Frosty Posted September 22, 2016 Share Posted September 22, 2016 Just wear a dust mask, the refractories aren't actually toxic so it takes more than a little exposure to be a serious breathing hazard, a dust mask should be plenty of protection. If you want to be able to remove the halves try wrapping a piece of saran wrap around the floor and cementing the top half to it. The refractory should bond to the top half and the saran wrap will prevent it from bonding to the floor. Butter the top half before you apply the refractory, just mist it with water so the fresh refractory doesn't flash dry on contact and not bond. Looking good so far. Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam R Posted September 27, 2016 Author Share Posted September 27, 2016 I tried the trick with saran wrap. That works well. I assembled the two pieces on Saturday, and fired the burner very low to start curing everything slowly. Sunday I worked on warming it up a little more every 45 minutes to and hour. On my second warming cycle Sunday afternoon I put the kiln shelf in to protect the floor from direct flames. after about two minutes there was a small pop, and I had a silicon carbide puzzle. I pushed the peices back together again, and kept going with the process. I am guessing the piece that I was using needed less direct heat or a longer warm up time. During the curing process I occasionally got some quiet rice krispy like crackles periodically. My thought is these were small air bubbles in the surface of the refractory cement. The forge retained heat well between firings, and on my last cycle I got it up to a nice uniform orange color throughout after a few minutes. I never really turned the burner very high. I have been using the hard fire bricks from my brick pile forge as "doors". Last night I took the halves apart to apply the Zirconium wash, and wound up developing a crack where my fingers were. I am not sure if I should patch it with refractory or just apply the wash, and let it be. I am not able to get the pieces out because of how they are broken. Would this be dangerous with rigidized Ceramic fibers? One build detail that I forgot, is that after I had applied the rigidizer to the insulation about half way, my spray bottle clogged. After I got a heavier duty sprayer, I wet down the insulation and trimmed the layers even about 3/8" from the edge of the shell to allow for some thickness/structure to the outer surface. I did apply the wash to the inside of the forge, and to one face of the fire bricks. I didn't know if it would help a lot on the bricks, but thought it couldn't hurt having some IR reflection on my "doors". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam R Posted October 2, 2016 Author Share Posted October 2, 2016 Fired the forge up again Friday night. I was able to bring a 2 lb. chunk of 1 1/2" 4140 to forging temp in about 20 minutes from start up. I enlisted my wife as the director for punching the eye. We did a test punch on a piece of 1/2" mild steel then worked on the hammer head. The MN Guild teaches a class on this style of rounding hammer that starts with the billet having two offset hole to guide the punch then upset the ends to shape. Since this was the first time she had ever done anything with hot metal, I was pretty impressed with how well she did in the dark no less. It is great making tools in my own backyard with other tools I made. I was also able to use the hammer head as an example of a practical use of upsetting when I was demonstrating the technique on 1/2" bar at a basic blacksmithing class yesterday. One thing I noticed while forging was some quiet puffing with little puffs of flame coming out around the hole where the burner is inserted. I tried adjusting the burner depth both ways, and adjusting the bricks covering the openings. Neither seemed to do much. I do have a thread protector on the end of the burner tube as a flare, but don't know if that would matter. The puffing occurred after the forge was warmed up very well. I will try removing the thread protector next time I fire it up. During heats on the hammer head I had no problem getting 1/2" MS to a nice yellow color, and thought I might get hot enough to melt a small piece if left in during a punching cycle. A leaf I was forging heated up in about 30 second toward the end of the 2 hrs the forge was on. Most of the forging on the hammer was done Friday night, but I worked on drifting the eye on the lunch break of the class yesterday. I am using a Brazeal style shape anvil I made, and am lacking a hardy hole. A striking anvil is next on the tool list. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted October 2, 2016 Share Posted October 2, 2016 Two thoughts come to mind regarding the huffing: First, was there a breeze blowing? They can blow exhaust into the burner intakes so you get momentary non-flammable puffs which will ignite with a yellow flame huff, puff, poof or rarely whump. The other thought is you may have had the opening closed too much or the hammer head was forming a pocket where the flame was being directed back towards the burner causing a back pressure issue. Those are the two things that jump out at me but it could be something else entirely, maybe the propame jet kept messing up the spider's web so it was sticking a foot in the jet to mess up the flow. Without being there and seeing it happen I'd bet on my first two thoughts, breeze #1. Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigb Posted October 3, 2016 Share Posted October 3, 2016 Looking good and thanks for the pics. So it cracked from the pressure of your fingers as you were lifting the top off? Haven't worked on mine yet, the pipe is sitting out there on my cutting table staring at me every time I walk by. Just too many irons in the fire right now but thanks to you I'll have more knowledge when I begin my build. Was going to finish my roof today but then the wipers quit on my truck and there went that idea. