Help on a charcoal forge

[Daniel95]

Hi all,

I am a beginner smith. I have been at it for a couple months, and it has been kind of rough. First forge was from a pile of bricks, dirt, and a fan. I live in ND and I dont know if I can get coal, so I used charcoal. That worked ok, but not ideal. Next I spent $100 making a propane forge. It works, but it is inefficient. Propane forges are a little more complex than I thought. Anyway, I dont have the budget to fix that forge up. So I thought I would revert to charcoal. I can get . near infinite amount of wood for free and turn it to charcoal.

So my question is, what is the easiest and cheapest ($30 or less) way to make a decent charcoal forge? I want to focus a little more on smithing itself rather than trying to figure out forge building. Help would mean the world to me. 

I am a Newbie so please speak in laymans terms. Thanks very much, and God Bless!

-Daniel

[ThomasPowers]

What do you want to be forging?---Makes a difference in what forge would work best for you.

Cheapest is a hole in the ground, 1 piece of black iron pipe and an air source.  Not the easiest to use, especially for folks whose knees are old enough to drink 3 times over...

Have you read the MANY posts on JABOD forges?  Cheap, easy to build, able to be adjusted for differing items, etc?  Use a browser to search on:        jabod site:iforgeiron.com          and don't forget to break for eating and sleeping!

Looks like you have already learned the lesson that to get good results the first go you must fine a good set of plans for a propane forge and follow them EXACTLY!

[Daniel95]

Thanks very much! I am planning to forge trinkets out of steel (hooks, leaves, stuff to sell) and maybe one day some knives. I will read up on JABOD forges, that is a great idea. Thanks for pointing me in the right direction. God Bless

[Glenn]

Do not overthink simple as JABOD is just a pipe going into a hole in the ground raised up to a convenient level.   You can use wood as a fuel but will need to have a deeper fire so the wood has time to turn to charcoal, the charcoal to turn to embers, and the embers to heat the metal.  

[ThomasPowers]

So generally small stuff to start---smart!  You won't want a huge forge then as with charcoal forges pretty much all the fuel on the forge bed WILL be burning and all not contributing to the work area is just excess heat and waste.  You will want some depth as making a charcoal forge too shallow is a common mistake---shoot one commercial brand does that!

[Randy Griffin]

And if you are going to be making your own charcoal, look into making it from pine. I made a 55 gallon drum of pine charcoal last week and I am loving that stuff. It burns hotter.

[Daniel95]

I liked the idea of digging a hole, at least for now. Low commitment and low cost. If you don't mind my asking, I have a few questions about it. 

First off, I have a forest in my backyard, so I could easily put sticks in there until I am able to make charcoal in large quantities. Would sticks work?

Secondly, what dimensions? Remeber that I am making smaller stuff, so it doesnt have to be huge.

Finally, what kind of blower setup would I need? The last time I used charcoal I burned thru that stuff in a heartbeat because I was blasting it with a industrial fan. I dont want that to happen, so yeah. 

Thanks in advance! God Bless

[Randy Griffin]

Again, go to the forges section, solid fuel forges and read the jabod thread. It's going to take you a while to go through the whole thread but will be beneficial to you. All the answers are in there.

Good luck.

[ThomasPowers]

Well instead of asking what you need to go buy; why not plan for what you already have?  Like: 12V automotive heater fan + battery charger; computer fan & cereal box and duct tape shroud,  blow dryer, 1960's box hair dryer, build a bellows from Naugahyde and scrap plywood/dimensional lumber, build a chinese box bellows from scrap wood; I've seen bellows built from plastic bags, (or goatskins for that matter)

Charcoal doesn't take a lot of air----Weygers once built a charcoal forge from a paint can and a section of irrigation pipe---yup that's *all* he punched some holes in the bottom of the can and made a little flap door in the side and fastened the pipe to the top.  The chimney effect in the pipe would pull air through the holes in the bottom controlled by how open the door flap was.  He used that to forge wood carving tools to make wood blocks for prints.

[Charles R. Stevens]

So if you like the idea of a hole, start buy digging a 16” (knee) deep hole, perhaps make it a step. So now form the forge from the spoil from the hole. I use a Double Quick III bed inflating pump ($20) and an 8” schedule 20, 3/4” pipe nipple. So we start buy building up about half your spoil in a flat tiled pile, lay your pipe down so it ends 2” of center and laying facing to one side viewed from standing or siting in your hole. Now dig a 1” deep trench in front of the pipe 4” long. Now begin building up another 4” of dirt. So you have a 4” wide and 8” long trench with the opens end facing you and your pipe in one side (a 5deg or so down word angle is ideal) now take the remaining spoil and build two mounds on each side of the trench at least 4” high. This helps contain the charcoal over the metal your heating. 

