Latticino

I remember those old Johnson Natural Gas forges. They still have one in use over in the Metal Sculpture shop over at Rochester Institute of Technology (where Bill Moran taught a class back in the '80s that I unfortunately missed). As Frosty says, horribly inefficient, huge thermal mass, with a ribbon style burner with a metal slide to change the outlet length (if I recall correctly). The best that can be said about those forges is that they are pretty much bulletproof, which is why they ended up in so many educational institutions (back when they were actually teaching tradecraft that is). There is a young man over there currently who is turning out some nice pattern welded billets and making knives from them. I'm not certain if he is using the gas forge, but I don't recall seeing any other forges in the shop.

Yes, Buffalo has an active chapter of the NYSDB (Niagara region). There are quite a few talented smiths in that group with plenty to teach. Unfortunately Theo, in Brooklyn if I recall correctly, is a good 7 hr drive away. New York may not be as large as Alaska Frosty, but it is no Rhode Island either...

Suggest you look at Ken's Custom Iron, who make their "Quick Tongs" in a similar method. Not sure if, including the cost of materials, labor and utilities you would be able to beat their pricing: https://kensironstore.com/collections/quick-tongs/products/best-selling-quick-tongs-bundle-set

I have also tried to contact Euclids to get more information. One thing that concerns me is the composition of what they are calling a high alumina kiln shelf. Their site says it is Cordierite - Mullite. According to other research on refractories I've done this material combination may only be rated for 2,150 deg. F, which may be an issue in some forges, and certainly for flame impingement. Of course, what the material is rated for doesn't necessarily mean we can't use it for a forge floor at higher temperatures, just that it may not be able to be used as a wall or ceiling element at elevated temperatures. This is the site I used for additional info: http://www.usrefractories.com/products/prod04.htm

Welcome to the site. Fantastic job for a first try at tongs, wish mine had looked that good. I suggest for the first couple of tongs you drill the rivet holes rather than trying to punch and drift. Timing gets tricky for that operation, if you don't have a more experienced smith nearby to guide you through it the first time. I recommend that you practice punching and drifting on bar stock first (say 1/4" thick) to get a feel for how it is done. Typically I do my "front" punch at almost an orange heat and hit the punch no more than three times before cooling the tip of the punch in water (to keep the tool from overheating and deforming). Rinse and repeat until the punch feels like it "bottoms out" against the anvil. Steel should then be dull red at best, possibly showing no color. Flip billet and look for the cold black mark from your front punch. A quick punch on that side should knock out the plug. This needs to be done at a black heat or the plug will just deform to the other side. Needless to say it is easier with thinner stock. From what you are showing I can only expect that you were working the steel too cold. Remember as the crossection gets thinner it heats and cools more rapidly. I don't see any sign of your punching the bolster in the photo. Also check the steel to see if truly mild steel. Using mystery steel from the scrap yard is always a bit of a challenge. Test it with a "snap test" to be sure before putting too much more work into it.

Just to clarify, though I don't disagree with any of Thomas's points, the site the OP has referred to is not a forum, per se, but an informative site setup by a fellow who is extremely generous with his time in posting about blacksmithing and associated tools. His site is chock full of great information, in particular on old post drills, and was extremely helpful in assisting me to get mine arraigned to function well. My guess is that he got a bit upset with the, likely manly insistent newbie questions from folks assuming that because he was kind enough to post some great background information that he would be available to walk them through any equipment repairs. Here is the site: Link removed as the post was a long time ago (1999), and does reflect well on the site.

Suggest you seal the frax with before coating with Plistix to avoid wasting the expensive IR reflective topcoat product.

Haven't built a solid fuel forge myself (as yet), but just curious why folks don't just use commercially available cast iron floor drain covers for their grates. You can get them either perforated or slotted in different sizes: https://www.hardtofinditems.com/floor-drain-covers/ Pricing seems pretty reasonable to me.

