twigg

Just to add to swedefiddle's respone, pictures are very helpful here.

Absolutely will do, Mikey. Here's the complete shopping list for the forge minus the burner: pack of 4 Morgan thermal ceramics, 9-1/2" (L) x 4-1/2" (W) x 2-1/2" (H), bought from Ebay (includes mortar for assembly and repair) a 5lb bucket of plistix, from the IFI store bed frame angle iron for a frame, gotten for a few bucks at the scrapyard And here's the burner parts list (following Frosty's instructions): 3/4" x 1/2" black iron pipe tee (make sure you get the 1/2" side on the 90 and the 3/4" on the straights) a 1/2" x 6" black iron pipe nipple 10 pack of KP2744-025T Lincoln Electric 0.025" mig contact tips (they're threaded 1/4-20 and about 1" long overall) 1/8" brass male-to-male hex fitting

In my opinion, that's the right reason to start a new forge. I'm building my fourth forge for similar reasons. Interesting that the tubing started to melt when you turned off one burner. I think that means that the burner that stayed on starting performing much better, either because of a lack of over-pressure or because the volumetric flow of propane increased (at a lower pressure).

Mail call! Showed up way earlier than anticipated: the one tool that'll make me a better welder

Glad you're planning on ditching the tubing. If you're not familiar, look up "chimney effect" on this forum. It looks like one of your burners has a shut off valve. I'd use that instead of a cap. I've never used one of these T-burners before and I'm not an expert (Mikey and/or Frosty will probably visit this thread sooner or later), but from what you're describing (flames coming up the tubes at higher pressures), I think you've got an overpressure problem. Too much pressure in the forge from too many / too big burners creates a back pressure that chokes up the flow of fuel/air mix. The other thing I'm seeing is the way the flame is pressed up against the floor. I had this behavior on my flat forge when I tried using a 3/4" burner. I think the issue is that your burners are too close to the floor and the flame path is interrupted. Try backing the burners out a bit. Alternatively, both issues could be addressed by making two 1/2" t burners. Check out the pinned threads on this subforum. It's very do-able.

Holy smokes, something just dawned on me. That green beast is drawing at least 292 amps of current (that's assuming it's got a power factor of 100%) and it's totally enclosed! If you stalled that thing (a herculean task to be sure), it could turn into a pipe bomb! Yikes!

There's a very easy fix for some of your issues: put some doors on it! Ask at your local forge supplier for some of their cheapest firebrick. If you use these to partially block the front and back openings. Play around with how much of the opening you block until you get the level of heat and evenness you want. Eventually you'll want to add some structure to retain the firebricks and keep them from falling off. You may not get perfect evenness, but you can compensate for hotspots by moving the steel back and forth in the forge. What kind of work are you gearing towards? That is the key factor that should determine the dimensions of your forge. 30 whole seconds?? That's plenty of time to work it on the anvil That's normal and has nothing to do with your forge. The size and quantity of burners looks a little excessive. Are those 3/4" burners? Also, since the burners are mounted vertically, you're going to want to use copper tubing not synthetic, for the propane line. What pressure of propane are you using? Overall, that's really nice for a first forge. You should see mine

JHCC, I'd love to know how well that respirator works. Thought about getting one of those but didn't want to gamble with my lungs.

Mikey, you're right the bricks are shipping with mortar. I swear I have no idea how I've survived this long with my lack of powers of observation. Frosty, yeah, I'm shamelessly attempting to reproduce teenylittlemetalguy's two brick forge that I saw in some old threads. I've got a crazy busy spring semester ahead of me, so I figure a small, really hot forge can make life a little easier for me when I'm trying to squeeze in an hour here an hour there. If it melts something, oh well.

If you had a gear increaser (whatever the fancy word for that is), you could do some friction cutting! Ever had a perverse desire to cut a ball bearing in half with a bandsaw? Also, Frosty, on my landlord's bandsaw, there's a gaping 2" hole around the blade. I think he lost the piece of the table that's supposed to hug the blade, but they don't make parts for this piece of junk anymore. In any event, it sometimes will suck a piece of cutoff into the hole. Hasn't launched anything yet but it sure is spooky. This bandsaw is hungry

Thanks for the info, I just finished putting orders in for materials. If there is shipping damage to the bricks, would that be an appropriate use case for fireplace mortar (the black stuff that comes in the glue gun)?

Hi all, Mentioned in another thread, but I've decided to move towards a two-brick forge with a 1/2" Frosty T. I don't need to do any forge welding, but I plan on working mainly 1018 and A36 in the near future, so I would love to get white hot temperatures. I've got a handful of questions. Any advice on selecting a K26 firebrick manufacturer? I've never bought anything other than the cheap hard firebrick, and I'd prefer to spend on bricks that I won't regret this time around. I checked the pinned threads on forge materials but didn't find much to go off of. Any tips to make a two brick forge last longer? Can ITC-100HT be applied directly to the firebrick inner surface or does there need to be an intermediary refractory layer?

