First fire in the coal forge

[Steamcheng]

Greetings all.  I am a new member here and new to the hobby.  It is something I have always wanted to do, but a career in the navy (and another after) didn't allow me the time to engage.  Now I'm retired and live in a place with enough room for me to enjoy a few hobbies.  I figured one way to introduce myself here was to post something I made, so here goes.

I've been an amateur machinist for close to 20 years now, and frequent auctions where I can find tools.  I also collect and work on hit and miss engines, and go to some big shows and swap meets.  These venues have afforded me the opportunity to kit myself out with some basic blacksmith tools.  I'll make the rest.  I got a nice, clean 148# Soderfors anvil a couple of years ago, and I recently picked up a nice little rivet forge similar to a Champion, but with the ratchet driven blower underneath.  It needed a fire grate over the tuyere, and I machined one out of 1/4 plate.  It also needed the lever and pintle, which I made, and a leather belt.  So today I decided to get a fire lit and play around a little.  I had previously made a little gas forge to fiddle with, but all I made with it are the hooks I hammered into my stump to chain my anvil down to.  I like the traditional flavor of the coal forge better.

So...one thing I don't have, and need, is a fire rake/poker for the forge.  So that's where I started.  I took a 9" piece of 1/2" round stock and drew it out to about 21 inches, then made a flat for the rake and bent it 90 degrees.  Then I made an eye in the handle end, and realized I was a little off and wasn't it lined up with the rake, so decided to put a full twist in the middle as part of the fix.  Since it wasn't planned that way (didn't think of it, duh!) it isn't as nice looking as it would have been if I had left the middle squared for the twist, but overall I'm not too bent about it.

So here it is.  My first effort from my new coal forge.  I'm pretty happy with it, and enjoy being covered in soot and coal dust and ash.  Be gentle. 

Cheers!

Steamcheng

[pnut]

Looks good. You find yourself a post vise and you'll have the Blacksmithing triangle kitted out. Welcome aboard, be safe, and remember it's supposed to be fun. 

Pnut

[Steamcheng]

Thanks, Pnut!  I have a very good friend who made me a great deal on a post vise.  He has plenty, so he loaned me one for life.  Pretty funny, but it didn't cost me anything.  If I find one I like better, it goes back to him.

It is a lot of fun, for sure.  I'm considering a little 10 x 10 smithy behind my garage if it becomes a habit (and I am pretty sure it will). 

 

Edited June 7, 2021 by Mod30
Excessive quoting

[Goods]

It’s quite an addictive hobby! Before long 10’x10’ will be too small. I’m trying to get my new shop finished and at 20’x20’ I’m afraid it’s going to seem small very quickly...

Good work on the fire rake. Not as criticism, but for my aesthetic, I personally would have tried to have the handle area thicker as the thickness section, then a gradual taper to the end. (Of course I’m notoriously critical of my own work, and would put hours of work into something that would be acceptable in 15~20 minutes. I am very much a hobbyist, and would go broke if I even tried to do this for a living!)

Welcome aboard, and remember to keep it fun! (We love pictures, keep them coming...)

David

[Steamcheng]

Thanks!  I like that idea.  It certainly would have more visual appeal that way.  I have to make some more pokers (for my woodstove and for my neighbor's) and I'll definitely keep that in mind for that project.  I think my neighbor is going to help, and possibly be a partner in crime, as he pumped the blower on my forge while I made this and got quite interested.

Steamcheng

Edited June 7, 2021 by Mod30
Excessive quoting

[Goods]

Fire rakes and pokers are good items to play with ideas. If they are just for you own use, think about what you would really like or want to try out. If it doesn’t work out, not a big issue and will most likely still be useful for you. You can always replace it later anyway. If they turn out nice, they’ll end up as kind of a show piece when someone visits your forge. Either way, you tried something new and learned from it.

Personally, I try to challenge myself every time I’m at the anvil. Sometimes it doesn’t work out and I end up leaving the forge feeling frustrated. Then I reflect on what may have went wrong, do a little research and so far ended up the better for it. Not to sound corny but blacksmithing has really become an almost meditative personally growth mechanism for me.

