Building a Charcoal forge.

[Savlaka]

So I got some more work done on the hood.

I cut the opening out and made the top extensions for the opening, I have the side panels roughly cut, I'll fit them after I weld the base frame to the tank and cut out the front section of the frame to fit.

But I decided I needed to give this design a quick test to make sure everything was going to work the way I wanted. So I dumped in some 1/2 rotted pine sapwood and the dusty dregs from a bag of charcoal to make the most smoke and fire fleas I could... I definitely need the extension (perhaps visor is a better term?) on the top of the opening - without it I was only containing about 60% of the smoke and 75% of the fire fleas. But with just that top piece it worked almost perfectly - at least 90% of the smoke and better than that for the fire fleas. 

I'll be working on the roof panels and chimney cap later, and once it cools off again I'll get to welding up the parts. The final bit will be the rain guards and painting all of it... Though I need to pick up some more high temp paints all I have left is red, don't think I want this thing bright red...

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

Looking good, but from the amount of fire fleas, I'd say the air blast is a little too much. I think red would be an appropriate color for the ingenious design.

I can't control the wind, all I can do is adjust my sail’s.
Semper Paratus

 

[Jason L]

Really clean work there. I really like the hood design. I'm sorry but my eyes aren't what they once were, does the hood sit directly over the fire or is it offset towards the back? Either way it's impressive, great work. If all of your work is that clean I expect there to be some mighty fine project come out of that. Can't wait to see some of them.

[Savlaka]

Irondragon - I was cranking on it much more than needed to make as many fire fleas as I could to see how it would handle them.

Jason - Thanks. The hood is completely over the forge but is offset to the rear a bit. 

Almost there...

I got the rain cap for the chimney started, I need to make the mounting legs for it - it'll bolt onto the top of the chimney using the 5/16" threaded holes already there. 

All of the major work on the hood itself is done. the front of the baseplate decided to warp some when I fitted the front panels on... some percussive persuasion convinced it to go back to where I wanted it :).

I did use some of the red paint... just only on the inside. it's only for rust prevention I know it'll be black eventually. I got the rest of the metal stripped and clean and repainted it's a semi metallic grey. once it was dry enough to move I put it in place.

after these photos were taken I got the roof panels cut and put back in place, though I still need to make some flashing to get it mostly watertight. I also still have a bit of sheet metal work to do for the rain guard... I'm not trying to get all of this sealed up 100% waterproof just to block most of anything that makes it to the forge.

[Savlaka]

I got the rain cap on, lucky for me the day before it started raining again. and a bit of flashing (not done in the photos) seems to be enough to keep out the majority of the water during the rain.

And then I moved over to the other part of this project, the charcoal bunker.

I made the charcoal bunker from old fence parts, and a few small cut-off's from making shelves. this design allows me to just take a scoop of charcoal out the bottom and dump it into the forge as I need more fuel. I break the big chunks coming out of the bags down to size and then dump it into the bin., and my guesstimate on total capacity is 250+lbs of 1-2" charcoal pieces - at least.

50lbs just barely covered the sloped section. now I can pick up charcoal when it goes on sale and not worry too much about storing the bags somewhere.

[Shainarue]

I absolutely love that charcoal bunker idea. Much better than my current method of diving into a metal barrel, lol

[Frosty]

It is until it gets wet, charcoal can start to decompose, generating heat and possible combust. A good water tight cover and ventilation to help keep it dry is a good idea. 

Nice bunker though, I like it.

Frosty The Lucky.

[Savlaka]

thanks y'all, I thought it was the simplest method of both storing and being able to feed the forge (or grill).

while the studies I read show autoignition of charcoal does happen, normally it requires a very large pile (I was seeing #'s in the range of 20-50 cubic meters), and it needs to get soaked. the autoignition happens at the interface of the dry and partially wet (drying out) charcoal. usually more of an issue for industrial situations...

But even with that, I tried to ensure that there was some airflow available from the sides. this bunkers sides are not fitted super tight, the fence pickets were left as they were and just placed close and screwed into place. on the other hand I knew the top would get rain spray on occasion so the top is multiple layers in alternating directions and the edges were jointed to make it fit tightly. then glued and screwed together to make a sort of plywood. I did not find any water inside after the afternoon rainstorm despite the top being wet from spray.

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

Just a thought about storing charcoal. If you have pack rats around, it will take them no time at all to make off with a lot of charcoal. So if your charcoal seems to be disappearing, you may have to rat proof the storage area. I lost about 50 pounds of charcoal in 2 days to the little critters.

I can't control the wind, all I can do is adjust my sail’s.
Semper Paratus

 

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

The bin I made is made out of green fiberglass sheeting and is is about halfway down the left wall behind the lumber when we were adding an addition. It holds about 200 pounds of charcoal. It's the only picture I could find of it. Keeps the pack rats out of the charcoal.

 

 

 

I can't control the wind, all I can do is adjust my sail’s.
Semper Paratus

 

[wirerabbit]

Now I have to go out to the forge and check my bags of charcoal for little holes and missing coal!