I picked up a harrow disk at the flea this sunday, $3 and the phrase "useful piece of steel" kept floating thru my head. Its a bit shallow for a forge pan, though it has those nice sloping sides, unlike the brake drum forge. I forge with charcoal (Cowboy Brand) so its not really deep enough for charcoal, I don't think. I can see it as the base for a stand of some sort.

Also picked up some small pickup tongs and a flux spoon with real elegant hook on the handle end, gonna try and duplicate that.

Michael-San Francisco

They are often high carbon steel so you can cut them up and make knives from them.

think about making a sheetmetal ring to fit in the disk to hold a deeper charcoal fire. If you have a stable set up I would just put the ring in and fill around the outside of it with creek clay---or make a series of different diameter/height rings and have an adjustable set up.

Make great hoof stands for horse shoeing, I would make it in to a hoof stand and sell it for $50.

I attach three legs to them and make dutch oven stands. Charcoal is burning on the disc and a camp dutch oven is set onto the charcoal. More charcoal is put on the lid of the dutch oven for baking. Mmmm biscuits.

They can also be cut into a triangular hoe blade with a slightly curved cutting edge. It looks different and is popular at about $20 (with a hickory handle).

Steve

I think I've mentioned it before on here, but we made a couple of "boy scout" tomahawks outta them when I was a kid (living on a farm meant PLENTY of worn out disc blades.) Just gas-axe the general shape, grind to perfection, heat up the shank, bend around a mandrel to form an eye and then weld by your preferred method. They generally won't hold a keen edge like for a hatchet, but they are VERY tough and will stick in the end grain of a nice chunk of wood (provided it is set up in a properly safe manner).

Another project I'd been wanting to try is to cut a broad-ax shape out, keeping the curved edge that's already present. I'll heat it up, hammer it flat and form up a socket out of whatever I leave as a shank. Attach an old broom handle and presto-chango, I'll have (hopefully) a manually operated edger to trim the sod off at the curb. Just sit the curved blade on the ground and stomp it in.

-Aaron @ the SCF (whose getting sick of using the grubbing hoe to edge his lawn but is just TOO thrifty to go buy an edger )

I attach three legs to them and make dutch oven stands. Charcoal is burning on the disc and a camp dutch oven is set onto the charcoal. More charcoal is put on the lid of the dutch oven for baking. Mmmm biscuits.

They can also be cut into a triangular hoe blade with a slightly curved cutting edge. It looks different and is popular at about $20 (with a hickory handle).

Steve

Dutch oven stand! Brilliant!!!

I have used one for a fire pit for years,,three legs keep it up off the grass enough that the grass looks great the next day and It is the best for dutch oven cooking while camping,,,thenext day sift through the remains and make sure there is no hot spots last nights water did not get and you can toss the ashes in the bushes or trash and leave camp looking like it did when you arrived,,,slick! mine has a piece of steel welded in the center hole

weld a piece of square tubing to the center hole and insert the next smaller square tube into that. weld a nut to a hole in the side of the larger tube to place a set screw to adjust the hight, then weld a horse shoe , heal up, to the top edge of the smaller tube. They make a nice third hand at the anvil. Light weight and stable.


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it would look like that if laid on it's side.

I have also seen new harow discs with the center hole welded up and two handles added so they could be used as a shallow wok/pan for outdoor cooking of fahitas and such. It looked good but I never went to the trouble to make one.

Steve

In Africa I have seen them used as barbecue grils. With or without holes in them to allow grease/fat to drip through. Weld a 2 inch piece of pipe at one point with a screw hole tapped into the pipe. The disc will be horizontal and the piece of pipe welded to it will be perpendicular to the disc. This slides over another piece of pipe/stake, ususally one size smaller than the piece welded onto the disc, that is hammered into the ground beside the fire. You can adjust the height and swing the disc over the fire and tighten the screw - the ones I used had a buttelfly type screw for ease of usem and adjustment. You can have 2 or three discs - one with holes in it to allow for grease/fat to drip through and another with no holes - say for morning eggs. Several can be slipped onto one main upright pipe/stake.
It can be a permanent part of a BBQ pit or you can point one end of the pipe stand so that it can be hamered into the ground for camping.

Brian
Ottawa

Farm junk or jewels?. 11 Oct 2007. ABC New England North West NSW. (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Growing up as a farm/ranch kid-I have piles of these discs. From fajita or carne guisada cookers to nut and bolt bins they have a lot of uses. I took five of them, used one as a base, welded a piece of 2-3/8" pipe to it, cut out the centers of the other four and turned them dished side up and welded them every 8"-1' on to the pipe. It makes a great organizer for nuts and bolts, cotter pins and keys etc. It is at my parent's shop so I don't have pics. The pic below shows one as a base for a grinder stand that is topped with a piece of railroad plate for a nice heavy work station.

Note: the second pic is not my work-I "liberated" the pic for explanatory purposes and to show the camp cooker use.

If you can score a Rome Disc 30-36" you can really build some heavy duty stuff!

Edited October 10, 200817 yr by mesquiteforge
Brainstorm....