Ribbon burner forge question

[Anthony Bruno]

Hey all, new here and first post. I’ve been a lurker for a few months now but I’ve now signed up. I just completed a ribbon burner forge based on Wayne coes design on his site and in fact got the supplies from him. I just have a few quick questions and wanted to introduce myself.my question is what kind of gas pressure guys with similar set ups are running. I have only fired this forge 3 times so far and I’m still learning how to best regulate it. I give a quick run down on the forge. Like said already it’s a copy of Wayne’s design and burner was built as per the specs on his site only I increased length by an inch so mine is 7 as opposed to 6.  I got the blower for my forge from the old trash incinerator set up in one of the large apartment buildings I work for as maintenance. It’s a pressure blower not a squirrel cage type. Blower is rated at 80cfm. Seems to run this forge with air to spare. I am regulating air flow via a nice butterfly type valve my buddy and I made inside a 2 inch diameter 6 inch pipe nipple in his home machine shop set up. I’m feeding propane from a 100lb tank thru a regulator to hose running to needle valve and dumping from valve thru a 1/4 nipple welded into a cast 90 I have a mixer in the pipe between gas supply and burner. I’m not having and uneven burn or anything like that it seems to run beautifully I am just curious as to what kind of pressure I should be looking at. Like I said I’ve only fired it 3 times so far to ramp up and not overheat the castable so I’m just lookin for a few guidelines on regulating a ribbon burner. Blower seems to have plenty of air to spare.

 Also wanted to add I use firebricks to close up the front and rear openings so I’m not running with ends wide open like that.

Also wanted to add I use firebricks to close up the front and rear openings so I’m not running with ends wide open like that.

[stockmaker]

Hello Anthony and welcome.  I too have a Wayne Coe/John Emmerling  type ribbon burner, however my gas injector is a 1/16" hole drilled into the 1/4" copper pipe  which fits into the 3" air pipe.  This will make my pressure different from yours, and since both you and I have needle values in the gas line does it really matter what the pressure is at the regulator ?  I am assuming you are measuring pressure at the output of the regulator?  I set my flame by sound and sight, too low on the air and it vibrates, and gives off Carbon Monoxide,  too high and the clear blue flames about disappear and I notice metal does not heat up as fast, I have never blown out the flame, but also I have never turned up the air all the way.    My regulator is set to 4lbs,  the needle value is rotated to about half it's rotation to produce a clear blue flame with just a little dragons breath, but it's the gate valve on the blower that gets adjusted most of the time for me, I have a 112 cfm blower with the gate valve set about 1/3 turn open, mark your gate valve handle so you know how far it is turned, I have one knob on the round handle painted white.

Have you started it yet?  If not ask Wayne what pressure he runs, I think his gas injector is the same as yours.  For first time start up before fire set your air so you can lightly fell it come out of the ribbon head with your hand than go from there. 

[Buzzkill]

Pressure will be dependent on the smallest diameter of tubing or orifice between your gas supply and where it enters your burner tube.  With a large enough supply line you might not see any pressure at all on the regulator.   On the other hand if you were using something like a .023 mig tip at your inlet you might show 15 psi or more pressure.  The volume of gas and air is important, but there is not a good way to measure it.   Using a more restrictive gas inlet will allow you to approximate volume by using pressure though. 

For the sake of discussion if you used a mig tip or other small orifice where your gas is injected into the burner tube you would be able to adjust your gas and air until you get the temperature and forge atmosphere you desire.  If you take note of the pressure at that point then you can use it in the future to return to that temperature, but you'll still need to adjust the air to the same place. That assumes you are not restricting the gas flow anywhere between the regulator and the gas inlet.  A needle valve or other restriction between the two changes things.  In that case you would want to find a setting for the needle valve that works over the entire range of temperatures you would like to achieve and leave it there in order to get repeatable results by changing the pressure at the regulator.  If you have an accurate way to keep track of air settings then you can note both the air and fuel settings and easily return to the same spot without fiddling about.

