Forge atmosphere

[JMJones]

I have an uncle Al's blown forge and have been messing with stainless damascus, which entails long soak times (45 minutes). On two occasions the mild steel can that held the stainless strips slumped down into the path of the burner and was burned away. I stuck a peice of square tube in the forge the keep that from happening and this is the tube after one hour at 2200. There was dragons breath from the forge the whole time, what is causing this?

 

[stezann]

Maybe you could post other pictures, since it's hard to tell...
But as a blind guess, it seems you have a very strong beam directly on the piece. You should try to reduce the forge opening and direct the flame away from the piece, in a swirl inside the chamber as it works in vertical forges, but also in horizontal ones. The flame should heat the chamber, not the piece.
If the latter situation is the case, and the flame is on the bottom, maybe the big opening allows too much oxygen inside....reducing it may help.
On the other hand you may simply have your temperatures too high and you could try lowering them while extending the soak.