evbob

Wow I'm still learning so much from this post, this for is great!

First off I want to say thx to all who helped me! Second I want to say I try ed what you said, I took a pant can and cut it bringin my charcoal closer and I used way less air. When I did this I used one back for 9 hours of forging and made a cool little knife! There's even a little left over. Thanks for all you help!

Thanks for the help, Glenn the water was just to put a little on the out side so it didn't burn all of it at once just what I wanted. Mr. Stevens I am interested in getting some coal and trying the cave method, as that might suit me alittle better and my forge. What do you think?

Chico, Chino couple hours away. So ill try to bring in my fire circle, adding a little water to the edges and building it up under the metal. Ill also try slowing the air down too.

See that's what im saying you got 6+ hours out of a bag, and I got 3. Im going to try what people have said today and I'll get back to you if it last longer this time.

Where do you think I should get good coal, thats not to expencive. Sorry for so many questions I'm very new to this.

Oh ok! About the secound part of my question?

M Cochran about how many hours can a bag last you of royal Oak?

Excuse me if I’m wrong but what you saying is I need to make the sides of my forge taller so I can put more charcoal under the metal, makes sense. Also the forge I have is it made for coal or charcoal, and what brand or type do you suggest?

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I'm sorry i was out of town for the night, will post a picture when I get home. Did water help you? How long did a bag last you and was it like mine?

Thank you for all of your post, but no ones really told me why I'm burning though so much charcoal. I have been researching and people say that the same stuff I used they used and it lasted 12 hours and burned alot hotter. I am looking into ordering some smithing coal, but i am still wondering why my charcoal is doing this. I read in one post someone used water to spray the top alittle, but that was with coal. Would doing this work with charcoal and make my bag last longer? The pic is the charcoal I used.

Glenn it was a 18lb bag of hard wood lump charcoal. My forge bowl is 2 1/2 feet wide and about 4in deep. I had a good pile over the air vent but everytime I pulled the metal out I had to add another hand full of charcoal just to keep it going. I live in chico CA, and I have talked to some black smith's about how to forge and got some training but we didn't talk about fuel. I am still young and work part time so I don't have alot of money, that in mind I won't be able to do this if it is costing me 30$ a day. I'm willing to put money in it but that just seems like alot.

Ok, I just started black smithing today and ran into a bit of a problem. I got the forge and it works great, its a cast iron bowl with a hand crank blower. I lit the fire and threw in a piece of metal, at first I used a little charcoal but that didn't seem to get it hot enough, so I add a lot more and this worked. The problem is i burned through a 14$ bag in 3 hours and just flattened a piece of metal. Sense i am new to this i am not sure if this is normal, I need help why am i burning through so much charcoal!