Otherwise it's a matter of adjusting either the gas or the air and then the other until you get the temperature and atmosphere in your forge that you want.  It doesn't take that long once you get used to it, but it's still easier to have known set points that produce repeatable results.

Regardless, the pressure that someone else requires for a specific temperature/atmosphere in their forge should never be viewed as more than a very general benchmark.  No two DIY forge/burner combinations are 100% identical, and relatively small changes from one to another can cause changes in behavior.  Even the altitude and relative humidity can make a difference.

 

[Anthony Bruno]

Hey thanks for the reply, I had my regulator set at 5 or 6 lbs this morning and it seemed to be running well with how I had it set thru the needle valve and air gate. I had a piece of 1/4 x1 inch stock about 12 inches long in the forge and I had it up to a bright orange and I had the air gate open very little so I know there’s plenty more to get from this set up. Like I mentioned in previous post I have only fired this set up 3 times now because I was trying to “break in” the refractory.and this morning I didn’t try to adjust beyond that bright orange I obtained because of the “break in” So I know it’s going to take a little bit of playing around with air fuel to learn the ins and outs of a blown set up. I’m very certain this set up will hit welding heats no problem I just have to experiment more and get more comfortable with settings to be able to set it where I need it.  So far I’m very impressed with this set up as opposed to my dual Venturi burner set up. That forge worked well and would hit welding temps but it used a lot of gas to do it. Now actually being able to forge weldis a different story at this stage lol. Anyhow I appreciate the reply and I’m just trying to get a feel for how others run theirs. 

[Buzzkill]

You should have no trouble at all reaching welding heat with that setup.  However, keep in mind that heat produced is a function of how much air and fuel are burned.  Regardless of how it is delivered, it still takes a certain amount of fuel burned with the appropriate amount of air to bring a forge up to the desired heat.  The ribbon burner may provide some additional efficiency, but this is mainly a function of slowing down the flame front, which allows the heat generated to stay in the forge longer before exiting the openings.   I'm using a naturally aspirated ribbon burner now, and it does seem to be a little more fuel efficient than the single port burner it replaced.  However, at forge welding temperatures I'm still going through a lot more fuel with the ribbon burner than the single port burner at "regular" forging temperatures.  At this point I can't see any reason to move away from the ribbon burner though.  I'm very happy with its performance so far.

[Anthony Bruno]

Thanks for the input so far guys, I had a chance this afternoon to play around a bit more with my set up and I had it running pretty hot. Still haven’t pushed it to a high yellow heat yet but after playing today I’m sure it’ll get there and beyond I just needed your guys input and to play around a bit more to get a feel for how it reacts to different amounts of air and fuel.its a bit if a learning curve moving from a naturally Venturi burner forge to this. My Venturi forge got really hot no problem I just wasn’t happy with the overall design of it. It was my first and I kind of designed on the fly so it ended up looking a bit sloppy in the end but it did function well. I don’t quite know what possessed me to start another so quickly after the first but..meh..here I am. Now I need to start practicing some actual forging techniques. Lots to lear, glad to get to know this community. It sure seems like a lot of knowledge on this site.

[WayneCoeArtistBlacksmith]

Anthony, you will have better control with a gate valve, you will be able to more precisely adjust the air and be able to find that exact spot each time.  If you had put your gas input down somewhere in the vertical run you will get better mixing.

I run my forge about .5# pressure.  I weld Damascus billets without flux.  You can adjust the atmosphere in the forge just like an oxy/ace torch.  Adjust a little gas, adjust a little air until you get the atmosphere you need.  For general forging I want a natural flame and it is quiet, for welding I want a reducing flame with about 6" of dragon's breath.

Let me know when I can help you again.

Wayne

[Anthony Bruno]

9 hours ago, WayneCoeArtistBlacksmith said:

Anthony, you will have better control with a gate valve, you will be able to more precisely adjust the air and be able to find that exact spot each time.  If you had put your gas input down somewhere in the vertical run you will get better mixing.

