Leather Bill

"Yes it is a lot of material but it should not only answer your question but give you more information that you could imagine." True and well stated.

Thank ya'll for the well wishes and advice,precip has passed and temps are rising. Comparing Texas with Ak and upper mid-west states during weather events (or 75% of life in general) is decieving. A few decades ago,there were lots in common but not so much nowdays. The average man on the street in Tx today is quite different when it come's to "paddling one's own canoe" and acting responsibly. The main contributor to widespread power outage and failed water supply is an outfit called Ercot ( Electric Reliability Council of Texas ) formed when electric power was deregulated in Texas. It has come to light they have been neglecting 75% of their duties,such as annual inspections of power plants and grids to assure readiness. As temps fell,demand rose,wind died,turbies stopped and fossil fuel plants broke down no sooner than put in operation. Ercot is charged with resposability of managing "rolling blackouts"in cases of emergency. Nada,when a plant went down,their grid went dead and no plan was in place to rotate power amoungest other plants. The story about lack of wind turbines causing the problems was a thin coverup that didn't fly. Those turbines have been producing power for years while fossil fuel plants stood idle and fully staffed in case wind died and/or demand spiked. What is it they say about "follow the money"? Well here it comes. Deregulation opened the buying and selling power up similar to day trading on Wall Street. Turbines and nucular plants are far more expensive to build(tax paid) than fossil fueled but produce KWs much cheaper. I challenge you to go online as if you were moving to Tx and need to enter contract for power. It's a shell game and shell games have been con artists go to for centuries. You decide for yourself if Green Energy is a good deal for consumers or a get rich scheme for the chosen. Let me see if I can put it delicately regarding what I said about folks from different areas of the country. I'm Tx born and proud of it but majority rules when it come's putting people in charge.

CGL,is your house on slab or sitting above ground? I can understand a pier & beam foundation alowing pipes to freeze but not a slab. I hope there's no busted pipes when they thaw. I suggest leaving one hot and one cold facuet open until everyone go's to bed. With temperature rising it's possible the frozen pipe will alow a tiny bit of water to pass. If that were to happen full flow would be restored within a few minutes. It's also possible that supply is off to intire community like many places today.

And that's a shame because I know a few characters that deserve a buggy whip skillfully used on them.

I like the way you think Thomas. I used a similar stratagy to gain access to a large scrap metal yard. The abencente owner forbid people to prowl through the place for fear of them being injured. I cobbled a wood box with lid to protect a cheap stryafoam ice chest inside and burned our brand into it along with phone #s. Next trip to scrap yard,I set the chest filled with ice and drinks out by scales and told manager I would pick it up next time I came by. A few days later I dropped by with another chest of iced down drinks and dumped them into the home made box. While I was there I told the manager I was aware liability issues forbid customers messing with things around the yard but I would buy a pair of large coil springs and if they brought them to the office and called me. He said I was welcome to look and tell him if I saw what I was after. He cautioned me not to dig or climb in order to retrive them but instead come tell him and they would retrive them for me. I have since bought alot of material from them at penneys on the dollar. If they see angle,sq tube and such I might like they call (remember the brand and ph #s on ice chest). How much better could you ask for? You be the judge. The owner took note of the box and drinks on his visits and was astonished at the fact it was sitting in the sun on a 100+ day without ice melting. Why do those silly little chests keep ice so much better than a more expensive Colman? He called to ask if I could build one a little nicer but keeping the rustic look with his Corp's logo. I asked if he had a picture,drawing or something to which he said no,just use my judgement. I thought about doing it free but on secound thought priced it as I would for any commisioned piece. Sure glad I didn't cheap it out because he ordered two more after seeing the first. The hardware wasn't forged but to the untrained eye store bought were good enough after I toasted and whacked them a little. Long story that used up some of the site's jigger-bits but hopfully spark's benificial for someone.