Check out this video of Jason Knight forging a point on rectangular stock: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqCieOsxlrc. Note that he hangs the stock a little past the edge of the anvil and then forges the point down later in the process. This works pretty well for limiting fish mouth, but I'm not sure how it would influence a precise pattern welded billet.

Not sure what your issue is with interpreting the Wiki page as regards the style of tanto you are looking to make. To me it looks like all the info is there for you. If you are having trouble with the proportions, you can always use the Xerox trick: Print the image of the blade profile then use a Xerox machine to scale it up or down till it matches the general length and width listed on the Wiki page. The convex portion of the blade crossection is generally only roughly forged then ground to final shape, as far as I know. Slack belt on a grinder, or resilient backed hand sanding "platen" will get you that shape fairly easily. Of course that is trusting what you see on Wikipedia. Going to a source of an actual blade, as Thomas suggested is much better. If you are planning on forging an effective blade you will want to make sure that you use high carbon (tool or spring) steel, not just some random scrap. Starting your forging trying to make a tanto is pretty ambitious. Might make sense to try to pick up some basic forging skills first. You will also need to learn a lot about heat treatment and blade grinding.

Well done for your first forging, particularly forging down what looks like either 3/4" or 1" bar stock. Couple of suggestions for future improvement, if you plan on making more knives: Work on your hammer and fire control to minimize scale formation and hammer head marks in the final product. Steel seems to show some signs of being overheated and burning. Be careful as the blank gets thinner, it will heat much more rapidly. Use high carbon (tool or spring steel) for making knives. The heat treating process is really the heart of making a good functioning blade, secondary only to grinding the correct geometry (which is actually where you have done the best in this first effort: decent first full grind) Plan out what you mean to forge before starting. Looks like you are somewhere in between a full and hidden tang with this one. Forging the tang of your blade is one of the bigger advantages of forging a knife rather than just using stock removal. Heat treatment must be done before riveting the handle in place. Get a heavy duty butcher block style wire brush and use it to help with scale buildup and final finish Take a bladesmithing class to accelerate your learning process. Get and read a couple of the better knife forging books for additional info (Jim Hrisoulas, Steve Sells...).

Love the bench, very clean design and assembly, but am a little confused. Looking at it I see a total of 5 bends (one which might have been able to do cold with the right equipment and the others with a torch) and two smaller (length wise) scrolls. Yet you say you used 210 lbs. of coal, what am I missing?

Don't know anything about the CDBA, but as a member I can recommend going to the NYSDB meetings if you are able to get there.

Recommend you go to the NEB meet at Ashokan. Great place to meet other smiths and they have a decent tailgate section. Last year someone brought in an, admittedly rough, 115# anvil and let it go for $125, if I remember correctly. Would have been a good starter for sure. Otherwise there are plenty of make do alternatives, depending on what you plan on forging.

Don't get me wrong, you did great for a first forge weld. Was just trying to help with your next one.

Extremely nice job. I have a similar one that I inherited from my father in law that I use for jewelry projects, though mine has a hardy hole. Might want to put in a prichel hole at least. It also looks like you may have welded on a top plate. If you did, was it a full penetration weld? What kind of steel did you use for the top plate? How did you heat treat it?

Looks like you got a forge weld, but would have to grind or do a peel test to be sure. Cold shunts at the tips of each bar most likely due to lack of scarf before assembly. "Tear" at location of weld can be due to forging the welded area at too low a temperature. If your hammering will put a stress on the welded joint (i.e. forging in the orientation that is 90 degrees rotated from the forging you did to initially bond the surfaces) it is recommended that you keep the stock at close to welding temperatures until the weld is completely set (and probably thereafter for that matter...).

