Frosty Posted November 7, 2020 Share Posted November 7, 2020 Stand on the other side of the forge and turn the crank according to what the blower needs. Re-route the ducting if it's in your way, the blower will turn right, left, etc by loosening the nut on the pipe it's mounted on. If you have to turn the fire pot around you'll have to break the welds. A sharp chisel cutting ALONG the side of the flange won't damage it. If you didn't cut the hole in the forge table too large you can just lay the pot in and rest it on the flange. No need to weld it down. It's funny, I'm a righty and used to crank the blower with my left hand until seeing the recommendations to crank with my hammer hand and discovered how much more efficient that is. So, after decades of cranking with my left it feels goofy cranking with my right hand. Actually you can crank your blower either direction and it'll make more air than you need. Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cere19 Posted November 8, 2020 Author Share Posted November 8, 2020 (edited) I never realized that it would crank the other way, I'll just have to move the piece that the blower sits in to the middle of the end or cheated a little bit to the other side and it will be good. Thanks Frosty Edited November 8, 2020 by Mod30 Excessive quoting Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frosty Posted November 8, 2020 Share Posted November 8, 2020 You're welcome, it's my pleasure. Intuitively a blower should work better cranked the "right" direction and maybe they do but there's so little difference I can't tell and the forge doesn't care. I discovered it when I kept seeing guys cranking their blowers backwards and for once managed to avoid the taste of my own foot by not saying anything. Their fires seemed to be getting plenty of air and they weren't working hard or doing something tricky. I tried it on my own blower and nope, didn't make enough difference to care. Frosty The Lucky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Irondragon Forge ClayWorks Posted November 8, 2020 Share Posted November 8, 2020 The only thing about the "right" direction is, I've found a lot of the old blowers, the rotation direction arrow is cast into the case. Without that they will work in either direction, but the gears will take a set and be noisy if turned in the opposite direction than they have been turned for decades. I have three Champion blowers like that (2 Lancaster's & a 140). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted November 9, 2020 Share Posted November 9, 2020 Yes: no arrow it should be good either way but may have a "set". The "Dry Run" method is also good for checking out your shop design; is it easy and "natural" to move from the forge to the anvil? Do you not gunch yourself on the anvil horn when rapidly striding to the post vise? Is the quench tank away from where dropped steel would land? With my double lunged bellows we could put the lever in the center and work the forge from both sides so that righties and lefties could use it "normally" for them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cere19 Posted November 13, 2020 Author Share Posted November 13, 2020 I actually fired it up yesterday for the first time, it worked pretty good and I was able to bend a straight piece of rod for the handle on my forge. I still need to weld it onto the forge, I made this so that I can wheel it outside when I want to use it there's no way I'm running it in the attached garage. I don't have a great anvil yet, I have a section of railroad track that I got from one of the intro to Blacksmith instructors but I haven't made a stand or anything for it yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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