Chimaera, I love the whale. I've gotta try some of those. I keep hearing people talk about solar heating + water heat pipe + heat exchanger for driveways to melt the snow (here in Colorado I think every house has this feature by default if they have direct sun on their driveways). That's all well and good, but how come no one's made one for socks and gloves like a clothes line? Guilt free warm socks! Thomas, ouch! I hope it heals soon! I got through another two leaves today when my forge started to self-destruct. Lining started falling off in chunks with bits of unrigidized fiber blanket everywhere. At least now I know how I messed up. I checked my bottle of water glass and it's still full. When I did the "rigidizing", I had two zepp sprayers: one for water for buttering and one for the water glass. I must've grabbed the wrong sprayer and used the water twice. D'oh!! Now I get why they dye the branded stuff blue. For dopes like me! Anyways, I'm not happy enough with this forge to justify sinking more time into it. The only thing going for it is size and being sturdy. Time to move on and simplify! There's nothing I want to do that I could do with that forge that I couldn't do with a good hand torch. After that, I did a little burner testing on my 1/2" Mikey burner and there's a lot of secondary flame. The jet ejector tip is wobbling loose even with the set screw... Might be time to retire it. Or solder the loose joint and give it a new life as a hand torch. I'm thinking smaller and hotter for my next forge. Right now I'm thinking of copying teenylittlemetalguy's two-brick forge design with the 1/2" frosty T. That thing looks fun! Going to throw up a thread for advice in the gas forges section.

If I'm not mistaken, the motor only applies the minimum torque necessary to keep spinning, so until you apply a load you shouldn't see a difference. Only practical difference I can think of is how much of a scare you get if something goes wrong and the blade jams up.

Thanks for the input all! I think my big challenges with the welding were visibility (time to replace the screen on my welding helmet, could barely see my own hands before auto darkening) and the rate I was dropping bead (way too fast, had to grind a lot of excess and what I couldn't reach stayed on). I've been blindly trusting the recommended settings on the chart and maybe it's time for me to experiment to get a slower bead. Frosty, hadn't thought of forging the weld bead! I think I'm a little low on heat at the moment. I just got a low yellow yesterday. Need to reline the forge. I think I didn't rigidize deep enough because every surface is moving and flaking off refractory (I did butter first, not sure where I went wrong). Going to have to break off the existing refractory layer, re-rigidize, and re-line it. I didn't put any emissive lining on yet because I wanted to see if the refractory would flake off first. Glad I did that! BillyBones, I think I could a better job on finish work. Gotta put a bough on top!

Alexandr, really nice work as always! JHCC, lol! 671jungle, is there any significance to the different shapes of grafting knives? My dad's a wine buff and the one he uses is shaped like a hook with the sharp edge on the inside (always struck me as a finger amputator!) I finished my decorative twig tonight. Could've done better, but I learned a bunch. Time for me to get a die grinder. Also added some rests on the forge for propping firebricks more snuggly. Now that the firebricks don't lean or fall off, the new forge got significantly hotter tonight.

Good point. I forgot that cost of labor is a modern thing.

Glenn, remind me to never let you near my wrenches! Lol! Thomas, the thought of showing up to a shop like the one in the video and finding it flooded... yiiikes. Man the maintenance on that must be an incredible amount of work. Do you think a facility like this one would've turned a profit back in the day? Just curious for some perspective

I'm imagining a bunch of motor repairers playing ozone Toucan sam. Follow your nose to the busted motor! If you can get your hands 3ish car batteries, that should let you test the motor at the low end. Just don't let it stall and cook itself.

JHCC, and here I was being all millennial. Das, did you put insert nuts in the baseball bat or did your friend cut wood threads onto the spikes? Just curious cause I wouldn't know how to tap something to screw into wood 671jungle, was that a door knob you got the pin stock from? Neat! Got a little time on the forge, started making a decorative 1018 twig, because I need practice and because I didn't feel like working my larger stock because I've once again broken the handles on every 2lb hammer I own. Seems to be a recurring theme. Got two leaves out, was thinning the stem on #2 and I ran out of gas.

Did another round of shop reorganization (landlord's orders) and put 5 listings up on FB marketplace. I'm not lost to the dark side yet, Frosty

When you say they sawed the bearing off, does that mean they left one end of the shaft flapping in the breeze? Sounds legit! Didn't get a chance to do any more forging the last few days due to lack of space. I finished up my reading on open die forging, learned some good stuff along the way. Got a new switch and power cord in the mail to repair a Bosch worm-drive saw I dumpster-dived out. I swear I need to get rid of tools, not acquire new ones! Argh!

JHCC, I'm not expert, but I wouldn't try hardening the 1/4" rods. If something's gotta give, I'd let the rods get eaten instead of the blade.

Oh you are so lucky! Your dad must be looking out for you and your electronics endeavors. If you need a hand on the voltage supply / controller, I'd definitely be game to help out. Way more manageable than a brushless controller!