I've been away from the party plowing my drive since yesterday so I need to catch up. Thanks for that nice hydrant diagram arkie. Thomas,I actually enjoy forging during winter because summer heat is bad enough without adding more. I never heat the whole shop. I have a vent free infrared propane heater with one 5k and two 10k plaque burners that can be run individually or all at same time. Ambient was 10f while a friend and I were in the shop last night sipping the poison off a new jug of Johnny Walker and was quite comfortable sitting in front of the 5k and one 10k burner. On occasions when I can't be near heater and need to heat some space I have 2 curtains made from foil faced bubble insulation I drop down to isolate 300 sq ft in one corner. If I had a band of elves working I'd improve insulation and install a heat pump for doing mechanic and woodwork in summer. As it is, the forge sits beneath a cover in the shade of a large oak all summer. BTW, you folks that plow your drive when it snow's must be weird. I went up and down my drive with a chisel, a moldboard, a tiller, a bedder and a disc harrow. My drive is such a muddy mess I'll have to wait til it dry's and bring in 3 loads of rock before I can drive my truck out.

What is this frost free pump? As for keeping water available during freezing weather,solar heat is simple and effective. As a cost cutting/energy saving plan for home heating,solar is about as good as it get's. For diyers and tight wads,I highly reccomend "Build it Solar" site. You will find more than one plan for heating water. Here's what I invision for a livestock water trough. Insulated trough with as little water surface exposed to air as # of animals alow. Using a water heating plan,make it closed loop with NON TOXIC antifreeze. The heated water simply circulate's through submurged lines in trough then retrn to collector for more heat. For domestic hot water,the loop is open to a 30-50 gallon "pre-heater" in series with and upstream of regular heater. On good days,100% of water used will be heated without regular heater coming on. In weather like now,there's still plenty solar available in Tx to preheat water to 90f saving alot of energy bringing it from 90f to 110-120f. There's some simple space heating plans adaptable to home,workshop or animal shelter.

I read a few days ago (I do believe right here at IFI) about a policeman that ran kids off a parking lot but told them of another outside city limits where the could continue "drifting". Common sense if I ever saw it. 30 minutes on an icy surface where there's nothing to collide with can teach drivers more than all the words and pictures in the world. The best way I know to explain it is that you gain confidence that staying off brakes and steering toward the light pole comeing your way is the right thing to do. If there was a way to take lawyers out of the mix,I believe slick surface driver's ed could serve us well. I feel so strongly about it that I believe ins companies would pay for their inshured's training. From watching videos of pile ups on the IHs this week,drivers have ample oppertunity to steer off the pavement into the ditch before colliding with stalled cars ahead.

Without doubt the forge I build will be propane. I have used propane for various perpouses my intire life (not quit yet actually) but not for a real forge. What the jury is out with is wheter it should be na, blown,ribbon or other style. Unless I do better with one arm and left handed than I expect to,all i can do is try and convince others here to test my ideas until I can use both hands. All the grandsons are competive so I don't think they would injoy building,altering then altering some more without assurance of success. Once I have a working forge,they will be onboard for doing the heavy lifting on projects. Dr told me unless I surpass his expectations for recovery,my slinging heavy hammer days are over. At 76 years old,I have no fantasies of returning to good as new but that doesn't discourage me. I'm thankful to be here and able to do more than a number of less fortunate folks.

Thanks to all for welcomes and I appreciate your wishes and prayers Daswulf. I don't consider myself a smith,just a gearhead that use's anything from a campfire to a rosebud for heat and whatever is handy to move it while it's hot. When I was a child there were many full time smiths but I paid little attention. With what I pick up here I will fabricate a safer forge for my grandsons. CGL,goats were incidental on our farm but if you have questions about land, cattle,farm structures or pre-2000 year model tractors,I might be helpful.

Rotator cuff injury and impending surgury has me sidlined a few months so I will be hanging around to hear what others are doing. I injoy reading how some of you save one another from your addiction and help newbies become hooked. IDK whether it belong's to one of you Canadians or Great Lakes fellers but some of your weather is in my neighborhood drunk and I wish you would come get it.

