Bobby Campbell Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 Ok so I am putting together my first forge (charcoal). With scrounged materials that I have found.So far I have invested $0 in this forge, I expect to have to buy some piping for the air/blower portion.I think my pan is too shallow but it was seriously my very first attempt and fabrication from scratch so I'm going to go with it and adjust with clay/mud to deepen it up.So some pics here is the pan I built from scrap. It's pretty thin stuff but I'm going to line it with clay and even if it doesn't last long it will get me started. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobby Campbell Posted May 10, 2015 Author Share Posted May 10, 2015 I actually started assembling all this today as I have been gathering materials for close to two weeks now.I used some scrap angle to build a support frame and some old pallet wood to build a box to hold the angle frame. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobby Campbell Posted May 10, 2015 Author Share Posted May 10, 2015 I then attached legs to the frame from the 4x4 scrap lumber I pilfered.And added a lip around the frame box (why will become apparent in my next post). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobby Campbell Posted May 10, 2015 Author Share Posted May 10, 2015 Here is a picture of the skilled labor I recruited to help me out.She's serious about hammering in that woodscrew (wink) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DSW Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 I think my pan is too shallow but it was seriously my very first attempt and fabrication from scratch so I'm going to go with it and adjust with clay/mud to deepen it up.Without dimensions it's tough to tell whether it's too shallow or not. Also what fuel are you planning to use? You need a deeper fire with charcoal than say coal. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobby Campbell Posted May 10, 2015 Author Share Posted May 10, 2015 I work at a plant that uses a 150ft long rotary kiln and a few years back during a rebricking of the kiln I was able to obtain some of the scrap brick material.I have seriously been using this firebrick scrap as edging material around a flower bed for the last two years. First dry fitting of the firebrick......That's as far as I have gotten today as severe thunderstorms fought me all day long off and on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobby Campbell Posted May 10, 2015 Author Share Posted May 10, 2015 (edited) DSW its 12"x14" and roughly 3" deep metal pan only. The brick I am using is roughly 1.5" thick and I have some more scrap pieces that are about 3x3x5" that I can put along the edges to build the fire deeper or I can mud it up to make it deeper. Will be using Charcoal to fire with (edit) Edited May 10, 2015 by Bobby Campbell added line for clarity Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 If you double the fire brick around the pan you'll be in the ball park for depth. I like a larger table in general but I could work with what you have so far nicely. A little tweaking and you're on your way to a first forge. Once you've spent some time using it you'll start thinking of things you'd do differently then one day you will and after a few forges you'll have the one.It's a process we all go through. I don't burn coal and I have 3 coal forges anyway.Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobby Campbell Posted May 10, 2015 Author Share Posted May 10, 2015 Thanks Frosty,I have plenty of brick scraps to double it up. I may want to get it where I plan on using it first though as its already getting pretty heavy.I hope to have some extra cash coming my way in a month or so. I plan to use some of it to build a shed/shop. 12ftx12ft I think with two sides closed off to start. any bigger than that will take up too much room in the yard and might get the wife to yelling at me (wink). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 No, don't get the wife yelling at you, make her some garden tools, plant hangers, cool stuff she'll like. Well, she'll have to like anything you make for her but at least try for something she'll like anyway. Once you come up with some popular items you can start selling them and buy more tools.Done right blacksmithing is a self feeding addiction you know. <wink>Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles R. Stevens Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 Bottom blast and charcoal arn't the happiest relationship but it can work, tho the pan is way big. My big charcoal forge is 8x8 botom blast, wile my small one is about 6 and sideblast. The bigger one alows me to feed it scrap wood, "cokeing" it on the parameter. Depending on your air supply (typicaly to much) you need the depth because the air cools the fuel and it needs to filter up to make a good fire. My small one is only about 3" deap, with fuel piled up to about 3" above. It burns small stock quit nicely. The bif problem with the large one is getting the air supply meterd. The smaller one is built around the air supply, a double acting air matris pump wile the larger one gets a cheap hair drier, it curently operates with a 3" air gap between the hairdrier and inlet for the tweer. Honestly I lrefer the little one, tho I use the big one for larger stock. Somthing to be said for the slow rithum of a hand pumped forge. Seams that the hot spot with one tweer is about 6" or so, and unles its a large radius bend, you realy can't forge more than about 6" anyway. With a bit of playing you will get your set up to work, I recomend some kind of air gate to reduce the air flow, large volume low presure is the ticket Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobby Campbell Posted May 10, 2015 Author Share Posted May 10, 2015 Charles,I had honestly started my pan with a side blast in mind, but once I