Graham forge users

V

Vintage Welder

Joined
May 22, 2020
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Hello this my first post, I'm new to bladesmithing /blacksmithing but not new to working with metals. I was a welder/ fabricator and I teach it at a high school tech center. I finally found an anvil now I want to purchase a forge. Through recommendations and searching threads here I like the Atlas Graham forges, I see they have recent updates. Has anyone used one yet? I see one end is open and the other has a smaller end. When you use the smaller end do you close the open end with bricks. With the chamber being round, do you need to put bricks in the bottom for a flat surface? How easy is it to be relined? Thanks.
Charlie
 
I have an earlier Graham prototype, but essentially the same.
The larger end is usually used for your material. The smaller end, as I understand it, is for venting exhaust gases. You do not want to fully block this off. If you do, gas has to leave somewhere. It will end up leaving through the inlet (gas) port, which mixes into the venturi port and cause incomplete combustion.
There was another thread describing this behavior. My take away was that you can partially block the larger front opening, but not the back.

I don't use bricks for a flat bottom, but I sometimes put in a 'sacrificial' brick if flux is involved. As I understand, the round chamber is preferred to enable better swirl from the flame.

Mine is entirely soft firebrick inside, which is probably a pain to fully reline. I did coat some damaged parts with ITC-100 which wasn't too bad. That said, the new versions seem to use a different castable refractory that I'm not familiar with.
 
When working swords or long blades and other type things you can have them pass out the back hole to heat farther up the blade.

I do not recommend blocking any of the ports ( holes) on a Graham forge. Charles has the ports designed to allow the exhaust gasses to escape properly.

These are really good forges for general work. They get more than hot enough to weld. The curved floor isn't a problem, but you could put a 3" wide kiln shelf floor or pour a flat floor with some type of refractory (read on).

Relining would not be required for a long time unless you let flux eat up the floor. The simplest way to prevent that is to coat the floor and a little way up the sides with bubble alumina. You could make the floor flat when doing that. Atlas sells a bag of Tuff Mix that does the same.
When relining becomes necessary, most folks would just put a layer of satanite or other refractory over the eroded/damaged liner.
 
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