Drunken Dwarf Posted March 20, 2019 Share Posted March 20, 2019 Hi all One of the limitations I have in setting up my forge is electricity. I need to run the whole thing on a 12v battery and it's indoors without the ability to run a high chimney, so that will already have to power smoke extraction and lighting. So I'm looking at hand cranked blowers to save a little power on the forge itself. And obviously, like everyone, money is tight, so I'm looking cheap. I've found these on Amazon https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07K9HVTG4 and I'm assuming based on the price that they are not worth the effort of even clicking the button, but I thought I'd ask for advice as to whether they would be a workable option here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted March 20, 2019 Share Posted March 20, 2019 Why don't you build and use a traditional double lunged bellows? I built one from water stained plywood, scrap tarpaulin, scrap dimensional lumber and it worked great for over 20 years. I preferred it to my hand crank blower and I preferred my hand crank blower to the electric blower I started with. The downside was the amount of space it took up---why many of them were mounted in the rafters of old smithies. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Drunken Dwarf Posted March 20, 2019 Author Share Posted March 20, 2019 Now that's an idea. I like the traditional angle. I don't suppose you have any pictures of it? I think I remember seeing plans for a bellows somewhere on this forum. My forge is a 10' metal shed, I could always mount it on the roof and have a chain pull system. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted March 20, 2019 Share Posted March 20, 2019 Nope I gave it on to a friend when I had to move my shop 1500 miles and I was already over 1 flat bed semi truck of "stuff". Was back before all phones had cameras. However it was based on one in a museum in Oklahoma City that was, I believe, one sold by the Sears Roebuck company 100+ years ago. Not much to them if you get the inner valves oriented right. The way I sized mine was: I got the wood I could use and then adjusted the design for 3 solid pieces and 2 "horse shoe" piece to come out of the 2 4'x8' pieces of plywood. The snout was glued up from 2"x6" and 2"v4" dimensional lumber and the nozzle was a plumbing floor flange and piece of 2" pipe iirc. I used a draw knife to make the snout look "correct". The frame to support it was made mortise and tenon from dunnage lumber. The support for the pump lever was 1/2" rope that I doubled over with a twist to "grab" the lever but I could take pressure off and move the lever in/out and side to side---I took this forge to events and so had to swap which side I worked from and needed an adjustable mount---I could pump this bellows to forge welding heats with my pinkie---did it on a bet once. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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