started my angles were all wrong and the sides didn't seem like they were steep enough to try and get a pipe to go through them. My fabrication skills leave a lot to be desired when figuring angles etc. Once I round up some more scrap sheet I'll make another attempt to see if I can get the next one cut right. I really would like to try our both types side/bottom. Just got stuck with bottom for now. I had planned on mudding up the pot quite a bit to close up some of the size and to protect the pot. I don't know the exact thickness but its pretty thin stuff. Think sheet metal they use to build guards around a drive belt system.It's definitely not ideal but hopefully it will work to let me heat smaller stuff.I appreciate both yours and Frosty's posts. Every time either of you reply to one of mine you impart more tidbits of info.I plan on digging around in the back yard tomorrow for some of our famous "red clay" weather permitting.I hope your dodging the worst of the storms that are blowing through tonight. We haven't gotten any bad winds yet but it has dumped a ton of water on us today. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles R. Stevens Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 (edited) Just a foot of rain in the last few days for me as well, Sandy is planning to clean house wile I'm traped in side (she forgets I have heavy duty rain gear ;-)an old wash tub or a oil drum can quickly be made in to a side blast, as can a crate, or box, anything that will hold about 8" of dirt, pack two inches in th bottom (for a wooden box) and set your tweer an inch above that. Now build up the sides with dirt and scoop out a bowl about the size of both fists. Now at this point you have to play and find out exactly how deep you need to be. Charcoal dosnt get healed on the table like coal, or it will all end up lit. You may find that you have to fill the box clean to the rim, or you may find that 2" down puts the steel in the center of the hot spot, if thats the case dig down to that point and not h the sides of the box so you can pass long peices threw. If you want to save weight you can build box that sets bellow a sholower box, just leave atleast two inches of clay rich soil around it to protect the wood. I do have one side draft pot I built that is no more than a 4" slice of a peice of 4" angle with flat sides welded to the "V" making about a 3" deap pot with a hole drilled in the side and a pipe fiting welded to it. Works just fine, but I havent instaled it in a permenent base. Many ways to skin that cat, many old charcoal forges (side blast) are nothing but a back stop (bellows stone?) with a hole in it, with fuel piled infront of it. Wile others are a trench (two rows of brick?) or mounds of dirt with the tweer stuck in on side. Real simple, bottom blast complicates things honestly if you want to build a side draft, fill a box up with dirt and play around untile you get a size and shape that works for you and your air supply. Clasicaly multible tweers are used to make bigger charcoal forges, be it a pipe with multible holes,a manifold feeding multible pipes or more than one thral pumping bellows.my small charcoal forge started out as a 11" deap box, I placed the tweer 5 1/2" deep. I have had to cut 2" deap notches to get the steel down to the heart of the fire, so that makes my "fire pot" 4 1/2" deap with the tweer an inch of the floor. So my fire is only 3 1/2" deap with a backstop that I pile fuel up over my stock. This works with the air supply I am using (double action air matrise pump) a bigger tweer (3/4") and an electric bed inflator is my next project, i plan to install a ball valve tho Edited May 10, 2015 by Charles R. Stevens Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DSW Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 Easy way to deal with angles on things like the fire pot is cardboard. It's easy to cut and shape and can be held together with tape. When done, you have your patterns for your steel. I worked mine out in 1/2" plywood, and cut the angles on my chop saw since I'm used to working in wood and had plenty of scraps. I'd simply mock up a design, and then alter my angles and take note on how that changed the fire pot shape, and continued to make adjustments from there until I ended up where I wanted to be. Then as mentioned with the cardboard, the wood pieces became my templates for marking my steel plates to cut. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobby Campbell Posted May 14, 2015 Author Share Posted May 14, 2015 Fired it up for the first time today. I couldn't wait until I had it lined so I did a test fire and beat on some stuff. Just worked on tapering a bit and trying to shape a tong side. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted May 14, 2015 Share Posted May 14, 2015 Bobby: The first projects to come out of that forge are it's fire tools. A rake and little shovel is a good start. You'll need tongs too or forging short stock will be . . . interesting and smell like BBQ. Leave the blades till you have your forge tooled up will ya?Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobby Campbell Posted May 14, 2015 Author Share Posted May 14, 2015 Frosty, Actually that's what I was trying to do was build a set of tongs =) They turned out ok I think for my first time forging anything.I still need to "pin them" and I drilled the hole cause I don't have a punch yet.Here's a pic of the tongs..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted May 14, 2015 Share Posted May 14, 2015 Sorry, I misread tong for tang. Those will work, they may not be pretty but our firsts never are. Fire tools, you need fire tools anyway and they're good basic drawing practice.There's nothing wrong with drilling the hinge for tongs nor is using a bolt for a pin.Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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