I believe Thomas Powers answered the question of why ypu are having trouble getting suppliers to talk to you. I don't understand half what you said in the above post so why don't you just say what you want to accomplish and we will try helping you figure out and find the hows. On another note regarding propane delivery. All jurisdictions are not the same but in Texas it's illegal to fill portable containers from a delivery truck unless using certified scales. To have scales certified that are hauled around in a truck open's a big can of worms so few compainies are willing.

Dropping pressure in two stages alows smaller pipe for long distance between tank and forge. What it doesn't help is pressure drop if pulling vapor from tank. A large tank overcome's pressure drop. The supplier can do some calculations on minimunm tank size based on ambient temperatue,lbs per hour use and final pressure that must be maintained

One day while doing a poor job of welding,I recalled what our local smith known as The Flying Irishman said in the mid 50s. In his memory,I stopped to paint it on my hood. "If little bit of daubing do little bit of good,whole lot of daubing do whole lot of good"

There's multiple way's to accomplish what you want. A couple that come to mind is (1). Use a tank capiable of storing as much (and the larger the tank,the better) fuel as you consume in a week. From tank,gas vapor to forge(s) can be plumbed any way you like AS LONG AS it's leakproof,resistant to damage that might rupture fuel containing parts and all parts are approved for the perpouse and each forge has it's own individual regulator. Stated another way,hook everything up exactly like you have been doing with seperate tanks (2). ( My preferance). Use tank of any capacity that alow's drawing liquid. Liquid line connect's to a vaporizer and vaporizer connect's to prerssure regulator. If all forges run near same pressure but not neccessarly same volume,one regulator can serve all forges through a manifold.. If you require precision control,regulator off vaporizer drop's and maintain's pressure at +-100 psi in manifold . Manifold pressure is futhur reduced and maintained by regulator at each forge. The last arrangment can run half dozen forges from a single 20 lb bottle until 80% of fuel has been consumed. Not the most ecconomical place to buy but vaporizer and liquid draw tank can be sourced from forklift parts distributors. Good luck and we love seeing pictures of shops to see what ideas we can steal.

There's significant hazard presented by a piece of ceramic blanket just lying around the shop where it might be disturbed occasionally. I have to ask why you have to think twice about this? Do you see a possible advantage in not incapsolating the stuff?

I'm aware one doesn't become smart until they have a high post count but what hey,I'll jump in non-the-less. I think different people are experiencing different issues but all are being put under a single heading as"freezing". More specipiclly,there's two common problems that cause burners to stop functioning(either burning lower or going completly out. What has been discussed is rapid drawdown causing tanks to frost which doesn't neccessarily effect burners but if burners deminish,warming tank will indeed restore pressure and normal operation. As has been suggested several times,2 interconnected 20lb tanks expose more surface than a single 40 lb tank and help's with rapid drawdown. To answer the question about pairing with empty tank,it helps or you can get better result if needed by transfering some liquid. To transfer liquid to empty tank,with tanks joined by hose and both vlves open,hold full one upside down above empty for a few minutes. Don't store or transport full tanks inverted nor laying on side. You can fix fosting with a 2 stage regulator and/or liquid draw tnk with vaporizer. A totally different but more common issue is frosting of regulator which usually shut's burners down. If the regulator frosts or become's ice cold then burners go down,the tank alomost certainly has moisture in it. Even the tiniest drop of water turn's to ice and plug's orfice in regulator. It's often difficult to see frost so look quick before it go's away. A supplier can fix it but often refuse and insist you buy a new tank or have yours recertified. If you want to fix it yourself,warm the regulator as needed to keep it functioning until tank is empty. WARNING wear disposable gloves and do not get even one drop of liquid on clothes,garage floor or anything else you don't want to stink for 6 months to a year (you can not wash it off). Set tank upsidedown overnight then without tilting any more than can be helped,reach under and open valve. Let liquid drain until it stop's dripping. Set container up-right and pour 1 or more ounces of denatured alcohol into tank then immediatlly close valve. The few drops water remainig in tank amalgamate with alcohol to form liquid that won't freeze if it reaches regulator.