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam R Posted October 3, 2016 Author Share Posted October 3, 2016 Frosty- Thanks for the input. I have issues with wind since I am working outside. That particular night was pretty dead. Thinking about the wind issues, I did try to cover one side of the T at a time which has corrected the issue in the past. It didn't make a difference. I also thought about too much opening restriction. The tests there were inconclusive as well. Since the flame is not being drawn up into the burner, I don't think it is a safety issue. I will keep using it. If it persists, I will make a video, and try to figure out how to post it. I thought I was the only one that thought it was the spiders that caused my problems. I think about spiders every time I crack a high pressure tank before hooking up the regulator. Funny how some of those things stick with you 20 years later. bigb- Glad I can help. I hope including more information might fill in a gap in someones knowledge. The side where the fingers cracked it was a little tight to the base. I think I should have slowed down, and concentrated my pressure on the edge that was built up. Maybe I can be an example of what not to do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam R Posted October 3, 2016 Author Share Posted October 3, 2016 Frosty- I have a 10' piece of 1/4" flexible copper that isolates my burner from the propane hose and regulator. However in my current shop situation (patio) I need to take my burner out and put it away after every session. I have been trying to flex it as little as possible during setup/tear down, but I have started to get a couple kinks in the line. I don't think it would be a flow issue given the orifice size, but I am wondering if there is a better solution to the flex copper for my situation. Alternately, is this just a consumable that I need to plan to replace at intervals? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted October 3, 2016 Share Posted October 3, 2016 I have to break the hose from the burners to transport too. I do it at the manifold and avoid breaking at the flare fittings as much as possible. The burners are mounted to the forge so that's where they have to stay. Having the iron pipe manifold hanging on the copper tubing is vulnerable so I tend to insist I'm the only one to move it and pack it in the truck. The new forge has an entirely different burner set up to get used to packing. It's a butterfly effect thing, you change one fiddly little detail and it domino's into several others. Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam R Posted October 16, 2016 Author Share Posted October 16, 2016 The puffing has not happened again, so hopefully that issue is solved. I developed a kink in my copper tubing. I cut it and re-flared it for a new connection. Frosty - is there a picture of your manifold somewhere here? The forge is heating up well, and retaining it too. While forging on the hammer I turned it off so I wouldn't burn up the smaller pieces. They were ready to forge after I relit to warm up the hammer. The heat battery is charging. I have tried a couple configuratios for bricks covering the ends. What worked well last night was to set two pieces of fire brick to the sides of one end and put a hard fire brick on top. This gave me around a 6x1" opening that I could lay several bars in to work on in series. The other end I closed with one brick that I moved to put the hammer head in/out. For a pass through for straightening my post vice leg I just stood two bricks up, and gapped them as needed. The leg 3/4" heated up in 5 minutes or less to orange. Rather than laying it on the forge floors, I set it on more fb chunks. Those broken pieces from the brick pile aren't going to waste. The hammer head forged and shaped great then failed in heat treat. I am planning to write it up in another thread to try to figure out what not to do next time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted October 16, 2016 Share Posted October 16, 2016 There's a pic of my typical manifold in the pic of the NARB showing the forge top. It's just a shortish nipple adapted to the propane hose, the other end is a T and two elbows. The elbows connect to 1/4 turn ball valves and then fittings to connect the copper line. Please don't hold the lashup in the pic against me, I just screwed the test manifold on the new forge and took it to the meeting. I really let myself get rushed to make the meeting time. It's neater and safer now. Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam R Posted October 16, 2016 Author Share Posted October 16, 2016 Frosty - a picture says a lot. What I am thinking is that I have way to much copper tubing. As long as I have it where there is a close proximity to the forge/flame I can just use a propane rated hose to the tank. Does that sound right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam R Posted October 17, 2016 Author Share Posted October 17, 2016 This will probably be the last update, but I was able to get a successful forge weld! I was practicing making a rams head, and decided to give it a try. My wife has given me Mark Aspery's first book, which had gas forge welding instructions. I didn't clean the joint terribly well before bending it over, but brushed as well as I could, got it hot, applied a little borax, heated until bubbling, hit it 4 times lightly, then repeated as recommended. After I had finished the rams head, I thought destructive testing would be a good idea. As you can see, the 3/8" bar bent pretty far before joint failure. I am very new to forge welding (maybe my 3rd one), so if anyone has any suggestions they would be greatly received. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted October 17, 2016 Share Posted October 17, 2016 22 hours ago, Adam R said: Frosty - a picture says a lot. What I am thinking is that I have way to much copper tubing. As long as I have it where there is a close proximity to the forge/flame I can just use a propane rated hose to the tank. Does that sound right? That's what I do, the copper line is for close to the fire the rubber to the reg and tank. Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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