Latticino

Welcome aboard. Might consider editing your profile to show you location, which will help us answering questions down the road. Lots of good info already in the forums. Recommend you read selectively to see if your questions have already been asked to avoid repetition.

Pictures?

Yes you can, but probably shouldn't. In fact at first to learn hammer control I would recommend forging with stock pieces long enough to hold in your off-hammer hand whenever possible. The proper selection and use of tongs is another skill that needs to be learned and it is certainly easier to limit the number of things you are trying to learn simultaneously. Photos, drawings, information about things you are interested in making, a good progression of starter projects. Language and descriptions that are approachable. I like the Backyard Blacksmith and Aspery's first book for beginners. Probably, but that depends a lot on having a proper venting system for your forge. As it was inherited, I assume that it is a coal forge. You will likely need a hood and exhaust stack (flue) to remove fumes. The diameter and vertical rise are the critical parameters, and a sidedraft hood can be relatively easily constructed and supported. Research carefully, take some classes, join a blacksmithing group... Be careful what you follow on YouTube as skill levels and safety precautions are not always evident (though there are some excellent ones as well, as a beginner you may have trouble identifying them). First person training, particularly early, will always pay off. Try to get a class in basic skills first: fire tending, hammer control, tapering, punching, drifting, twisting and scrolls. You will save yourself a lot of time. Crosspost with JHCC lots of overlap, but clearly we agree on a lot...

Not to deliberately shift from the fascinating farrier drift here, but as regards the OP: The only problem you are going to have with these new forge tools (which were sorely needed in the last meeting as I recall), is that they are far too nice and may end up disappearing. Hate to ruin the aesthetics, but perhaps paint the handles some bright fluorescent color...

I participated in a sword forging workshop with Sam Salvati where we used this technique to temper our swords after quenching. Worked well.

I've layered, but never used any kind of glue. I just seal the outer layer once I line it twice. If the density of the 3/4" won't work for the form desired, consider the pleating technique where you can build in almost any liner thickness. Just be sure the blanket is rated for the temperature it will be exposed to or include a cast refractory inner liner

Not going to be definitive on this (Proceed at your own risk), but provided you move the contact point around and ensure that the tank doesn't ever get to the point where the zinc starts to burn off you should be OK. The quenchant inside the tank should keep it cool provided you don't get a local hot spot on the outside. Keep upwind. Not sure how you are heating the object to be heat treated if you only have a propane burner... I would recommend heating the tank using the method I outlined in the previous post. If you see any white smoke, stop! This is nothing to play around with.

Just like any other, more conventional, type of hammer a weight forward hammer can be used for any number of operations, depending on your skill level, its size, weight, face configuration... The one pictured appears to have a pretty aggressive rounded face and should be great for moving material. I've seen weight forward hammers well up to 10 LBS of head weight that were used for anything from striking to solo slitting and drifting of hammer eyes. Of course with a more flattened face they also do very well at final clean up of a beveled knife edge. Nice hammer, going to have to put that on my list to copy. The one weight forward hammer I made to date has a face that is more optimized for finish work.

Very unlikely that any surface zinc on your tub will volatilize at 150 deg.F. The issue is in how you plan on heating that water up. If you use the typical red hot piece of stock carefully swirled around in the quenchant before you actually heat treat you should be fine (I like a meat thermometer to check my quench temperature). Just don't try to heat the tub up with a roofing torch on the exterior surface or similar.

Nice one Bob, love the wood selected for the handle. Some kind of spalted maple? If you don'the mind my asking did you oil quench the 1075, and what quench oil was used?

Coil spring certainly makes a lot more sense. Only thought it was a pulley from the OP.

Might also be left over crayon burning out in the openings of your burner. Amazing how long that can persist. I cured my multiport burner up to 1450 deg. F in my heat treat oven. Looks good to me, though I anticipate that like me you will be working out a more sophisticated door design eventually. Nice job!

Kind of hard to tell from the picture, but if I had to guess I'd say that the pulley has nothing to do with the vise operation (perhaps put there by mistake by someone storing the vise, or just used the post vise location as a transfer location for an idler pulley that changes the direction of a v-belt assembly). Of course I could be totally off base and would love to be educated if so.

