusty cheap barbecue grill. All of which were free. Ugly but, as i found out accidentally, she'll melt steel with charcoal as fuel. Using two, hundred poundish (<-made up technical term) rocks, and about a 25 pound piece of railroad track as anvils. Aside from various claw hammers, i have a 24oz ball peen, and 3 pound cross peen from good 'ol harbor freight that seem to be holding up for now. I will be making my own charcoal with an old barbecue grill and a hole-in-the-ground fire pit for fuel for now. Learned a lot just from reading this site, but there's nothin' like firin' up that forge and havin' at it!