I run my forge about .5# pressure.  I weld Damascus billets without flux.  You can adjust the atmosphere in the forge just like an oxy/ace torch.  Adjust a little gas, adjust a little air until you get the atmosphere you need.  For general forging I want a natural flame and it is quiet, for welding I want a reducing flame with about 6" of dragon's breath.

Let me know when I can help you again.

Wayne

Thanks for the input Wayne, you’ve been s big help thru this whole process and I know I appreciate your efforts. I believe you are right on the gate valve, the butterfly valve my buddy and I built is very nice and and works well but I’m finding it’s hard to get a feel for where I’m at in the range of it’s travel. I was picturing a throttle body type set up and that’s why we went that way. I thought it would be more controllable but it’s looking like I may have been wrong. I also believe I may go ahead and experiment with moving the gas entrance point to the vertical run like you mentioned. I’m not committed to my current set up and I struggled with deciding on how long to make each run. I had read about the distance needed for nat gas vrs propane But other than that there is no set reason my piping is that long. I see your pipe runs are not as long.i built this forge at work in my off time so it will be getting broken down some to make the trip to my house so I may make my changes at that point. 

[Frosty]

Welcome aboard Anthony, glad to have you. 

The gas pressure, etc. isn't so important with a gun type burner. With a little practice you can tune it by eye and ear in seconds. Once it's where you like do NOT adjust things just turn it on and off. You need to tune it every time you turn the heat up or down and unless you have a way to gauge the air supply gate there isn't even much reason to make notes of the regulator psi and how do you determine needle valve position? Count turns is how. Sorry, couldn't help asking a test question there. I'm bad I know. 

Learn to read the flame by eye and ear, tuning is easy once you get the hang of it. Honest.

What kind of refractory did you use? Some brands only need set and cure time. Once cured there is no need to heat cure them. Kast-O-Lite products need no heat curing. You have to go to their web site to find this out though. You'd think they'd put it on the sack but evidently they don't expect folks to use so little. 

Please show us the fire! We love pics of FIRE! 

Frosty The Lucky.

[timgunn1962]

It's your burner, your blower, your gas train and your forge. There will be enough differences between yours and anyone else's that it's not realistic to apply their numbers to yours.

There's a trade-off between the distance needed for good mixing and the distance over which the flame can propagate through the mixture. If things go wrong and you get a flashback, the flame will travel, accelerating as it does so, back through the mixture. Effectively, the further back your mixing point is, the bigger the potential explosion.

There looks to be plenty of length between the gas injection/mixing point and the burner. The bend before the burner looks to have wrinkles on the inside radius and these seem likely to promote turbulence, and therefore mixing. I don't think you'll have any problem at all due to insufficient mixing as it stands. Unless you do, there is nothing to be gained by moving the gas injection point any further back and there is a (probably fairly small?) safety risk if you do.

Butterfly valves are horribly non-linear and the butterfly throttle seems unlikely to give as fine a degree of control as a gate valve with its fine-threaded adjustment.

If you are measuring gas pressure, the gauge needs to be downstream of the needle valve. At the low pressures you are likely to be seeing (probably Inches to tens-of-Inches Water Column), a U-tube manometer may be the best type of gauge to use. Cheap and accurate too. Basically it's a transparent hose formed to a U and half-filled with colored water. 

As Frosty says, it'll become second nature pretty quickly, but having some measurements can help you understand what is going on until then if that's the way your head works.

It's worth noting that the CFM rating of blowers is seldom of any real use to us. We tend to operate at the higher-pressure end of the performance curve and the CFM rating is usually the maximum flow at zero pressure.  If the blower specs give a static pressure (most don't), this is the more useful value to us.

I calculate that to burn 80 CFM air with Propane would use between 24 lb/hr of Propane (burning to CO2) and 35 lb/hr (burning to CO). Most of the forges I have seen have used much less Propane than this: typically 5-10 lb/hr, suggesting around 11-33 CFM air actually used.

