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Sparks from fire


natkova

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How much sparks are dangerous from fire that comes out, if they come in contact with eye (didn't had that expirience) but iam just wondering wil lthat hot burining sparks cause eye blindes if ladned on eye?

This topic inspired me yesterday , luckly i have long pole when controling bellows some sparks are flaying around , did anybody had expirience with those sparks that jump out of fire.

I know you should have glasses, but i couldn't bought them. Iam asking how much those sparks are dangerous for skin eyes etc.

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I don't have much experience with sparks hitting me around the eye, but I have had scale pop off and hit me just underneath my eye leaving a pretty decent burn, reminding me that safety glasses don't do much good if they're sitting on top of your head rather than on top of your nose. Would I have been blinded if it had hit me just a little higher than it did? Maybe, but I don't think so. It would certainly have been very uncomfortable though. Burns on the surface of your eye generally don't heal very well nor very quickly.

To answer your question more directly, no amount of burning hot material landing on your unprotected eye is going to do anything good. Therefore, I would say that any amount of sparks could be dangerous to your eye/vision However, how many sparks would it take to cause permanent damage to your cornea isn't something I can answer. Burning your fingers or arm is inconvenient, but you really don't want to mess around with your eyes.

I highly recommend getting some safety glasses or eye protection of some sort. Better safe than sorry. 

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Shut your eyes and tell me what you see. 

If you have sparks jumping out of the fire, most likely you are pumping too much air into the fire, and or the fire is not deep enough.  You want a gentle air going into the fire and only the amount of air to provide the amount of heat for the project at hand.  Fuel does not make the fire hot, air makes the fire hot.  You will be surprised how little an amount of air is actually needed for small to medium size stock.

Eye protection is VERY important.  Sparks landing on the skin causes skin burns.  How many and how large the sparks depends on the size and how severe the burn(s) are. 

Would you grab a piece of HOT metal with your bare hand?  NO !!  You use tongs that properly fit the metal your holding.  Scale can pop off the metal and is hot enough to do damage, burn your skin, etc.  Sparks from grinding are VERY dangerous, can travel 20 feet (3 meters) or more and bounce if they hit things.  Eye protection, aprons, etc are a must when using a grinder.

Personal protection is your personal responsibility.  Can it be expensive, yes, but always less expensive than a hospital visit and time off work.

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Frazer i once had one spark landing on my lip and it was nasty for 4 days, it was like pimple ,  i had pain and some psychological Consecuenses fear and i avoided forge  for weeks.

Glen when fuel burn out when there is less smoke , sparks tend to be less in  when fuel burn out and less is smoke, and when you have hot embers,  but yesterday one flow foot away from my head and after couple of minutes i was like "Man that could hit my right eye or ear" for that matter.

And i was like, i will pause this  for couple of week,  this one was close one.

 

And i used to have larger lever when i operate bellows. since i used foot powered and it was shorter, (luckily ) i was side away from forge. And i avoided that sparks.
I was not talking is it expensive or not, probably price is a litle bit higher than headphones that i have, but only thing that i found in market was welding goggles. 

I should search it more.


Is there any danger from sparks Glen when you have protective glasses?

Can spark somehow go underneath of it,

 

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Always a danger, and yes, debris CAN get under any protective layer.  It is no guarantee, just trying to make the odds of an accident less.

Look for safety glasses at your welding supply store. They should come in clear, gray, and several colors.  Choose the clear or gray as the color glasses will change the color of the fire and the metal.  Look at a full face shield as another option.

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I once worked in a factory where PPE would be provided if you asked for it; but it's cost came out of the supervisor's bonus.  I was the only one on my line that wore hearing protectors and took a lot of flack from other workers. Of course I can hear my grandkids when they talk with me nowadays.

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I worked at one of those pay by the day places when I was younger and waiting to start my new full time job that charged YOU for ppe. They nickel and dimed you at every turn until you would only end up with about 25 dollars for an eight hour shift. This was in about 2007. I only worked there one day to get lunch money for the job I was starting on the following Monday. 

Pnut

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Your bellows rebuild has been fun and inspirational to watch. However I'm curious about your actual experience blacksmithing. No offence meant but watching your fire says you do not know much about fire management. Both Glen and I have said many times you are getting far too much velocity. This is poor fire control. You need to learn proper fire management, then match your bellows to this. You appear to be doing this the other way around. Your sparks will go away with proper fire control unless you are burning charcoal and not coal.

Too much air(high velocity) creates what's called an oxydizing fire. This means too much oxygen. Too much oxygen causes high scaling and burnt iron. It also means the outside of your iron tends to be hotter than the inside. Usually the outside will burn by the time the inside is hot. Not to mention that your sparks will disappear.

If you are burning blacksmith coal(bituminous cokeing coal) you should never have actual coal in the middle of your fire, only around the outside where it will change to come. Then keep moving this coke into the center of your fire. This coke is what you need to heat your work. Coal in your fire causes smoke, too much air blows the ash and other stuff all over the place causing sparks.

And finally use your whole bellows, not just those quick strokes you do in your vids. That will physically hurt you, tire you out, burn your iron and,,,,, make sparks.  

