Fe-Wood Posted December 6, 2014 Share Posted December 6, 2014 A few friends helped with design and engineering. About $150.00 later and 15 hours time, here is what I have! Enjoy! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frozenforge Posted December 6, 2014 Share Posted December 6, 2014 Do you have the 2 center bricks on the top held in place by something in addition to the squeezing being applied by the all thread? The lightweight bricks I have used in the past shrink over time but I don't know if it would be enough to cause any issues. Thats a monster forge! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fe-Wood Posted December 6, 2014 Author Share Posted December 6, 2014 I used HT Super 32 from Hitemp Ceramics as a mortar between the bricks. I will be coating the inside of the forge with a layer of the super 32 as well. I made this forge to be simple to rebuild (no welds will have to be redone) because all bricks fail over time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timgunn1962 Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 Just a thought. I've pinned firebrick forges together with welding rod to give them a bit more structural integrity. I tend to use 2.4mm (3/32") stainless gas/tig rods as the pins. I grind away half of the end 10mm (3/8") or so to make a rudimentary D-bit. I get a bit of scrap wood a couple of inches thick and drill a hole through it on the drill press to get a guide hole at 90 degrees to the face, hold this on the brick with enough of the welding rod in it to go all the way through the guide block and the workpiece, chuck the rod in a battery drill and just drill through. When the rod comes out the other side, I snip the excess off and leave the pin in. It works well on Insulating Fire Bricks because they are soft and the waste just seems to get packed into the pores so there's no need to peck. As they are single-use, there's no need for a hardened tip. The longest I've drilled and pinned through IFB is 19 1/2", but the limit is probably the length of rod available. Incidentally, D-bits work well on other materials too, though they are usually best made from drill rod and hardened. They'll drill deep straight holes (though they need a *lot* of pecking due to the absence of flutes) and cut flat-bottomed holes. Used with care (slowly and with lots of pecking to minimize heat buildup), they will drill through holes in wood blocks for stick tangs at a fraction of the cost of an extra-length drill. Shop-made D-bits were a mainstay of British model engineering until low-cost drills and milling cutters started arriving from the Far East. They are still very useful for one-offs and some of the more specialized jobs. If you've not come across them, they are worth Googling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fe-Wood Posted December 7, 2014 Author Share Posted December 7, 2014 timgunn1962, I'd never heard of D bits like that. Thanks for showing them to me! I have been thinking I should pin the top bricks together somehow. The mortar and clamps will only do so much. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles R. Stevens Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 I use high temp silicon (away from the heat an inch) as a flexible, heat resistant (500 deg or so) adhesive for ridged forge liners. Any kind of solid cement is going to crack with movement. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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