Hello all, I'm a 16 y/o from Puerto Rico. I just started forging yesterday and need some help with my setup. I'm using a very rudimentary forge from a tutorial I watched on YouTube. It works for now, but if I can do anything to improve for free, please let me know!

    Below, I've put some photos of my forge, including a piece of rebar I was whacking on just to 1) practice, 2) test my hammer, 3) test my anvil. You may also see a claw hammer in some photos, but I'm not using it to forge anything.

    I also apologize for the dark photos; I got a late start in the day yesterday.

    Outside of my forge photos, I also included 2 photos of the piece of rebar I practiced on yesterday. This was the first piece I ever forged. I quenched it in water and let it cure over my coals for an hour.

    It took me about an hour to build this forge. I built it from all free materials, and it works! If you have any tips for me being able to improve it for free or very cheaply, please reply. 

    -Omari

Bienvenido!

You've got the right approach, starting with what you have and working from there. If you're using the weights as an anvil, you should mount one of them on edge, to give more mass underneath the hammer blows. If forging on a rounded surface seems odd to you, consider that this is how traditional Chinese "turtle" anvils have been used for centuries!

This would work great for me as I want to have some sort of way to put curves in my metal. I also forgot to mention it in my post, but is there any way to curve or punch holes in my material with my current setup? What can I use to do so?

Edited February 17Feb 17 by Mod34
Removed unnecessary quote

One thing to watch out for it using concrete blocks as the interior of your forge. Concrete will spall at high temperatures, possibly violently! You can simply line it with dirt, but a clay/sand mix would be better. Nothing fancy, just clay out of the ground if ground in you location has any.

You can even build the forge from wood and fill it with dirt/clay to get it up at a your preferred working height. We generally refer the this as a JABOD forge (Just A Box of Dirt), and they are very effective and easy to reconfigure.

https://www.iforgeiron.com/forum/267-jabod-just-a-box-of-dirt/
 

Keep it fun,

David

Welcome. 

As Goods pointed out i would get rid of the cinder bricks. A hole in the ground would be much safer. Or even just a couple mounds of dirt with a trench in the middle. People built forges like that for many hundreds of years. 

I see what looks like a hair dryer for air supply. That is way to much air even on low. Just move the hair dryer till you get just a bit of air going into the fire. Air makes a fire hot but to much blows the heat out of the fire. 

I would highly suggest that you take some time, grab a sandwich, cold drink, and read through the section on forges here. Also read through the improvised anvils thread. 

But good job on using what you have available. 

I would emphasize BillyBones' suggestion, there is an enormous amount of information contained in this forum & one who makes the effort to dig a bit is rewarded with many pearls of wisdom which will likely save both time and money. One hint is that the site's search engine isn't always as helpful as it might be, so consider also using your favorite search engine with "site:iforgeiron.com" appended to your query. 

You're off & running, have fun with the learning process!

--Larry

Also make sure to read the READ THIS FIRST page first.

 

Welcome from the Ozark mountains

My wife's folks are from Puerto Rico.

I would say you are off to a good start. If you have a scrap yard that will let you look for a good piece of steel. Here is one I picked up years ago. Bulldozers and tractors are made out of anvils. This dozer counter weight weighs 110 pounds.

I can’t control the wind. All I can do is adjust my sails. ~Semper Paratus~ USCG 1964-1970

 

Thanks to you all for the help. I'm always glad to learn more about this stuff.