Looks like a winner to me. Hard to tell from the photos, but do you have a full circumferential weld at the outlet fitting (concentric pipe fitting welded to the discharge side of the mixing chamber)? If you don't, I would highly recommend you complete the weld in that area. I always prefer to have bubble tight joints for piping that has either gas or a gas air mixture. You don't want fuel mixture leaks adjacent to your forge skin. I would be interested to know where your gas orifice tip is located verses the concentric reducer at the entrance to the mixing chamber. Try it inside a forge and see how it performs.

Yes the real world is more complicated than this, mostly because of friction and boundary effects inside these nozzles and at their exit. The boundary layer adjacent to the walls of a pipe can have a very significant effect on how much fluid flows through that pipe as well as the local velocity of the jet at the exit (many smaller pipes is not directly equal to one larger one as regards fluid flow given the same upstream pressure). You didn't think the gas/air mixture inside the burner was flowing at a constant velocity at each crossection did you? This doesn't even include issues with turbulent verses laminar flow (note I'm not saying that the mixture flow inside the pipe is either, haven't done the Reynold's number calcs. but it does make a significant difference) and the end effects of a jet exiting the orifice itself. Personally I think that the turbulating end effects may be a big part of why the ribbon burners slow the flow down so abruptly and consequently work well, but I haven't done any of the analysis, so that is just speculation.

Short answer: No Long answer: Residential natural gas is typically at a MUCH lower pressure than what you use from your propane tank (1/4 psi verses up to 30 psi). If you have a Naturally aspirated (ventauri) burner the air is entrained by the gas escaping through an orifice at high velocity. That velocity is proportional to the upstream gas pressure. Lower pressure means lower amount of air entrained (not to mention less gas as well). This will lead to a malfunctioning burner. If you are using a forced air burner (with a blower) there is a chance that you can just replace your burner orifice with a larger one and get it to work. Orifice size is critical, and expect to need a much larger natural gas line than the propane line (for the reason listed above). See that Thomas has beaten me to the punch this time. As far as I can quickly read, his recommendations are correct, as usual.

That is how I have done it in the past. I suppose you could try to assemble it on the knife while putting on the scales, but I think that would be a bear to align, not to mention drilling the rivet holes.

Sounds to me as if he is looking for a small manufacturing facility, not a one person shop (unless he is just trying to scam you out of a prototype or two - how reputable is this guy?). Ask yourself this: If I get an order for several hundred of these will I end up hating blacksmithing after I'm done? Do I have the equipment, or am I willing to purchase it and set it up on speculation, to go into limited production (and how does that coordinate with the price point for each item)? If it were me I would likely want at least a hydraulic press for the punch and tapered swage, a big belt grinder to clean up the edges quickly, and possibly a fly press for the subtle curvature. How precise will the multiple items have to be to match the design and how good are you at working to spec? Is he going to accept handcrafted variation or will he be looking for a more "machine" grade set of multiples? What about product liability?

I haven't done a ton of welding cable, and hopefully someone with more experience than I have will chime in, but I've found that using a half round crossection bottom fuller or swageblock half round channel to forge into helps with welding cable quite a bit. Also I would suggest using your twisting wrench to twist the cable tighter before welding the center section. What has worked for me is forge welding the two ends, heating to red and wire brushing and fluxing liberally, then heating again and twisting tightly. Reflux and only then I go for my forge weld of a couple of inches at a time. Probably go faster with a press, but all I have is a hand hammer and treadle hammer at this point.

Yes that is the intent of the clay. Did that when I had a cheap source. No I don't believe that Casto lite is considered rammable.

Well I was not going to add any comments to this discussion, but after reviewing rookieironman's previous posts I guess I have to. In one of them I attempted to assist him in his design for his first gas forge (along with several others). While I would never promote myself as an expert in smithing, I do have a fair grounding in gas forge design, and in particular with use of forced air burners (P.E. specializing in HVAC design with years of experience designing, building and using forced air burners, both for off hand glass blowing and for the last couple of years for ironworking). I find his continued negative feedback for folks donating their time to try to help him inappropriate. I have a very, very short list of "ignored" members. He has now joined it.