bluesman7

In the pictures it is JAB.

Back the regulator off before opening the valve slowly, then turn up the regulator slowly. Some 20 pound tanks are touchier than others. Once 
I find good ones, I get them filled instead of exchanging them.

I think that you need a bigger orifice.

I don't know how your idea would work, but it is worth a try.  I've been repairing my soft firebricks  very successfully with Satanite. I've also put a skim coat of Satanite and crushed brick on the face of the brick that takes the brunt of the burner with good results. 

 

 

 They sell a plate that goes over the top of the burner, but are sold out. Can I just put a piece of metal up there to adjust?

I don't know the answer to this. My feelings have always been that you don't want to disturb the flame where the chemistry is happening. Can you adjust the flare on the burners? Making it shorter may make the cone of the flame shorter.

The last time that I stayed at a campground I went to all of the unoccupied sites and collected the charcoal. Had to dry some of it out, but it worked fine. I would recommend a relatively  airtight metal container for this. How many times have you heard "I thought it was out".

That was my thought also, or the metal is in the cone of the flame where there is still free oxygen.

I've never had any problem moving O1 with a hammer.

I just ground a piece of O1. The piece that I have gives orange non branching sparks, but I would not call them short. The chemical composition of O1 does differ from different vendors, so there's that. Short red sparks sounds like stainless to me. Note that martensetic stainless is still attracted to a magnet, so you can't test for it that way.

Opening the valve with nothing attached will definitely  not allow gas out of the tank. The valve has a mechanical interlock to prevent gas coming out without a hose or regulator attached. The interlock has a plastic bushing that melts in case of a fire and also shuts off the flow. Sometimes the plastic bushing gets crushed from use and does not allow the appliance to engage the interlock. There is also a flow restricting valve, as Frosty say's, that could be causing the problem.

I'd repair it, but I would be able to do the repair myself so that changes the economics. Shouldn't be too hard to keep the face below 400 F or so by using  a temple stick. With that much mass, temperatures are not going to be changing very fast.

I had to laugh at the don't risk damaging it comments. As if breaking off the heel was not damage. If someone had repaired it 50 years ago, would it be worth less, or would it be part of it's history? Even if it was somewhat botched. As long as the temper wasn't drawn on the face it would be no worse off. If it was ugly enough just cut it off again and you are back to what you have now.

Not mine so what ever you decide is what is right. Just posting my opinion. 

I've had customers hand me a broken, beat , distorted, often repaired and broken again, piece of hardware with glue all over it,  and tell me not to ruin it. Hahaha.

Edit; Just saw that you have another anvil. I guess if you have the room to have both anvils in the proximity of the forge there is no need for the repair, but also less need for the broken anvil. 

Check makerspaces  in your area.

Grade 60 rebar can easily get hard and brittle. Rebar does not have a specified chemical composition, only a minimal yield strength.

I made my first pair of tongs from grade 60 rebar. They came out fine, but when trying to cold set the bit just a small amount one side snapped. I arc welded the bit and still use the tongs.

You didn't do anything wrong, except for using rebar for tongs.. You may be able to anneal the tongs to drill the hole, or hot punch it, but that still leaves the problem that Charles pointed out with future quenching. I would recommend  hot punching the hole and using them, but do not be surprised if they snap on you at some point.

You may also tell him that if he did get something down a boot or shoe, stepping into the slack tub would not be a bad idea.

I've heard of people who were badly burned, while trying to remove a boot, not even thinking of this. I'm not sure that I would have either.

12 hours ago, Marc1 said:

Alec uses mostly just the one burner, the second occasionally and the third one in the middle he got rid of.

I've never seen any evidence of Alec using less than both of his burners in his large forge.

If you're going to be making billets and folding or cutting and stacking you will be doing a lot of drawing out. Drawing those pieces out to 1/4" thick or so to start will be a small part of the work. I would be sure that I was proficient at welding chromium alloy steel before attempting A billet with those pieces. I have no idea how those pieces will work for damascus, but my gut feeling is that there might not be strong contrast.

8 hours ago, jlpservicesinc said:

Thanks.

Do you mean personally, or for measurements/comparison with a hand?

The anvil is 5.5" wide. Not sure if that  helps.

I meant that I wish that I could hold the pieces personally for a more complete appreciation of your work. Thanks for the anvil dimension, I was guessing close to that.

Very nice. I wish I could see the pieces in hand.

The modulus of elasticity (flex for a given load) is identical for hardened and unhardened steel up to the yield point of the unhardened piece. Since you don't want the spatula to ever take a set (yield), I would harden it. The hardened steel will be able to flex farther without taking a set . 3/32" to 1/8" would be a good place to stop forging IME.

Rocky Mountain Smiths. I'll shoot you  a message.

Cut off a piece of the shank end and make sure that you can harden it. Assuming that it is hardenable, you may be able to untwist it and upset it to get extra thickness.

21 hours ago, Scruffylookingnerfherder said:

Thanks guys. I've had two fires now, so I have enough coke to get the fire going. Now I have to work on controlling my air too, a chunk fell out of my steel yesterday because I got it too hot I work outside though, so sometimes its hard to judge colors.

Thanks for your help!

Scruffy

There is an open forge in Berthoud tomorrow.

On 7/1/2017 at 3:00 PM, Mikey98118 said:

Secondary Air: Merely Bad or outright awful?

Massive quote removed

Hmmm... I have zero secondary air coming into my forge around the burner. The refractory is sealed right against the nozzle. I did open the choke a bit from how it was adjusted for free air. This might explain why my mild steel nozzles have such a long life.

15 hours ago, ThomasPowers said:

 

The first time you light up all green coal the clould of smoke is usually quite bad.  Next time you can start with coked coal and add the green coal around the outside and let it coke up without so much smoke and burn off the smoke it produces

^^This^^

Scruffy, I'm sure that I'm using the same coal as you. If you pile on green coal it will be very smoky. You can start your fire with a bit of charcoal and let the coal coke on the outside of the fireball before moving the coke into the fire. I personally don't like to ever put green coal into my fire, but some do. 

I used to have my tank on the cart under the forge. I've since moved the tank outside with rigid pipe through the wall and up to the ceiling and a drop hose to the forge. There is a shut off immediately after the pipe enters the shop. I feel much better now.