May 22, 201313 yr Howdy! I'm planing on making a forge where I can melt iron, charcoal, sand, and glass to make carbon steel! I am very fascinated by Wayne Coe's Inswool Kast-o-lite Plistix/ITC-100 Propane forge in a 20 gallon tank. I would absolutely love to go along those lines for my propane forge, but I want to get everything (if I can) locally at a Home Depot/Lowes or something. But I need do need my forge to reach temperatures of almost 3000 degrees Fahrenheit. There aren't any refractory supplies near my location and if I can i would rather not buy online. Thank you!
May 22, 201313 yr Where is your location? could location be made a required part of the sign up process?
May 22, 201313 yr Welcome aboard Billy, glad to have you. If you'll put your general location in the header you might be surprised to find out how many of the IFI gang live within visiting distance. As far as my experience shows, you're out of luck finding 3,000F+ refractories at Home Depot. Have you contacted the local concrete company? Every one around Anchorage, the Mat Su Valley and frankly everywhere I've asked carries fire clay and silica sand. Heck, most will sell you forms to make pavers. Heck, many will supply the forms and make pavers when they clean out the truck. Most around here sell fire brick, heavy and light. I'm thinking you need to hit the yellow pages and start asking. Frosty The Lucky
May 22, 201313 yr Welcome to iforge and the world of artistry and metal. Can I suggest that you find plans for a forge you can build in your shop and stick with those plans to the letter. Deviations hardle ever work out. Frosty has posted p;lans on this site that work..So has Garey Ford. And when you get forge up and running, Give it a few months of work and see how metal moves under hammer while hot. Get large piles of scrap metal and make large piles of smaller scrap metal..recycle! Then move up to car or truck springs. They work different than mild.MAke some tools and get used to making tools..punches chisels etc. and go through the information on the site about heat treat. As you go through these steps you will find wot good steel feels like when forged and how it hardens when heat treated. Study the information aboiut steel composition..that will help you formulate a recipe for wot you propose. And when you get it all blended together and begin to forge you can compare to the high carbon steel you have been forging with known contents. If you can forge quite often several days a week you can get ahold of the basics in a couple of years. If you have sord or knives in mind there is a section on here devoted to those items..and information on heat treat and forging as well. Looking to the day you make your steel all of this information will be of great vbalue,,would be a shame to have it turn out poorly,, like poorly forged or burned. Keep us posted as you work and ask questions on any information you get that is not clear..someone will help ya out.
May 22, 201313 yr Author Howdy again! Thanks for y'all's replies! Currently my location is planet earth. lol just yanking y'all's chains! My location is Lubbock Texas! Land of the wind and dirt home of the energetic texans and has the greatest sunsets! And if you decide to use that information against me, almost all my friends are police officers and former military! Lol Does that help? Do you mind me asking where y'all are, and giving me examples of how y'all get supplies? Thanks again, you guys are AWESOME! Bones.
May 22, 201313 yr I am in Glendale AZ,,near Phoenix. I am not one for typing thing in this little box that has been covered a lot of times already,,,if you read through this forge thread,,,lots of folks have asked similiar questions and the answers still work....
May 22, 201313 yr Billy, I'm from Lovington, New Mexico so even though I now live in Tennessee you can consider that you are buying local, well sort of. My brother still lives in Lovington and has one of my forges. He thought that he was going to get into blacksmithing so I built a forge for him. Now he would sell it and he is in Lubbock from time to time so he might be able to deliver it to you. If you are interested I will check with him about the price and when he could bring it over or you could come pick it up. This is a complete unit with the forge, Z-Burner, hose, stand, and regulator. If that is not what you are interested in I ship supplies all over the country all the time.
May 23, 201313 yr Do not think you are going to find the high temperature materials, like the high temp fire bricks, or wool blanket or any other other high temperature supplies at Home Depot. Think you need to search out local specialty dealer for supplies for industrial furnaces and boilers.... Check local phone book.... OR internet search for product you need by product description or brand names.... I know you are going to hate this, and I hate saying this, and when somebody tells me this I sort of implode, but GOOGLE can be your friend... Dale
May 23, 201313 yr Author Billy, I'm from Lovington, New Mexico so even though I now live in Tennessee you can consider that you are buying local, well sort of. My brother still lives in Lovington and has one of my forges. He thought that he was going to get into blacksmithing so I built a forge for him. Now he would sell it and he is in Lubbock from time to time so he might be able to deliver it to you. If you are interested I will check with him about the price and when he could bring it over or you could come pick it up. This is a complete unit with the forge, Z-Burner, hose, stand, and regulator. If that is not what you are interested in I ship supplies all over the country all the time. Ha ha! This is funny I have already contacted you about how to buy from you ([email protected] is my email). I came here to see if it was possible (knowing it probably wasn't) to make a forge relitivaly as good as yours, just from a shop near me. And if I couldn't I was going to buy from you. Small world! Well, I think I want to make mine, how much would the suplies cost (inswool, kast-o-lite 30, plistix) to make it in a 20 gallon propane tank plus shipping? Thanks man! Bones.
May 23, 201313 yr Author Wayne, Maybe we should talk over email. If you don't mind could you send me your reply through email? Thanks! ([email protected])
May 23, 201313 yr Ceramics shops sometimes sell firebrick, inswool and other supplies to potters who make their own kilns, and there are a lot more of them in small towns than blacksmith suppliers. Call around, it is not always listed on the website.
May 23, 201313 yr Author Alright I've found where I'm getting my supplies! Thanks everyone! I am now going to let this topic die.
June 2, 201313 yr Please note: making *one* forge that will "do it all" is like buying one car that will: win formula one races, haul 15 people---or 5 tons of coal, get over 50 miles to the gallon, and is easy to park
June 2, 201313 yr Alright I've found where I'm getting my supplies! Thanks everyone! I am now going to let this topic die. Pay it forward. There may be others in the Lubbock area wondering the same thing. :) Dont make it die, keep us posted with pics of the progress. Yes, please share!
June 2, 201313 yr could location be made a required part of the sign up process? I think this would be Awesome ! Sam
July 6, 201313 yr Billy, I get some materials in Lubbock, at Combustion Service Co. Go to link below. http://www.combustionserviceco.com/lubbock-tx-refractory-products.htm Sorry I am so late replying to your post.
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