Forge seal?

Nowicki

Nowicki

Joined
Jan 18, 2003
Messages
1,117
I"m buildin a new forge to weld up some damascus. Lining a 30 gal drum with fire brick. Using high temp. refractory cement to hold it together. I know that I should seal it with something but cannot remember what it was. Something to help reflect the heat in????

Larry
 
Larry, a 30 gallon drum??? What are you making Damascus cannons??? It's going to take a long time to get that sucker up to welding temp. The ITC100 reflect the heat back in. You are going to waste allot of propane warming it up. :confused:
 
Larry,

I wouldn't use firebrick for the entire forge...they are not the best insulators out there... I'd use them on the floor (or pour a castable refractory floor out of Mizzou) and line the sides/top with a couple inches of Inswool in a forge that big. The stuff to cover them with would be Satanite to stabilize things and ITC-100 for increased efficiency. Hope this helps some!

:)

-Darren
 
It will be a vertical forge. The drum is 14" across. I'll wrap 1" inswool first. The fire brick is 2.5" x 4"x 9". beveled to fit the circle 2 lengths high. That should give a interior diameter of about 7". When I used Mark's his was about 10" inside diameter and 14" tall. With his $10 burner it heated up quick and didn't use much gas. I think his was just reinforced inswool.
 
oops, now that I reread your post...I see you said 30 gallon drum, not 55 gallon! That's a more reasonable size with what you plan to use...

:)

-Darren
 
Why didn't you put the bricks first?? Then put the inswool and coated with the ITC100? This way the bricks wouldn't suck up the heat.
 
Been told that those little glowing sparks that come out from the inswool are carcinogenic. Thought I would put the fire brick on the outside to help seal it in. Thought the firebrick would also work as a heat sink to aneal blades...Put blade in....close it up...turn off...forget about till tomorrow. Blade anealed.

Larry
 
True, after the forge has been fired to temp a couple of times you want to avoid breathing the escaping Inswool fibers...that's the main reason we topcoat with Satanite....to stabilize the fibers and keep them in place.

You actually bring up a good point that is probably worth mentioning for others reading these posts....if you ever go to re-line your forge, it is wise to wear a respirator when you tear out the old Ceramic Fiber Blanket.

Regarding the firebricks...it's a tradeoff...you'll hold heat longer, but you'll also take longer to come up to heat...forge design is all about engineering trade-offs...you'll just have to decide what trade-offs work best for your application and budget.

Let's see some pics of that forge when you get it done!

:)

-Darren
 
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