Slyfox

Thanks for all the advice guys. I suppose I should give a bit more info about the floor since almost every thing about the shop we built ourselves except for the concrete pouring itself. After the stem walls were poured we spent a couple weeks pulling a compactor sled around the area for a few hours each day and filling in low spot. The shop itself is 40'x80' so it was a pretty large area to cover. It wasn't until after this though we decided to actually have the heated floors so we ended up scraping away the top few inches for the foam then compacted again but I don't think we spent as much time on the second round. The ground was already pretty hard I think, its been three or four years now so I don't remember exactly. Next we laid out all the high density foam, I want to say it was 3" thick though it might have been 4", then we stapled the PEX hose straight to it so the heat pipe is all the way at the bottom of the slab. We did that because we knew we may end up needing to bolt machines down, though a power hammer probably wasn't one of the planned machines. Not sure that there is much to do to determine where the lines run since the heat might be too dispersed by the time it reaches the surface, but we have a AutoCAD file somewhere that should show the relative layout of where all the lines are run. Just got to find it. Actually though, looking at Hans' machine and its base I might have come up with an idea. A similar wooden base, though perhaps thicker and wider for my machine, but instead of bolts going down into the floor the base runs up against and then uses brackets to bolt to our stem wall which is a foot and a half tall and 6" thick with rebar running through it. The wood platform would help cushion and spread the impacts and bolting to the stem wall could prevent sideways movement. Does that sound like a workable solution?

Hay guys, so I've kinda fabricated myself into a bit of a corner with my new toy. Just finished building myself a new style kinyon power hammer with a 125# head that's getting its paint job at the moment. I'll put a pic below of its unpainted self. My issue is the floor of my shop. The whole hammer weighs around 1400# according to my CAD sofware and was walking around while i was testing it out, and making a pair of damascus knives I had to rush for Christmas gifts. The obvious solution is to bolt it down which I intended to do. But now that the time for it has come I'm not so sure I want to, or can. The typical solution from what I've read is to cut a hole in the floor and dig a few feet down to pour a larger foundation for the hammer that's separate from the main floor. The problem, my shops floor has heat pipe running through it to keep it warm during the winter. The floor is about 6" deep but I'm sure that's not nearly enough. So far the best option me and my father have thought up would be to pour another cement pad roughly 48"x30"x10" that the hammer and sit up on and be bolted to. This would be a temporary solution as the hammer's final resting place will be under a large car port on the side of the shop that hasn't been built yet. But would this idea work very well? Would the floor have a problem with it? Would the pad just start sliding around with the hammer? Are there other options we've not come up with yet? Thanks for any input you guys can give Bren Leach Slyfox Forge

Thanks for all the responses. I've been trolling about the forums for a bit trying to discover what others had found. I wasn't so much worried about the SuperWool melting per say, more crumbling. I used a bit to block up one end of my forge for a bit and after a week or so pulled it back out to find it had hardened up and became a bit brittle. I just wanted to make sure that didn't happen too quickly in this new forge where I couldn't tell it was happening. And yes I initially started out making knives by stock removal and used a torch and some soft fire bricks originally for heat treating. Lucky for me my shop is full of all kinds of CNC tooling so building burners isnt too much of an issue. Got a lot of pipe and fitting parts leftover from when the compressed air system was installed around the building. Was going to put together another 3/4" sidearm burner, the only thing I'm missing for it at the moment is the reducing tee. And if I need to I can hook up a small blower I have at times to crank up the heat.

Hello all, I've got some questions for everyone who's more knowledgeable in forge building. I built my own forge several years ago but only in the past few months have I been starting to use it most days as I'm trying to turn this hobby into a business. Anyways I find my current forge lacking in some ways, the openings are a bit too small for the things I want to put in, the chamber is a bit big for what does go in (currently a double burner setup) and the refractory coating on the kaowool has been patched several times and in need of it again. So I figure its about time I make a new one more suited for what I'm doing now. The plus side is I have a bunch of SuperWool and Kast-o-lite 30 leftover from making my HT oven that I was thinking about using those as the lining. My current idea is to make a chamber roughly 9"x7"x4.5" (subject to change a little), the lining would be 2" of the SuperWool and then I'd cast up some 1"ish plates of the Kast-o-lite 30 for the "coating". I know the SuperWool has a rating of 2300~ degrees F but with the 1" of cast able refractory, rated for 3000 degrees F, between it and the heat how long would the SuperWool last going up to forge welding tempts? I know the refractory will act as somewhat of a heat sink but I'm willing to take that efficiency loss to protect the SuperWool if it can and move from a double burner to a single.

There might be a few tractor rental places nearby that will probably have forklift loaders. Kinda live out in the sticks so not a lot of choice for things locally.

Thanks for the quick replies and if 1/4" radious is good perhaps I've been working with too small of stock this whole time. And the hardy tool is probably the way to go if I do want sharper edges on occasion. Is there anywhere online I'd be able to get a chunk of forklift tine? Going to scrap yards is somewhat difficult as the closest real one is probably 2 hours away. I'm out near Astoria, OR

Hay everyone, several years ago my grand father handed his old anvil that he had gotten from his father over to me. What looks to be an old Peter Wright. As of two year ago I started putting it to use, making knives here and there and just generally fixing things. Also coming up in a few weeks I have a booth for a local farmer's market that I'd like to include hand forged items in. One thing that's always bugged me about it though is the lack of any square edges. All of it is 1/4-1/2" radius where its not been chipped and its been a trial just to make tongs. I know a lot of you will just say use i as it is but it would be nice if I could get at least one edge square for at least a few inches. Anyways, pictures down below, let me know what you all think.