Your question is too open ended to respond to. Size and shape of spring, size and depth of opening, material characteristics and size of the "thick metal", tooling and skill level available... all have an impact on how to make holes in metal. Taking a wild stab I would suggest either casting the "thick metal" around a form shaped exactly like the spring, hot slotting an opening and drifting to shape, or CAD/CAM milling of the opening.

Overall sounds pretty good. Response to some of your questions and some suggestions: Make doors on both sides, losses thru the door will be the greatest efficiency loss in your proposed design. A 6 x 6 opening is huge and will be a major loss of heat. Make sure the fiber board you select is rated to full 2,600 deg. F at least. There are many types. I would definitely use at least rigidizer, at least, on top of your fiber board. It will keep it from buckling and keep those nasty short fibers away from your lungs. You might consider a skim coat of refractory cement (build it up in layers, painting on each layer after the rigidizer) or a thin casting of refractory insulation for the inner surface of your forge to add some reinforcement. Particularly as a new smith you will find that you hit the walls with your stock periodically. IF nothing else you will need to have something other than the fiber board directly across from the burner outlet. Outlet temperatures may exceed 3,000 deg. F which will degrade your board. You can direct the burner down towards the kiln shelf, but then need to be careful after use, when the remaining radiant heat from the forge rises up to the burner location 360 cubic inches is generally thought of as a good size for a starter forge with a single burner. While you might want to consider upgrade to a multi-port burner in the future (see Frosty's post on this) you can certainly get by with a single (correctly sized) Naturally aspirated or blown (gun) burner for that forge volume with the insulation you indicate. Nut and bolt construction should be fine. Design to keep the frame cool and you shouldn't have to worry too much about thermal expansion there. Suggest double nutting any long threaded rod.

Just make sure whichever motor you chose is rated TEFC (totally enclosed fan cooled) or encapsulated for washdown (expensive, but possibly available used). The metal dust you generate while grinding is sudden death on typical ODP (open drip proof) motors. The other things to check on replacing motors aside from voltage and phase (which you already mentioned) are mostly physical characteristics and operating parameters. For physical you should at least check the frame configuration (so it will fit into your existing setup) and shaft size and keyway. For operating you should check both horsepower and RPM to meet or exceed your current unit. High torque start is nice, but IMHO not a big deal with a belt grinder as you don't have a huge inertial load to overcome on startup (unless your drive pulley is really massive that is...).

Or you could always go the easy route and pick up a 1 1/2" short nipple (say 3" or so) and a Fernco fitting (rubber no-hub drainage fitting with two hose clamps) to suite the nipple and the blower outlet. A perfect connection doesn't need to be made and you get the added plus of vibration isolation. Of course you have to mount your blower, but I hope you were going to do that anyway. I plan to upgrade from my slip fitting to a 2" pipe on my next build to a Fernco style fitting for just that. Probably costs less than your time in fabricating a steel fitting to suite, though you certainly could if you already had a working forge (be pretty easy out of a 6" long similar pipe nipple. Note that a gate valve will not work as well as a butterfly valve: though the right type can be difficult to source.

I wouldn't do that. The whole reason for the needles is to hold the refractory together if/when it cracks due to thermal cycling. A separate layer would defeat that purpose.

Cute puppy. Ports look good, though you may find them a little long. The dragons breath coming out will heat them up and the door closures at the front will add their volume to your forge chamber (from a capacity standpoint). The extended shelf is nice for supporting stock, but you may find that you want to cut the other three sides down to a 2" length (or consider the cast burner port shown in another topic in this forum). Where is your burner port and burner support? Looks like you have plenty of space above your kitty litter layer and below the openings to put in the burner. I'm still not certain why Don designed this vertical forge with so much "unused" space, but am willing to be educated. Shorter needles look good to me, though I think the ones I used were somewhere in between the sizes you have. In my experience these needles are a real bear to mix into the refractory, but do help in strength and longevity. Strangely any left exposed on the surface burn away, so make sure that they are all well covered with refractory when you do your casting.

