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I Forge Iron

important lesson in safety


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well, I learned one of these today, I forged out a knife blank and left it in the fire to anneal when I was done for the day, and my dad had the idea to cover the forge with a peice of steel plate (to keep coal embers from being blown out by the wind), well I finished up around noon, I went out at 7 pm and well the fire was still red hot!

I'm just Glad I caught it before something happened.

unattended fire = BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAD lol sorry

I knew it wasn't a good idea to put the steel plate over the forge. LESSON LEARNED.

so any smiths out there that have a coal forge, DO NOT cover it when your done with it.

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The "old way" to keep a fire overnight was to "bank" it. With a coal fire in the open fireplace, you would shake the grate to remove the ashes, load new coal on top and then cover the coal with mounds and mounds of ash before bed. First thing in the morning you would poke the fire to let the ash fall through the grate and bring the fire back to life. You would have a good roaring fire in just minutes. Add a little more fuel and your all set. I have seen this method hold fore for two days.

I have seen a wood fire in our wood stove still hot after 3 days. Nothing special about it, it just slowly burns as long as there is fuel.

DO NOT leave a fire unattended. If in doubt, put it out. Walking away for a phone call, or lunch, and you can get distracted and things can get out of hand.

This is one of the reasons I suggest that you put the fire from the forge into a 5 gallon bucket of water when you leave the forge. Two inches of water on top of anything that used to be hot and I can sleep well at night. Also remember to empty the ash dump.

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