Second Gas Forge

[Eric Farrar]

So I finally finished my new forge - my first forge is a huge beast and weighs a ton, so I wanted a smaller, lighter, and (of course) hotter forge for every day use. I'll keep the old one for larger pieces that may not fit in the new one.

First, let me introduce the old beast; a single-burner with approximate chamber dimensions of 8"x8"x5"... made the housing out of 1/4" HR Plate and have regretted it ever since. The third shot of her is of her back side...



Now for the new girl! She is a single piece of 3/32" diamond plate bent on a sheet metal brake then welded together. She is MUCH lighter than the old girl. Her chamber with refractory installed is about 17"L x 5"W x 4"H - Let's start with my first test of the dual burners without the refractory installed...



And then for the first time firing her up - this time I had some problems; there ended up being some bowing in the top of the housing which caused about a 1/8" gap between the housing and the refractory... flames were following any available spaces and due to the extremely reducing flame that resulted, I got soot covering almost all of my refractory and had a flame that was choking out badly.




I ended up extending the flares into the chamber to where they are nicely flush with the chamber ceiling. Fired it up again about an hour ago and still had a nice reducing flame, but it was no longer choking out and was relatively quiet compared to the first firing or to my first forge which sounds like a jet engine. At 3psi, the chamber was up to temp in under 2 minutes, and I got a 1/2" piece of 1045 round stock to welding heat along a 9" section in less than 4 minutes. These pictures are of it fired up at 3psi.




All I have left to do is finish the high-temp paint job, add some feet and stock holders and I'll be enjoying this new girl's heat!