First 4 welds 50/50

[piglet_74]

Finally tried to forge weld. It was a lot of fun. Mostly when it worked though I tried to make a basket and then weld it onto 1/2" stock and folded the end back to make a fire poker. I'm thinking 3/8ths next time. Anyway, first weld held up but as time went on the fire got dirtier. One of the pics shows a failed weld and the clinker I fished out. I've been saving coke for welding so next time I'm going to prep everything and then rebuild the fire with coke right before I weld. Hopefully that'll make them all stick.







Rob.

[Steve Sells]

good start and I think you can salvage that basket .

Remember the smaller the mass you are welding, the faster it looses the heat needs to get it to weld, simply 3/8 will be a lot harder than the 1/2 stock. You will have to move fast.

[piglet_74]

Hmm Good point. I didn't think about that. When I welded the basket to the 1/2" I kind of took my time and was worried I was going to miss the opportunity. I don't like the condition of the metal at this point. I saw in the video Blacksmiths Primer that it's from the clinker. It didn't seem to want to clean up. Is there something that'll fix it or is it scrap? Thanks, Rob.

[dkunkler]

I think you can reweld it. Heat till red, bend the loose segment out a little to open up the weld area ,heat till orange , quickly wire brush the scale out of the weld area, bend back closed and sprinkle with flux, bring to welding heat and weld.

[piglet_74]

That actually leads me into another question. The welds where you cut partway through some stock and fold it over, I was wondering if you flux the two mating surfaces or if you clean them, fold them, then flux the outside of the whole thing. I've been toying with the idea of making a nail header by punching a slot 2-3" up a bar, then drift the hole open. Then cut and flop the end over the hole and weld it with a forge weld. Thanks in advance. rob.

[ThomasPowers]

The answer to your question is "yes". Some folks do it one way, some the other. If you are slow on the nick-clean-fold getting it fluxed early will help. If you are fast then fluxing after the fold will work.

I weld up billets of bandsaw blade and flul wired up stacks only from the side for the first most difficult weld.

[Mark Aspery]

As a time & problem saver...
Have you tried using just two pieces of steel instead of four?

Let's say that you want an 8 inch basket (round bar).
Start with 16.5 inches of material and fold it in half. The extra 1/2 inch is for the bend.
That leaves you with a hair clip shape.

Feed one set of open ends over the other rather like feeding fingers together of opposite hands -so that the hairpins now overlap one another, a bend at either end of the cluster.
This is a far more stable shape, has fewer ends to come apart and you have extra material (with the bend) for your forge welds on to other bars.

It worked for me when I needed it to.

For square bar fold over on the diagonal and then intertwine.

[John B]

Tidy the end up by forge weldng a collar on to make a ball or cube end.

[piglet_74]

That's a really cool idea. Thanks. I ended up bending a 4 foot rod 10-12" up from the end and then tried to bend both in half to make 4 rods with a long piece for a handle. It did take some time to get things lined up. When I welded the rods to the 1/2" bar I actually didn't do a "drop the tongs" because I had the extra rod end but I did have to let go and pick up the hammer. I was amazed I didn't loose the whole thing into the grass.

Using your idea I could do one hairpin and slide it down onto another hairpin with one long leg for a handle. I'm low on tongs right now but I have some jaws forged up. I just needed to learn to weld to get reins on them.

Thanks again, Rob.

[Doug C]

Mark,
Once again you offer great advice. I would never have thought of looking at the problem that way. Thanks.