LemonAden

So It took me about 6 times of blackening and then cleaning before I got it where I wanted it to be. I tried the linseed/turp/beeswax mix and hated it. I tried heating the metal to blue and then using just linseed oil and hated it. I also tried using chemicals while the metal was cold and hated it. Then I tried heating them and painting with used motor oil and what do you know, they are exactly where I want them to be! I am going to rework the pintels a little but but otherwise I am happy with everything. Hopefully our door is finished soon!

Thanks so much! I will try it out this week

My ash dump actually has a lever on it and I can control how open or closed it is. It stays put also. You think this would be enough to pull off some of that heat? Awesome suggestion! Thanks

Hmmm. I will look into this. I am not sure where I could put this on my particular blower/forge but I will ask Centaur Forge if they sell anything

It is getting much hotter than I need! I did try wetting some of the coal but it doesn't take long to burn off. Even with my electric blower on the lowest setting it gets very hot, very fast.

Thank you very much for sharing this! I am still undecided about what size pipe I will go with. I am using my forge by moving it outside while I get comfortable with it and decide where I want to put it and what size pipe I will use. A local welder said he could convert the hood to fit a 12" flue should I decide to go in that direction. I am having some issues with my coal bed getting very wide and burning through coal very fast so I might try containing the coals in a smaller area using some fire bricks or something. I am only working with small round and square stock right now and would like to keep the are burning thin rather than fill up my entire fire box to help use less coals.

Thanks for the suggestions. The red came from after heating them on the forge before bending them. I didn't brush it off prior to applying the finish which I should have. I will try and wire brush it off and then refinish it tomorrow. Do you think putting them in my kitchen oven at 500 degrees would be sufficient for uniform heat? I won't get consistency on the forge. Thanks!

Just posting a quick update on my project. With some of your advice I got the courage to modify my door straps. To make the modifications match on both straps I used painters tape to hold them together and heated them in my forge. I used the horn on my anvil to move the bends and curl them inward, reducing the overall length of the straps to fit my new door size. I also made a mixture of linseed oil, beeswax and turpentine, heated the straps in my kitchen oven and then painted on the mixture to blacken them. The mixture made them look nice but you can still see a bit of red through it. I am not sure what the red it? Maybe rust? It came through in spots where I heated to make my bends. I might keep it showing or fix it with any suggestions you all might have? Overall I am very happy I was able to do this. No touch mark stamp yet so I can't put that on it but maybe for the next project.

I might just have to do that! I have been planning this door for 5 years so it means a lot to me and I would love to put my mark on it! Looking at the entire strap I do believe it is something I could strive to make some day. I only began this hobby so that I could make things like this and other farm/garden/home type things so I am pretty excited to see what I can do going forward! Anvil, thank you very much for the offer to help! I will shoot you a PM when I am ready to start the project. I asked my carpenter to bring me a cardboard cutout of the door so I can have it ready before I do any work.

Good idea! I do have bending forks and a scrolling wrench. No post vice yet but I am looking for one.

Thank you! For this piece I would prefer to do it cold, probably with a wooden mallet or bat if possible. Will certainly heat for the linseed and beeswax!

I will certainly start collecting some scrap so I can learn to identify different metals. I am new with this as a hobby. I grabbed a photo with my grinder on the back side of the strap and am attaching it. The sparks looked more orange to me than yellow and from looking at some diagrams online I am seeing mild steel but not sure of course.

Thanks for suggesting the spark test Thomas. If I were able to do this on my grinder and take a video when its dark in my shop would the video be enough to help determine the metal?

My home is a beautiful 1812 Colonial with a very ugly and modern entry door on one of the sides of the home. I was planning for several years to hire a carpenter to build me a new door around these gorgeous strap hinges/pintels I found at Brooklyn Restoration in CT (amazing place if you have never been). I purchased them prior to ever thinking I would get in to forging and have run into a small problem I was hoping for some advice with. The carpenter was originally going to build the door to the size of the straps but we had to cut that size down a bit and now the straps are too large. He suggested I take them to a smith and get the ends that rest on the pintels cut refit to the pintels because I am not yet comfortable doing that myself (the straps were expensive and apparently very old), but then I thought that rather than cut them back I could personally fire up my coal forge and hammer them out a bit at the curve to make it a wider curve which would reduce the overall length of the straps to fit the door (and I think it would make them look a little nicer). The problem is that I have no idea what kind of metal this is or if I can even successfully do this myself and I also don't want to lose strength in the metal. Thoughts and suggestions are appreciated and a photo is included.

Thank you all very much. I am on the fence about it. It would be much easier to size up to 12 if the 8 doesn't work out. I can DIY the install. Closing up the sides won't work for me as the things I want to make are long (garden stakes and such). If I do size up I have no problem using some mapp gas to get it warm in winter. I am in RI so it does get cold. I am curious to see your hood Irondragon. I won't cut into mine myself but there is a guy who I can take it to locally.

Thank you Glenn. I tried to explain this to them and they ended up giving me an analogy about how a straw works great when its a smaller diameter but when you go with a wider straw you have to exert more effort to use it. That didn't work for me. To confirm what you said, you think I could use a conversion coupling and size up from the 8" hood to either a 10 or 12? I am pretty amazed at the percentages you mentioned and it makes sense.

This is my first post here and I figured I could start my adventure into learning to forge by getting some advice on proper forge ventilation. I purchased a great coal forge for myself from Centaur Forge. It came with a half hood and also blower and I have been practicing outdoors while I sort out the location I want to install it in one of my workshops. This morning I had some contractors out that deal with wood stove installations and to make a long story short they are quoting me between 4-5k to install 14' of pipe through the roof of my unfinished workshop. The hood that came with my forge was designed for an 8" pipe and the contractors said that this would be sufficient. Everything I have read is saying to use no less than 10" but 12" is preferred. I am not going to pay that much money for this install and can do it myself but I want to make sure I get the right size pipe. The folks at Centaur Forge say that they use 8" pipe in their workshop with this hood and it works great. I was hoping to get some advice about this so I don't have to redo this project later on. I don't mind a little smoke in the shop as its a farm and I am used to it but I want to make sure I have a great draft so when I am burning fresh coal down it doesn't billow into and fill up my whole shop. I am including a photo of the forge from Centaur. This is not the final location where I will be installing it. Thanks in advance for any into you can give.