 

[Anthony Bruno]

Hey guys I do appreciate the input so far, some helpful points have been made. I still have not switched out the butterfly valve for a gate valve, I do intend to do so tho. But in the meantime I’ve since had some time to run the forge a few different times over past few days. I am now a lot more comfortable with getting adjustments where I want them. And like mentioned above I am now really starting to get a feel just by eye and ear. I am much happier with this design than I was with my previous forge. Like I mentioned before my previous build worked well as far as it got metal very hot but it was the overall design I wasn’t pleased with. This set up with the sturdy “porches” front and rear and the adjustable rest for longer stuff and how it’s all contained as one unit attached to the stand is just much nicer to work with. I’m learning everyday and I’m loving it. I’ve so far made all the tongs that come in a bundle set of rapid tongs from kens custom iron which I thought was a good deal for someone just starting out using visegrips for tongs. After making all in the bundle it gave me the skill level to make blanks from some stock I had and make a pair of my own from scratch only a bit larger since the ones from kens are a bit on smaller side. , I’ve akso made a few s hooks and other small type items. So my actual forging experience isn’t all that much yet but you gotta strat somewhere. My ego and brain tell me I’m an experienced blacksmith already but once I’m standing at the anvil with hammer in hand I quickly find out I am not lol, it’s nowhere near as easy as it may look to some to make hot steel move where you want it to move with hammer blows lol.. I learned valuable techniques just making simple tongs tho like using the horn to draw out the reins. My inexperience had me just going at it flat on the anvil face but a little experience from others taught me about the principles behind fullering and using the edges of the anvil and or the horn to work in that manner. I was very impressed at how much quicker drawing out happened using the horn as opposed to when I went flat on the face. Anyhow I don’t mean to ramble I just appreciate people sharing their knowledge and helping a newcomer along on the path.

[Frosty]

Gee Anthony I just don't know about a guy who writes rambly posts.   Blacksmithing is a life long learning curve, there's always something new on the scene.

Enjoy the journey. Frosty The Lucky.

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

1 hour ago, Frosty said:

rambly posts.

(Practicing the multi quote.

1 hour ago, Frosty said:

Blacksmithing is a life long learning curve

They are not so bad as long as there are paragraphs... and yep, I've been at it for 30+ years and still learning new stuff.

[JHCC]

3 hours ago, Frosty said:

rambly posts.

The Return key is your friend.

[Frosty]

6 minutes ago, JHCC said:

The Return key is your friend.

Not on Face Book. Drives me nuts on FB and I only participate on the club FB page.

Frosty The Lucky.

[JHCC]

On FB, do a soft return: hold down the Shift key while pressing the Return key.

[Frosty]

Good, now I know how to break a paragraph if I can remember how it works. What aggravates me is automatically hitting the return to break a paragraph and sending the post. Can't edit, bring it back or do anything but start another one. My typical FB post appears as a bunch of short  sort of nonsensical messages. 

I suppose it'd be too much to ask FB to have used a hot key combination for send rather than use the already claimed return key.  Just because it's been used for "return" since the QWERTY keyboard was accepted as slow enough typists wouldn't jam typewriters.

I just wish the bright boys wouldn't fix what ain't broken.

Frosty The Lucky.

 

[JHCC]

3 minutes ago, Frosty said:

Can't edit, bring it back or do anything but start another one.

If you hover your cursor over one of your FB comments, a little ellipsis should appear halfway up the right-hand side. If you hover over that, you should get a message that says "Edit or delete this". Click on that, and chose your option.

Oh, and the soft return just goes to the next line. Two soft returns gives you a nice paragraph break.

[Frosty]

Hmmmm, guess I'll start taking notes; stickies on my comp make it look like Big Bird. Thanks John I'll give it a shot. How much time do I have to edit? No reaction on my most recent FB post, I'll give it a shot next time I have to FB. 

Frosty The Lucky.

[JHCC]

2 minutes ago, Frosty said:

How much time do I have to edit?

I don't think there's a time limit; I just successfully edited a comment from four days ago.

[Frosty]

I didn't get anything from one I sent last night. I've tried: putting the cursor on a word. Highlighting various lengths. Highlight ad select. NADA.

Frosty The Lucky.