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I Forge Iron

Home build induction heater


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  • 4 weeks later...

I know this isn't normally used for forging, but it will reach forging temps if the material is left stationary for more than a few seconds I'm told.
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It's used on 48" diameter pipe for gas pipelines. They have a couple slightly smaller units for the smaller pipeline pipes, 36" is the smallest I believe.

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Stats:
Input Volts= 2135 VAC
Frequency= 975 Hz
Current= 4360 Amps
Waterflow= 186 L/Min
Output= 2700 KW

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Image contrast adjusted to clarify stamped figures.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Hey Daniel did you and your brother get bored with this or just woefully busy? His design looks really elegant, and being able to switch from 110, to 220, and possibly 3 phase opens up all kinds of cool. Hope you guys can put something together to sell wiether its just a kit with plans, or a finished machine. Its summer and I barely have time to read iforgeiron, but I still check this thread periodically... Hope things calm down and you guys can pull this off the back burner and get cookin.

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Woefully busy is it. My shop is almost done though, drywall going up tomorrow and in about an hour an engineer from the power company is coming over to see about running a separate 200amp service straight to the shop. The meter box is ready for them to plug right in to, just need the trench and line ran.

 

I'm not sure if its available here but I'm going to ask him about 3 phase as well.

 

I need to rent a concrete saw today as well and cut a 2.5x3.5ft rectangle and after the drywall guys leave tomorrow, dig down a 3-5ft.

 

 

 

The induction project is far from dead though, still very anxious to get it all going again.

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was not sure if this project had gone the way of the monty python parrot after the long break, glad to see some hope of light at the end of the tunnel.

 

I would like to know how easy it would be to run on other supplies like here in the uk we have 240v single phase ( most domestic sockets are 13a but in industry we use bigger ) and 3 phase is 440v ( mine is 32a per phase ), all of them at 50 Hz.

 

europe has similar to us I think but at slightly lower voltages, maybe 220v

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Here in France:

230V@50Hz 1 phase 20A max for a standard domestic socket up to 32A for dedicated use with a specific 32A socket (kitchen oven...). You can ask for more Amperage for a shop and use with the dedicated socket for the Amperage.

400V@50Hz 3 phase. Domestic or shop.

600V@50Hz 3 phase.

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on insulating sleeving you might want to look into using Kevlar, that withstands great temperatures I think, does anyone know what it will take or if it is available in a sleeve form

EFFECTS OF HEAT Difficult to ignite. Does not propagate flame. Does not melt. Decomposes at 900° F
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EFFECTS OF HEAT Difficult to ignite. Does not propagate flame. Does not melt. Decomposes at 900° F

 

From what I read "decompose"  should be considered as vaporize.  Apparently the temperature differential between solid state and gaseous state is small.  They are good insulators but  I don't use them for anything that produces sparks or around work pieces where the held end can exceed moderately low temperatures of around 200Deg F.   In practice much lower . 

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further looking at high temp sleeving I have seen a product called cool blue that it is claimed in one place will be ok at 3000 degrees F but on the same site the maximum temp is also quoted as 2000 degrees F.

 

though this is not needed on the coil it could help prevent shorting out which I seen here on a picture of several windings on a coil glowing white hot or accidentally touching the coil with the work, I also thought of possibly using a ceramic tube with the coil wound around it.

 

I do a lot of small stuff about 1/2" round and square where I just need to heat the 3" at the end and at the moment use a coke forge which works fine but is slower and heats a lot more up than just the work ( not so good on a really hot day ) and takes a while to get going.

 

if a sleeve or tube can keep a lot of the radiated heat from the work away from the coil I think coils may last longer ( dont know how long they last if using them a lot or how much work the cooling system has to do but if you were heating for 5 seconds out of every 30 with several people thats a lot of heat, done fast work before with 3 people a power hammer and an anvil before when a lot of things had to be made fast ).

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I think your making a issue out of a non issue.   In my production operation I heated and forged over 50,000 breaker points in the same unisulated coil.    My machine would run at 90-100% output for up to 6 hours at a time (not on and off but full power output with several parts in the coil at a time)  I even shorted out the coil to the point of burning a hole though it but a quick dab of solder is all it takes to go back to work, I didnt even remove the coil from the machine.   In practice the coils are very durable and some sort of a covering in not manditory.     If a simple, cheap cover could be found thats great but my experiance is unprotected coils are simply not an issue.

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Guys in your experience, how evenly do induction heaters heat your stock? Induction heating only really delivers heat to the outer couple millimeters of the bar. If you were working a 2" round bar, for example, do you have issues with the outside burning before the inside is hot enough to be doing major forging? I realize that gas and coal forges only heat the outside as well but they surround the item with heat. With induction, heat is radiating/convecting away from the piece as well as deeper into it. I'm very interested in an induction set up, just curious how well it works on thicker pieces...

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In the pancake coils there is a central "intensification" magnet and magnet powder in between the outer rings. It has to do with efficiency of the field.

Interesting to note they makers use mica for a heat barrier. I have used pieces of soapstone to good effect whe you want to lay or wedge something against a coil. Grant researched a bunch of different materials for insulators, he said triggering the overload on the machine was bad form. You can also mill some soft brick as an insulator/mini kiln.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Finally plugged the old induction forge into the new shop just to make sure it didn't get broken in the move. Turns out my old house/shop wasn't wired very well and that was the cause of the oscillation and low power on this particular unit compared to when we used it at my brothers house.

 

It runs amazing in the new shop, here is a quick video heating a 1/2" bar from cold, keep in mind this is only running on 120 and it heats a 3-4" section up to sparking in about 12-13 seconds.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Very cool project.  Looking at getting into blacksmithing & bladesmithing.  An induction forge would be great, could keep it right in my shop. 

 

You say this unit can run off 120v, is that standard 15amp household current? 

 

Do you have any idea of final cost on a unit?  The units the late Grant Sarver was selling were $3000 which is too much for me, under $2000 I would seriously consider getting one.

 

Look forward to updates.

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It would run a little slower on just 15amp but still nice for smaller stuff. A 30amp 240v plug would be the most common for garage/shop use on a hobby level so were kinda working with that more, Ive got mine on a 50amp plug right now.

 

Under $2000 yes.

 

I started this thread over a year ago though, its progressed a lot since then but its still going to be a little bit.

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