rider666 Posted February 15, 2012 Share Posted February 15, 2012 Hello! I decided to build my first coal/coke forge. First i will try to build firepot, what do you think abouth dimensions(see the picture) and what material should i use and how thick? please in mm.....i am from europe. The picture is in inches. Thanx for your answers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ridgewayforge Posted February 15, 2012 Share Posted February 15, 2012 That's about how big the commercially produced firepots are. Plate steel no less than 1/4 " thick would work, although if you're doing lots of forging or using coke I would go with a miniumum thickness of 1/2". The thicker it is, the longer it will hold up under intense heat. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rider666 Posted February 15, 2012 Author Share Posted February 15, 2012 1/2" these is inch or? (sorry i am from europe so i dont know american units). And how powerfull blower would you recommend? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unforgivun Posted February 15, 2012 Share Posted February 15, 2012 1/2 inch is 12.7 mm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Herb Upham Posted February 15, 2012 Share Posted February 15, 2012 This size works well, 1/2 inch material is better ... last longer ... and I would suggest a design using a clinker breaker (3 lobe ball in a round hole) as better than a multi-hole grate in the bottom. The grate is harder to keep clear of clinkers taht the clinker braker design. Happy forging! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ridgewayforge Posted February 15, 2012 Share Posted February 15, 2012 Rider, are you using an electric or opting for a hand-crank blower? personally I would go with the hand-crank. It gives better control. But as for electric, a 115 Volt or a 1/2 horsepower blower would work. OR you could do what I'm doing and trying to build your own hand-crank blower. Just a few options. And yes, my appologies. I should have done the conversions. My figures are in inches. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rider666 Posted February 15, 2012 Author Share Posted February 15, 2012 i will use electric blower, because i cannot buy hand crank blower in my country. but i will make some kinde of valve for regulating air flow. And i will do different firepot size. John B. send me some plans of his own forge..so i will build forge by his plans. thanx again! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ironartforge Posted February 15, 2012 Share Posted February 15, 2012 You can also look here http://www.blksmth.com/mild_steel_firepot.htm for ideas. Good luck with your forge build. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Gaddis Posted February 16, 2012 Share Posted February 16, 2012 I recently built my own first forge too. But my firebox was about 13 plus inches long, 10 plus wide and fully 5 inches deep. It took a dumptruck load of coal to crank it up and then the fire was too deep so items were angled down into the heat to get them up to temperature. I shallowed the box ...a great move and now I am going to shrink the size a bit. After the last several days of using a good forge at Brian Brazeals I know what they are supposed to be like. DO NOT OVERLOOK the air control valve. IT is IMPERATIVE to have a fully good operating air valve...I know that now for sure. They do not coast so much but save so much in coal. My valve will be replaced tomorrow. Good luck on your forge too! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Roy Posted February 16, 2012 Share Posted February 16, 2012 My fire box is 25 by 28 cm and 10 cm deep with sloping sides. I don't have a clinker breaker, just 2 slots about 1 cm wide for air. I don't have a problem handling clinkers. I have an electric blower which is equiped with a rheostat for speed control. The blower is also equiped with a knife gate damper so I can shut off the air flow and leave the blower running. This system works fine. the only problem is I bought way too much blower so it spends all its time at the low end of the speed control. I think it was rated at 400 cfm (cubic feet per minute) which is probably 14 cubic meters/minute. One quarter of that would probably work well. I'm not sure how much pressure is developed however and that is important too. Good luck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anhanguera Posted February 16, 2012 Share Posted February 16, 2012 Instead of steel firepot , for my first forge im trying a mud based forge. As im trying the cheapest project at this time it costed me less than $15. I hope the mud get dry soon. I hope it can handle the work as my very first attempt.Btw, as soon as i can i'll try the bucket forge model. Good luck and keep us informed Ridgeway! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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