Mad to using wood, taller side walls will slow this but a second fire just to generate embers is better, and just transfer them with a small shovel.

 this guy has a nice setup.

this guy makes charcoal

These illustrations May help 

[pnut]

15 hours ago, Charles R. Stevens said:

8” schedule 20, 3/4” pipe nipple

Not trying to second guess you Charles but did you mean sch.40 or sch.80 and not 20? 

Pnut

I can never find a picture of theAfrican style double mound forge that I believe was posted by Thomas but here's one that Glenn posted that demonstrates a ground forge like Charles was speaking of just without a hole for your legs and only a hearth mound instead of a double mound configuration



[pnut]

I finally found a picture posted of a double mound forge. Here's what one looks like. Just build it on the ground. 

Pnut

[Daniel95]

Thanks all. Pnut, how deep is the hole between the mounds? It looks doable.

[Daniel95]

I think Ill dig one up this afternoon and keep yall posted. I think I got the premise. Thanks much!

[Chris C]

15 hours ago, Charles R. Stevens said:

this guy makes charcoal  These illustrations May help 

Charles,

Thanks for that video.  I was thoroughly fascinated.  I had to keep reminding myself the guy was recording it with a modern man's tool.  The entire process was so primitive.  Thanks again.

[pnut]

1 hour ago, Daniel95 said:

how deep is the hole between the mounds? It looks doable.

Maybe an inch or two. The way an African forge is constructed you can lay the air pipe on the surface of the ground and build a mound over it so that the opening of the pipe is even with the wall of the mound and about four inches away make another mound about eight inches tall and dig a one or two inch trench between the two of the mounds. Hook up the air supply and get a fire going and get to work. Using charcoal you're going to want to pile at least four inches of charcoal on top of the steel maybe more depending on the air supply. All of these forges take some tinkering with to get dialed in but it's just dirt so it's easy to  adjust.

Pnut

[Charles R. Stevens]

My experience says 4-5”. You want the center of the fireball at the level of the hearth, so with a 6-8” fire ball...

Yes sir schedule 40. That gives you a 7/8” ID, if you use schedule 80 step up to 1” as the ID is almost 1”. I do have some big pressure stuff around here that is 2” OD and 3/4” ID if you want to get serous!

 

[pnut]

Nope, I'm quite happy for the time being with the schedule forty I've got right now. I'd actually like to go down from a one inch schedule forty to a three quarters sch.40 but I forget every time I'm in a position to get ones. 

I also forgot to add on my last post that I used a brick to raise the stock above the tuyere so without the brick you may have to add an extra inch to the trench for a double mound forge built with the tuyere sitting on the ground. Oops 

Pnut

[Daniel95]

Sounds good! Pics later.

[Charles R. Stevens]

Dang, Pnut we might just displace the dreaded brake drum forge yet...

[pnut]

I've not seen many being built anymore. Most are jabods now. I think you've changed the paridigm. I really don't see too many people going through the trouble of using a brakedrum anymore at all. I frequent a couple other rooms on Reddit also even though I think it's a terrible place in general the blacksmithing rooms aren't as bad. I recommend a jabod forge to every person that asks about getting into blacksmithing. I have the links saved. The improvised anvil link also. 

Pnut

[Charles R. Stevens]

Being poor changes ones perspective, lol. 

[pnut]

Yes it does. I hemmed and hawed about getting into smithing because truthfully it was overwhelming and I didn't have money to waste buying the wrong things because I didn't know what I really needed. When I stumbled on to the jabod it was an eye opening moment. I couldn't believe how simple it really was. As a matter of fact it looked too simple and made me a little skeptical. I would guarantee if everyone who was interested in smithing knew how low the bar to getting started is the world would be lousy with blacksmiths. I really did have a facepalm moment and had a forge in pretty short order. That's why I try to pass the info along to anyone interested. 

Pnut

[Frosty]

7 hours ago, Chris C said:

Thanks for that video.  I was thoroughly fascinated.  I had to keep reminding myself the guy was recording it with a modern man's tool.  The entire process was so primitive. 

Chris: You should watch all his videos. His processes aren't really so primitive he just doesn't use much for tools. Wait till you see his heated, tile roofed house. The  thing has a heated bed. 

He's a very entertaining guy to watch. He has a blog too and freely talks about how long it takes him to make some of these things. He refines ad smelts his own iron and forges it into tools. I love his blower.

Frosty The Lucky.

[ThomasPowers]

Except wouldn't a bellows have been faster to build and worked better than that blower?