Hey guys,

 

i am am going to call Wayne tomorrow, but I wanted to reach out to the experts and ask the following:

 

i used a 20# propane tank as my forge body. I will be using 1” fiber blanket and I wanted to see from experience, how may feet in length I should plan on purchasing? I will buy 24” width, but I am sure more than one person has does the same/similar build. I am guessing I need about ten feet for a double layer. Any input from your experience is very appreciated. I have a feeling Wayne will also know when I speak to him, but wanted see what others have ended up needing for a similar construction.

 

thanks

Have you read the Build a Gas Forge attachment on the Forge Supplies page of my web-site?

If you want two layers you would need 4 feet of Inswool, 3 bags of Kast-0-Lite and one pint of Metrikote.

You can find my url and other contact info on my profiles page.

Let me know if I can help you.

Wayne

Wayne,

My nephew does not have a covered place to work so his hard brick pile forge gets rained on. Am I correct that you don't want the setup you describe here to get wet?

Ernest

Thanks Wayne. Yes, I have read through your instructions. It didn’t have the amount of fiber blanket. But now I have that info. I will call you today to place an order. One last question, what about rigidizer for the blanket? Do you use it or just the refractory cement?

You can make your own rigidizer very cheap. It is recommended not only to give a firm base for refactory but also to limit shrinking of your insulation from thermal cycling.   You can order fumed silica on Amazon for about $9. 

 
Rigidizer 

one cup of fumed silica one pint of water. Don't forget a few drops of food coloring so you can tell where your thin or thick but First mist your blanket with water only so the rigidizer soaks in threw  capillary action  I use a spray bottle from the dollar store. Buy 2-3 they are cheap but handy.

Treat one layer at a time

Then I let it sit a few hours in a warm place. On top of the fridge was my choice. 

Then I take it out side and fire up my torch and warmed up the blanket till it's starts to steam and let it sit till it stops then repeat till the outer blanket starts to feel dry. 
Now put you burner in the forge and fire it up. 

At first it burns for a moment but the steam will put the burner out. When it does let it sit till the steam stops. Then fire it up again. Keep doing this till it stays burning and the forge comes almost up to forging heat. Good red heat. Then shut it down and let cool to room temp.  It's now ready for refactory which I cure the same way

I don't know if that is 4 linear feet of 24 inch wide (8 square feet) or 4 square feet.  My portable air tank, which is 10 inches around and 18 long took about 9 square feet of one inch 8 pound wool.  I did insulate the front and back though, so maybe if open it would take less.  

I just cast over the blanket with Kast-0-Lite then paint the Metrikote over that.

Let me know if I can help you.

Wayne

Thanks Jasent, MotoMike, and Wayne! I spoke with Wayne this afternoon and I am picking up the blanket, refractory, and IR from him. I went with Jasent’s and Wayne’s input for the length of fiber blanket (4’). I also ordered the fumed silica to make the rigidizer (again thanks to Jasent, I hadn’t looked at making my own until I got that excellent feedback). I just took four new pics of progress on the build and I will post those to my progress page if anyone wants to see. I will post a link to that thread after I post the pics.

 

What a great community. I can’t thank you guys enough for the feedback. It has definitely improved my design beyond what I had prior to getting input from all of the seasoned pros! So excited to fire this forge up! Another week or so and I will be trying it out!

Here is a link to the thread for my forge build with pics of progress. 

 

For conclusion on this thread, I wanted to share that I ended up going with four feet of blanket. It was the perfect amount for a 20# propane tank as the body of the forge. And the three bags of kastolite was also the exact right amount. I haven’t used the merikote yet, but based on Wayne’s precision so far, I am sure it is also the right amount. I wanted to share my experience in case someone else wants to use a similar approach. The one thing I would have changed is to go with the tank body as Wayne recommended on his site. Cutting the end of the tank like I did, made for a more difficult lining. May need to do another forge in a year or so. I have enjoyed the making of the forge more than I expected.

Most American tanks have similar sizes; but not all. Foreign built tanks can be very different in sizes and shapes.

6 hours ago, Mikey98118 said:

Most American tanks have similar sizes; but not all. Foreign built tanks can be very different in sizes and shapes.

For example:

Tanks a lot!

I really needed that today...

Excellent points. If your tank has tracks and/or a turret, please contact JHCC for recommendations. However, it should also be noted that if you are contacting JHCC about your “tank”, now would be a good time to give up on this endeavor since you lack the common sense to use sharpened tools and heat sources.

We have other IFI members with considerably more military experience than I do, not to mention the machinists who know how to run a turret lathe. 

We may have a member or two with Tourette Syndrome as well.

(so how many of us were thinking about what would be needed to turn one of those tanks into a forge...?)

If you want a metal shell to make a long forge from my local scrapyard had a naval gun barrel, the muzzle section is 40000 pounds IIRC so  about $8K to buy it.

What's the internal diameter?

Your are welcome to measure it;  I might be able to turn up a photo of it with a coke can sitting in it. HEAVY external wall compared to the size. (but the photos are on my home computer).

Maybe a bucket?

  Is that an American bucket, or a foreign bucket? Gallons or liters?

         N.N.F.                 Beautiful, Manchester, Michigan. USA 

John: Is one of those an environmentally friendly hybrid tank? Does it look cool? Does it have a good heater? Will be safe from people texting and driving? 

Not having the common sense to use a sharpened stick I'm now wondering why I don't see any trouble measuring the diameter of a propane tank and calculating the radius. I'd be pretty darned embarrassed.

Frosty The Lucky.

Lol! I tried to get in an Abrams to measure the radius, but it had a lot of right angles, blinky lights, and knobs. I got distracted and forgot why I went in there! But how cool would it be to reprovision a canon barrel into a forge? I know it is trouble to go by railroad property, but I haven’t heard any warnings about DoD sites. Maybe you just have to go to the gate and ask nice? Disclaimer: this was completely tongue in cheek... no federal visitors are required.

Which way to the Nuclear Wessels?   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdSJFrhb-HM

My local scrapyard gets stuff from the local university and from white sands from time to time; I'm still trying to figure out how it got a dozen dock weights and a large mooring cleat as NM doesn't have enough open water to use a cleat that size!

1/2

Gun barrel:  with soda can

 

mooring cleat