My very first (by myself). I am stoked. I took about 2.5 feet of twisted steel cable and forge welded to probly .5 by .5 inches give or take and 9 to 10 inches long. It totally destroyed a fire brick in the bottom of the forge. Is this the norm? Does the steel slag or whatever cause this or the flux?
I continue to get internal server error or error 500 when posting pics. I resized to 600x800 as posted but it still won't work. I would like to show the pics but for whatever reason it is beating me down.

RD

Congradulations The first is alway the hardest but now you know it can be done go it gets easier.
As for the fire brick was it a soft one. A hard brick should not of been eaten in one days forging.
It is the flux that eats forge lining especially koawool type gas forges.
Last fall I did see a waste oil fired crucible forge that melted some fire brick

I have the brick on the top of the koawool/itc 100. So i didn't reach that but ate 1/2 of the brick.

What kind of brick was it? Hard, or soft?

Got them from the neighbor so I don't know. They are pretty light feeling so the fact it melted away I would say soft. Truthfully I didn't know there were 2 kinds. I will be looking to get a few hard ones from somewhere near me. I still want to twist and fold it one more time. Then hammer to 1/4" and make a cool knife. Gonna attack the chainsaw chain also. I have probly 25 lbs to play with.

If it's the size of a regular brick but considerably lighter, it's probably an insulating firebrick, which explains the corrosion. Get yourself a super duty firebrick split (1-1/4" thick) or two. They won't be totally immune to flux, but they'll last a good while.