David

[Steamcheng]

I certainly understand that.  I have had much the same experience with machining over the years.  It represents one of my "happy places" and offers me challenges, successes and failures, but always a place to learn, think and unwind.  I know already that blacksmithing will offer the same opportunities for catharsis, and I look forward to each session.

Edited June 7, 2021 by Mod30
Excessive quoting

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

Your fire rake looks better than my first one made from rebar. I still use it because it is the first thing I made and it still works 30 years later. How about a picture of your forge. Is it a cast iron pan? If so did you line it with clay so the cast iron doesn't crack?

BTW: Welcome to the forum, a little note though about the quote feature, It's frowned upon quoting posts that are just prior to your reply as outlined here. The quote feature  always good to keep the moderators happy.

[Steamcheng]

Thanks for the tip on quoting.  I read the READ THIS FIRST (first, of course!) and misunderstood Bonus tip #1, as I trimmed what I was quoting without realizing it was frowned upon unless the previous post was particularly long.  I'm a member of several sites like this and each is slightly different on this.  I offer my sincere apologies to the mod who had to go edit each of those posts above!

As for the forge, she was a bit long in the tooth and has a few missing teeth and some nicks in her ears, but I think lots of life left.  I had a similar forge that was rusted down to a pretty thin pan with a lot of perforations in it, for which I received $100 at a recent swap meet.  I picked this one up at the same swap meet for $60.  There is a chunk busted out of one side, the blower wasn't attached or hooked up, and the ratchet on the drive assembly was stuck - all easy fixes for me.

Here she is, after I took the drive wheel and ratchet off.  I don't have a photo before I started work.  Thought I did, but 

Here's the ratchet after I got it apart.  Needed some cleaning, greasing and general TLC, but still good.  I will probably have to make new teeth at some point, as these were worn and shimmed in.  I used some small coil springs I had, but I think this probably had bits of clockspring originally.  Anybody know?

I had to make a new pintle for the lever, and then used the handle from a busted shovel for the lever.  I used a couple of pieces of pipe and turned one down to fit the mounting hole on the pan, and another to fit inside that for easy swiveling.  I welded a fork to the top piece of pipe, so the whole thing kind of works like an oarlock.  I bought a new piece of leather belt and used the belt lacer I had previously rebuilt to stitch it together, and got the blower hooked up.  Works great, after some lube!

The only thing left to fix was the fire grate, which was missing.  I have seen these with a "shower drain" sort of grate, but I decided to make a slotted grate I could easily clear with a poker, since this forge doesn't have a clinker breaker in the tuyere.  I had a piece of 1/4 plate that I butchered a chunk out of with and angle grinder and milled the slots for the grate into it.  Here's what I ended up with.

 

As for the first fire and proper refractory, no.  I didn't have enough material yet to do the whole pan, so I used some kitty litter and sand and covered the area around the fire grate and used some fire brick I had to hem the fire in so I didn't have it all over the place.  I only fired it like that once, since that temporary "fix" was just that - temporary to allow me to test things and conquer my desire to try it out.  Yesterday I got the rest of the stuff I needed (I had to go to a couple of places to find non-scented kitty litter!) and will be lining the pan completely today - photos to come in the Solid Fuel Forges topic area.

I've made sure to resize my photos for efficiency - these are no more that 100kb, most in the 60 to 70 range.  I hope that's good for the board!

Cheers!

Steamcheng

[JHCC]

Welcome aboard!

 

[ThomasPowers]

With your interest in old machinery I can see your liking for your rivet forge; however keep in mind that a simple home built forge may be easier to use and keep running.  I like a free standing hand crank blower feeding air into my forge with a steel table.  The larger hand crank blowers often work MUCH better than small ones and a steel table doesn't have problems with the cast iron cracking or breaking in use.

