Ross_FL

That's not a forge, that's a dumb friend who thinks his Xterra can conquer anything. I must have added it because when I made the thread id didn't give me the option to see the pictures. Is there a way to delete it? Also, I was wondering about adding more pressure, I just didn't want to damage anything before I posted a few pictures here, you know, to get a go ahead of some sorts. I can def. put a section of wool in the back, I will do that tonight when I turn the forge back on.

This is a great website, it is what pretty much motivated me to try and become a blacksmith. Also, the T-Rex burners are great. I have the 1" and it is amazing, much nicer then anything I could have ever build.

Also, I noticed after this firing of the forge, the wool has become stiff possibly even expanded, which actually enhances the forge as cylinder is now pretty much immobilized inside the steel can. You can also see the other items I have to work with right now (itc and brick) but I also have about 2 more feet of wool.

I fired my forge last night to get a feel of it's limitations. I've fired it a few times before to test it's functionality and tweak it, but last night it stayed on for about an hour. Basically, there is a 6" long cylinder with 1" thick walls made from castable refractory. The inside is coated with itc. The wool was wrapped around and it was inserted into a steel can. Uncoated soft brick is used to close the ends. I will eventually replace with hard brick and coat with itc. It takes about 20 minutes to really get going, and stays glowing for about half an hour after I turn the gas off. The piece of metal I used in the test was hot bar stock 20" long x 2" wide x 1/4" thick. It would get right in between orange and white, but not what I think would be welding temperature, which is what I eventually want it to do for me. Overall, the forge works great besides for that one detail. Does anyone have any ideas or tweaks to boost the temp? BTW - I was running about 5 psi from a 10 psi max regulator. I can turn it up, but I fear I might melt the aluminum conduit. I will be replacing it eventually with something more suited. Thanks!

Damascus Mike, If you would like I can mail you borax, it's something I can get any day of the week as well as just about anything you need to weld with. It's not very expensive, $6USD. Sned me a message if you want to talk about it.

I had the same problem, I was trying to forge a piece of 1" wide bar of steel that was 1/8" thick and only a foot long. It would get cold really fast, I was able to hammer it 5-8 times before it needed to go back in. To keep forging this piece into a dagger I hit the anvil with a heat gun for a few minutes and turned the reg up all the way to 10 psi and got the piece very very hot. I've only used the forge a few times so far but I will always use the heat gun from now on. Also, the problem went away when I forged a 1" diameter round, it stayed hot for quite a while.

Update: I have found an ebook dealing with exactly what I am looking for, titled Metallurgy of Steel for Bladesmiths. It reads like a theoretical physics book, but I am not having too hard a time and it seems well written. It looks like my local metal supply has 440c SS, as well as many other SS and carbons, but from what I have read, treating 440C is a very difficult thing to do. Anything wrong with picking up a few bars of 440c?

I am looking for good sources to read about metal selections used for blades. I'm mainly interested in bladesmithing, so that's all I am going to focus on and I eventually want to get into the finer methods, but that's down the road. Right now I need to learn about specific single types of steel and their characteristics. I've searched the forum and have not found any threads, and I don't expect anyone here to go in depth into this question, but if you do that would be great!! On Monday I will be making the trip to Alro Metals in Winter Springs Florida. They have many different varieties of stainless and carbon steels, and many other metals. I believe they even supply titanium. thanks in advance!!

I recoated the interior with ITC, and simply put 2 layers of 3" wool on the bottom of the forge and have gotten the heat time way down, and my test rod has gotten much hotter and stays hotter out of the forge. Monday I will go to the pottery store and get a piece of shelf to coat with itc and mount on top of the wool for durability purposes. I also coated the soft brick that I use to seal off the two sides of the forge cylander with ITC and I think that has helped alot. I should be able to weld with ease with this gas forge at this point, however that's quite a ways down the road.

Takes it about 15 minutes to heat the forge, I will most likely re coat. Any advice for applying with a brush?

Do you have Harbor Freight in your area? It's very mild steel, but will work to fool around on.

I bought a pint of ITC-100 about 4 months ago, about 2 months ao I used it to coat the inside of my forge. Two questions, how do I know if I applied it properly because I have found no descriptions of the finished surface or pictures of a good coating. Second, if I didn't coat it properly and a re-coat is needed, what is the shelf life of the pint I bought? I have plenty left, hopefully it's still good. Thanks in advance if you know your ITC-100!!

Frosty, I'm actually not new here, just got laid off, forgot my user name, can't use my old jobs email and therefor had to make another name. You actually helped me build my gas forge. I knew there was going to be a problem with filling the forge with the heavier refractory would be problematic, I was just not sure why. Question, I have plenty of left over itc100, what is the shelf life?

Looking to reduce the inside area of my forge in an effort to increase heat and heating time. What material would be the most efficiant? I was think about using crumbled pieces of the greenlite-45, which is what the forge itself is made from. Any other ideas?