Charles R. Stevens

Acceptible seals can be obtained with beards, dont belive me check out German police and military from the late 1980's. to assure a good fit and seal, one must be fited and leaktested. Keep your beard trimed. Volentire fire department and I went a few rounds on this one and i still have my beard. We work in the middle of a gas and oil feild, so not only do we deal with toxic smoke but toxic gasses with protective masks and SBA.

I think you cant have tomany forges ;-) build two, three, fore....

With the tweer tangental to the fire pot, it may have been to allow the forge to be used with a crucible for melting babbit or other metal

Coal burns just fine in a side blast, just use side notches on the forge rim or make the tweer so it can be slid up or down about two inches. Otherwise just combine the two in the same box if you make a fire pot that is flat on the front side, you can have a flush tweer in the side and a tweer in the bottom. Drop in a bullet grate and you effectively raise the tweer 2". If you are concerned with ash and fuel getting in the other tweer use a plate either in the bottom or on the side.

Using a large rounding hammer, helpfull for making the points curved. I acualy use my drawing hammer as well. As it has a 2" radius

I'm kind of stuck on the insulation of celings and roofs. The fact that the sun heats the roof and the roof radiates heat down on you means your shop can be hotter than the serounding air temp. This is the same thing that happens to tents with out a fly. Aluminum, unpainted or a parisal roof are also options, as the alluminum reflects most of the radiation from the sun, and a parisal roof is assentinaly two roofs, the bulding and then the detached vented roof. One will also find that locking weels or tall legs makes sweeping up a lot easier. And finaly, drywall is good stuff. As it dosnt burn, so even if you put up 1/2" OSB, cover it with drywall. If you go with coragated sheet steel like we did, back it with drywal if you have a wood frame. I you have a shop fire, it just might be the difference between smoke damage and a compleat loss

The main issue will be with perceptions, and with the fact of a yellow hot peice of steel. A demonstration of a gas forge will show the fire martial that its not an insurmountable obstetrical in and of its self. No worse than a commercial kitchen. The thing that gets you in trouble is "forge" is an industrial tool to most. In your case its a tool for an artist. As to the gas line. Gas delivered to a home or building is regulated down, so you either need a blown forge or a high pressure tap. Look at code for blacksmiths, forges, welding shops, glass blowers, jewelers, and kitchens. In fact some restaurants use charcoal in open hearths and ovens. You have to do your home work, and show them how it has been done in other places. And give them examples of simulare hazards and how they are abated in their jurisdiction. Be prepared, have your belt and suspenders on. Expect the insurance company (yours and the property owners) as well as the fire martial and building code inspector to have crazy, unreasonable additions. Around here we have grocery stores and some restaurants thet have commercial smokers built on covered trailers in the parking lot. Might be an option for you. Sorry for being long winded. Think of the advertising of you setting up in the parking lot, local craft show, gallery opening, etc

Well now, Allen. There are hammers and there are HAMMERS, lol. I guess we could try a 22.5 for a clutch, lol.

My experiance is with hornos and ovens, but lets see if any of this applies. Tho good old soft red clay brick has been used for centuries it realy dosnt like high temp. It spalds, melts and such. Hard red brick isnt any better, and is designed for cement mortor (cement is hard wile lime is soft). The soft yelowish tan "fire brick" does heat much better, but it will still deteriate at high tempetures. So the usual plan is to use fire brick, cut and stacked in such a way that it will be stable with out morter. "Fire cement" may be used but one must have very tight and small joints, and the expension and contraction will crack the morter, and aventualy the brick, so it is important that it is self suporting with out the morter. Now the outer shell is usualy conventenal masonry (red hard brick with cement morter) with a gap between the inner and outer shells. This can be left open, but is usualy filed with a lose, heat resistant material, such as sand, vemiculite or perlite. This isolates the outer shell from the expansion and contraction if the iner shell. As i said, my experiance is not with melting fernaces.

Thanks for the correection (heads up?) Glenn.

In the mean time put the can in a tub of water. I do this all the time with my truck forge

Lumps of coal ;-)

Used 25 gallon greas drums (90w and chasies"

Depends on the size of the fire ball you want to build, how big the pipe is to the forge, how long a run and how many bends. Air is subject to friction loss just like any "fluid". That said, the bigest one can always be controled with a gate or bypas. Wile the smallest can always have a smaller forge built around it. What ever you do, don' reduce the pipe size untile you reach the tweer, minimise your bends (side blast has a distinct advantage here) and mount the blower as close as practical.

I simply clamp thehandle in the vice and resaw with a back saw, makes the slot wider, also make sure the slot is 1/2 or a bit threw the head when instaled, not from the top. Drive in. Cut if the exeses. Press, set wedge cut of the rest if the exese. Set steel wedge.

You will pay it forward

A regular garden rake, with peice of spring welded to the back is servicible for home use. For somthing stout i would agree with TP, you should be able to build 3 or 4 from a 22" cultivator disk. A stout wooden handle is a must That tool is used in conjuntion with a polaskie (axe with a hoe blade on the back) and a sharp round point shovel. Used to fight fire of the USFS. If you plan on using proscibed burns for fuel management, build a slaper from am old mud flap.

Bigger face, keep it curved as to not mar the leather, longer and crved heal to reach into the seams. Not to say that that hammer woultnt be the bomb for some tasks.

Upseting matrix from the compleat blacksmith, tool steel die, like used to double flair tubeing, up set the end over the rod of the anvil (good heat and a big hammer) then cut if and head in a header threw the hardy hole, dedicated heding block (thickness sets length) Lots of ways to skin that cat, in luting forge welding on a head...

1-8-39 threw I-8-45

Blueprints http://www.lrgaf.org/images/blueprints/1-8-39.tif Thats the first page, there are 1/2 a dozen more

I have seen pike heads cut off, drilled and taped from the bottom and used with long bolts. My "truck" anvil uses to heads welded to a piece of angle and screwed to the stand, with a third with a third forged and drilled for a lag to clamp it to the stand. But my shop anvil uses two pieces of chain and 4 lags.

As we started out talking about a power hammer build, assuming a tire/clutch set up, start with the econo spare and call all the auto parts houses for a quote on the rear hub assembly (just make sure its a self contained bolt on unit. If you are an on line shopper sometimes online parts houses can be good to. If your building a trailer, with out breaks, almost any farm store (tractor supply etc.) carries traitor parts, as dose northern tool, granger etc. A good junk yard axle comes from crystler mini vans, as its leaf sprung, and not in high demand. If your looking for salvaged hubs, the absolute cheapest place is to check frame and body shops, as well as suspension/alignment shopts. Wreacks and curb checks often bend the rear axle on front well cars. It may damage the one hub, but usually the other is serviceable.

Depending on the original manufacuer, the part in question goes by all of those names, including "hub asembley" now, if you are looking for the hub, stub axle and baring assembley you will not need the 32mm, it will be held on by 3 or 4 smaller bolts, closer to 19mm This is usualy sold as an assembley. Might check your local parts house for a price before you go to the bone yard. Some times the diference in price is minamal.

Remember, you work it hotter, and its much more plastic. So if you would normaly be at your limit with a 1" piece of steel, you may be able to work a 1 and 1/2 peice.