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4 hours ago, anvil said:

  

No offence taken reason why i pump bellows a litle bit faster is because i want to get inhaled top chamber faster , i don't want it to be inhaled a couple inches i want it to inhale in full size.

That's why i do that (bring more air, and more sparks) And that's way i saw how blacksmiths in my place do when hey work with bellows.

I could do everything easier if i used haridryer of some electric fan, but i want to be somehow traditional and independent of electricity, at least some things that i can avoid using machine i will, and i don't pay the bills so, yeah, that's some of reason i use bellows, and they gave me lot less noise instead comparing to any electric machine.

Than i guess this guy make same mistake with sparks air.

I saw him doing it and i did it to, it may not be "appropiate " and righ way, but it works for him.

And yes i don't have a lot's of expirience with fire "at least when we are speaking about managing blacksmith fire"

But there are some reasons i  dont work as i should.-


1 I use cheap and free fuel some leftovers from lignite coal, and  more time i play and experiment with stuff, how can they work instead i seriously want to heat piece of metal.

2. I don't have safety glases so i kinda have distance from fire (like you would have with Covid person hahaha)  and i don't poke it and manage to control it while i blow air in it because of danger , i don have everything needed for "safe " working.

I know that you should use poker and chase place where air is going put fuel around it and than material and than again over metal some fuel. But doing that while there are some sparks flying or there are no sparks flying but having some distance over forge (I don't know should i have distance from forge or not) but i have it a couple of feet and that's is reason why i don't manage it properly.

 

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The bottom half of the bellows produces air.  The top half of the bellows just holds that air and then lets it go to the forge.  The fire at time 0:25 looks about right.  Good ball of hot coals to heat the metal in.  If you add some more fuel to make the fire a bit deeper, you can put the metal about 1/2 way up the fireball and avoid some of the scale.  Additional coal will also insulate the fire and hold the heat into the fireball.

Any piece of metal can act as a poker.  The poker is used to bring more fuel into the fire as the burning fuel is consumed.  When or if you develop clinker, let the fire cool a bit and use the poker to get under and lift the clinker up and out of the fire to be thrown away. 

You may want to try using a hair dryer to learn how a controlled air supply works, then switch back to the bellows.  You may find that you need to spill a lot of air before ti gets to the forge to make things work well. 

It is all about finding what works.

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Glenn what caused bellows to burn inside at nozzle part, i had that once, and i heard if you choke fire with flue too much they can suck back, and they sucked but didn't exploded just started to have some fire a litle bit to have some  burning at nozzle.


Could choking fire blast with fuel cause that "draw back".

 

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7 hours ago, pnut said:

I worked at one of those pay by the day places when I was younger and waiting to start my new full time job that charged YOU for ppe. They nickel and dimed you at every turn until you would only end up with about 25 dollars for an eight hour shift. 

"You load sixteen tons, what do you get?

Another day older and deeper in debt

Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go

I owe my soul to the company store"

In the US, it is the employer's responsibility to provide PPE when it is required for the job.  Any business that handles it differently is treating YOU as the consumable, and likely breaking the law! 

OSHA FACTSHEET PPE

https://www.osha.gov/OshDoc/data_General_Facts/ppe-factsheet.pdf

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On 10/14/2020 at 1:23 PM, Chris Williams said:

In the US, it is the employer's responsibility to provide PPE when it is required for the job.  Any business that handles it differently is treating YOU as the consumable, and likely breaking the law! 

OSHA FACTSHEET PPE

He is not in the US; he is half way around the world where even the idea of worker protection is foreign.  A poor kid working on his own with out any real resources.  I am impressed in how well he has been doing under the conditions he has to address, but I will also insist he gets eye protection as soon as he can find some before he puts an eye out

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1 hour ago, ThomasPowers said:

It blows out in 10 seconds with the nozzle completely blocked?  You have some major efficiency issues to deal with!  Where is all that air leaking out?

To be honest iam.not sure is it 10 or 20 seconds i cant remember.

 

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53 minutes ago, Steve Sells said:

He is not in the US; he is half way around the world where even the idea of worker protection is foreign.  A poor kid working on his own with out any real resources.  I am impressed in how well he has been doing under the conditions he has to address, but I will also insist he gets eye protection as soon as he can find some before he puts an eye out

I wont light forge until i get some gogles .

The conditions are not that bad, but you have right about protection, here i was looked down if i insisted to.wear headphones in workplace, even coworker wear them, but expected me.not to wear so i can hear him better.

And when i worked in some factory where we used angle grinder sometimes they looked at you as stranger if you will use protection for example you want to cut piece of pipe for 5seconds, they will lokk on you as " less manly" , i mean coworkers, even tho company bought it for that purpose.

2 minutes ago, ThomasPowers said:

If the nozzle is completely blocked the top "lung" of the bellows should deflate very slowly and not inhale any!

I dont know how that spark happened to touch nozzle inside but it started burning, it was dunn and sad at same time, because i got suprised.

Now i dont choke my fuel anymore, i let some to go out of forge heart .

I saw that on youtube one folk say that id you choke forge with lot of fuel and dont let sparks smoke etc to go to chimne , the everything will come back at bellows

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