When you get right down too it: most modern forges are just variations of a hole in the ground (used for forges for 3000 years now); moved up to a convenient height for us "modern" folks to work at.

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

On the piece of the pan that's missing, easy enough to make a patch out of mild steel flat stock the right width, curve it to fit snugly on the inside and let the filler material hold it in. That way you could remove it if needed for long stock and don't have to drill holes to bolt it to the outside. Your fire grate should work fine and the rest of the restoration looks good to me. Your pictures look good to me and load fast.

Like Thomas says temporary fixes have a way of becoming permanent fast. (paraphrased)

[Steamcheng]

Thomas - Thanks.  I already have plans in mind for a larger, rectangular steel forge with a bigger table and deeper firepot for the future.  I figure this one will be a great place to learn, even if limited to smaller work.  I'm not one of those guys who saw Forged in Fire and wants to make blades.  I like making tools and other useful things, and would one day like to become skilled enough to produce some more artful things that non-blacksmiths might think are pretty.  I've been reading the Controlled Hand Forging coursework on the ABANA site and will start with those exercises to build skill, along with a few personal projects to put them into practice.  It reminds me of the MASH episode when the wood carver handed a 2x4 to one of the guys, who said "looks like a 2x4" and the craftsman said, "Thanks - was round."  Maybe one day I'll be able to turn roundstock into square without hammer marks.  

Dragon - I actually considered what I was going to do about that missing chunk.  I don't want to drill any new holes in this forge, so your idea may be the way I ultimately go, but right now I'm more inclined not to do anything about it.  It doesn't seem like it will be a big problem, and as you suggest, also offers a way to put longer stock into the fire.  I wasn't planning on having the filler material all that deep - maybe a couple of inches - and this gap isn't deep enough down the side to affect that.  It might let some green coal dribble out though, so that may end up causing me to fix it as you suggest.

 

[ThomasPowers]

Round into square is a lot easier to do without hammer marks than square into round.

[Frosty]

No refractory, just plain old clay works just fine to clay a forge. If you bend a piece of strap stock say ? x 2" in a curve you can stand it in front of the break and prevent coal falling out excessively. I have a forge pan about the same as yours and guys have no problem getting coal to fall over the sides. 

Nice job, play hard, lay safe.

Frosty The Lucky.

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

Pay attention Frosty, that's what I said.

[Steamcheng]

Thanks, Frosty!  I will probably make the guard rail you and Dragon recommend.  I've been reading a lot of your advice on the board too, including the "formula" for the clay lining.  

In the spirit of whatever's worth doing is worth doing again, I decided to prepare the recipe of 2 to 3 parts sand, 1 part kitty litter (hydrated) into a dryish mix.  After slipping out under cover of darkness and swiping my neighbor's cat box off the screen porch and poaching a little sand from my other neighbor's swimming pool filter, I set out to mix things up.  After picking out as much cat debris as I could, I got the kitty litter measured out and more or less rehydrated.  I was afraid to get too wet, as I didn't want things to get muddy and crack later.  I stirred in the sand and mixed everything up.  The mixture just stayed clumped in my hand when squeezed.  I pounded it into the pan as carefully as I could.  It seemed to go well, but also seemed to be too dry.  After a while in the sun it started to look more like a beach with a cat litter box spilled on it.  I must have kept things too dry and not mixed well enough.  The surface was loose and the rest obviously would crumble and easily scrape away in use.  I was also afraid the neighbor's cat might come over for revenge.  

 

So, later on, I tried another batch.  I ground some of the kitty litter down into more of a powder so I could judge the moisture a little better and added some sifted wood ash and mixed in water very carefully.  I got things to a consistency similar to a very dry version of tile underlayment mix.  It clumped when squeezed but didn't leave the hand stained (much).  It pounded into the pan solidly, stuck together better but wasn't sticky and overall gave me a much better look than my first attempt.  I think this will do.  I suppose the proverbial proof is in the pudding.  We'll see if it cracks.

 

Thanks all for the great site with so much information!

Cheers,

Steamcheng