I'm not an electrician, but here are a couple of things I would do to this one. First I would attempt to determine whether the switch had failed or the motor. That should be as easy as getting a power cord wired directly to the motor, plugging it into one of the ubiquitous switched power strips we all have around these days, keeping all body parts far away from the fan in case there is a short, and turning the power strip on. If the fan spins, replace the switch. Of course you could just also test the switch with a continuity tester, but based on your previous questions I'm not sure you would have one. If the fan spins rewire same through a new toggle switch switching the hot lead (hopefully you know how to identify the hot and neutral leads of an AC circuit, if not get a basic wiring manual and learn this before going any further). Make sure before use to check the metal fan casing and ensure that it isn't shorted to power to avoid future shocks. If the motor doesn't spin in the previous test, then it needs to be repaired or replaced. A Volt Ohm meter might help in determining if the motor wiring has shorted (a distinct possibility given the signs of burning insulation you noted and the gradual slowing down the previous owner mentioned). I'm not sure if these old motors had starter capacitors like newer ones. If it does a simple capacitor replacement might do it. I assume that you have already checked to see that the fan blades rotate smoothly without being powered to eliminate the chance that the bearing are seized? That is all I got. Hopefully a real electrician like Steve can chime in and assist.

Someone at Quad State was selling old wooden bobbins to use as file handles. Thought it was an elegant solution myself, but for some reason didn't buy any. They looked just like these:

Not familiar with the "red" power hammer, though it does appear to be a version of an Oliver style to me. Can't watch the video at this point, but from the photo the anvil section looks pretty light duty (unless solidly steel stock which the exposed bolt heads appear to contradict) and the head weight is light as well. Certainly would still be better for drawing out than by hand (though it won't compare to even a 25# Little Giant in my opinion), but I'd be very sure of my welding abilities before I stood in front of that hammer head. The other hammer is more properly termed a treadle hammer, not a power hammer. These are more typically used for punching, chasing, chiseling and the like than drawing out. That being said, I have a 4-bar one like the one pictured and love it. Have used it for some limited forging as well as the specific techniques listed above. Works well in combination with flatter and fullering tools, but again won't perform up to a true power hammer for drawing operations IMHO.

I was one of those guys. Ran into Tom on the last day, but he was being pulled along by someone and seemed to be on a mission, so I didn't get to chat. Many good deals also went with the auction (very nice, large, CI forge table with extremely smooth functioning Champion 400 hand blower for around $350, and another one in less good condition, but with two loose blowers for under $150). Weather was hot, but at least no rain. Along with a large range of anvils there were expensive swage blocks, both mechanical and air operated power hammers (one needing extensive repair went for around $500), a nice hydraulic press, gas forges, post drills, solid fuel forges, a huge array of both new and old hand tools, high carbon steel stock, knife making materials, books and belt grinders. I filled my car...

Hope I was clear with that comment. It is hard to describe in text, but a picture would do much better. I meant that the material should touch down initially in the center of the width of the billet, then be worked towards the outer edges. Some folks slightly crown their layers to assist with this. I was not referring to where to start welding along the length of the billet. The key is to get any flux or slag to migrate to the outside before the outer edges are welded. Good luck.

In a vertical forge the top of the forge will be the hottest location, needing the most insulation. Normally I would recommend (2) layers of your 1" board and at least an inch of cast refractory insulation. I'm a big fan of over-insulating my chambers to cut down on heat loss, but structurally the 2" isn't too far out of line depending on the eventual design of the keeper ring. However it will certainly add mass, so if you want a faster to heat forge I would go with the 2" of board, or 1" of board with 1" of blanket behind it, and 1" of castable insulation. Might want to consider adding some stainless needles to the latter for extra strength. If you are encapsulating the board with castable refractory insulation you should not need to also stiffen it. It comes pretty stiff from the factory. The water is to keep the board from sucking the moisture out of the cast insulation during the drying. A better method might be to use a layer of consumable wax paper between the layers and let it burn off during use. This is just theoretical though, I've never done it that way.