I built a forge...

Wulf

Wulf

Joined
May 10, 2000
Messages
3,351
Started with some 8" diameter, 1/4" thick walled steel pipe and a bunch of other odd pieces of steel from the scrapyard that I cut to length with my chop saw.
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I made some "feet" and a handle so the thing wouldn't roll away.
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Drilled a hole for the burner inlet and made sure to do it at an angle so the flame will create a vortex inside the chamber.
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I took some 2" pipe, cut it to length, ground it to fit the curvature of the tube, and welded it on. I also drilled holes in it and welded on some nuts for tension bolts to hold the burner tube in place.
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I then took another short section of the 8" pipe and some pieces of angle iron and some barstock to build a door...
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Slapped together a hinge and attached it to the forge body...
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Then I lined the forge with 1" of inswool, coated it with satanite, and coated that with some ITC-100. For the door, I cut to shape a few pieces of insboard and cemented them in place with satanite.
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I put together a burner, using a burner kit I bought from Darren Ellis. I picked up a nice 164CFM blower from Kayne & Son and attached it to a flange with bolts and a rudimentary gasket that I made from some neoprene I had left over from when I made a pad for my Beaumont disc-grinder.
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With the forge mostly done, it was time to attach the burner
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Fired it up...
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Tweaked the gas pressure and the airflow until I had everything dialed in and got a nice, slightly reducing atmosphere.
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This forge burns hot and evenly. The forced air setup is nice too because I can easily adjust the forge atmosphere. It's also very efficient. I can get to a welding heat running my gas at just about 1 PSI.

Inspiration for this project came largely from Darren Ellis' forge gallery and a number of threads in this and other forums. Darren also gave me a lot of great information and advice on the project, and I owe him my thanks. It was an exciting project and the forge works exceptionally well.

Thanks also to the other members of this forum who have shared their knowledge and experience on the subject.
 
Pretty sweet rig! I've been putting off rebuilding my forge, yours provided some extra encouragement :).
 
Good looking forge. Was there a reason the burner hole was so far back? Will this affect the even heating if you have to open the back door to pass longer stuff thru?
 
I wanted to keep the main blast off of the workpiece. The forge body is 18" long, and I'm not making swords, so the chamber size and heat distribution are pretty good for general knife work. It is hotter closer to the burner inlet, so I do need to be careful about overheating the tip, but once the forge is up to heat I can turn the flow way down and keep everything well under control.

Oh - I also want to say that IG's tutorial was very helpful too, and using his forge at the recent NECKA hammer-in he hosted was another big source of inspiration. Thanks George.
 
The bike is an old BMW R65. My dad drove it back from the factory in Bayern (Germany) to our home in Brussells back in 1980, then we moved to the states, and he hardly drove it anymore. It's the first real bike I ever drove, and one of these days I'll get it road worthy again, but that's a project for another day...

howiesatwork - Darren suggested a paintjob too, and if I get ambitious I'll do it. I probably won't make it nearly as good as HappyCat's (I love that forge), but it would definitely spruce it up a bit...
 
Great looking forge. I have a couple questions about it. Do you think the 112 cfm blower would work as good as the 164 cfm blower? I realize there is only $10.00 difference in price, but I was wondering if the bigger size was necessary. Does the back door hinge like the one in front? Is it solid or does it have a window like the front one. Thank you very much. Your work is an inspiration for me to get in gear and get mine built.
 
Wow man I love your door design. That is awsome. I wish I would of seen this when I was building mine.
 
Thanks again for the compliments, guys

dwain - the 112cfm blower would be sufficient, and probably use a tiny bit less electricity too. I just figured that for an extra 10 bucks I may as well get the big one. But again, I'm sure the smaller one would suffice. After all, the chamber in this forge is less than 6" in diameter.

As for the rear door, well, right now the "door" is just some hard refractory that came out of my lowboy when I relined it. Eventually I plan on building a door like the one in front, but without a window. I don't really need an opening in the back unless I plan on working some really long stock so I'd just as soon keep the heat inside.

I'm also planning on putting a handle on the main door and maybe even putting a counterweight on it so it's easy to open...
 
nice looking forge,cool front door design,I built one alot like yours except the fancy front door, consider the bublinga for the floor if you forge weld i have had it in mine for 7 months and it really is flux resisant-- I also put a window
in the backddoor and put on a ledge just like the front but keep it plugged with wool coated with satinite it works just as if it was a solid back plate but with the option of removing the plug and forging longer material if i desire.i also purchased the same blower as you and love it. bb
 
Most excellent Wulf! So when do we get to see some cool forged blades? ;)

Roger
 
Good looking forge. As Roger said when do we get to see some blades. It was good to see you at Blade. Keep up the good work.
Brion Tomberlin
ABS Journeyman smith
 
cadillac forge said:
consider the bublinga for the floor if you forge weld i have had it in mine for 7 months and it really is flux resisant-- I also put a window
in the backddoor and put on a ledge just like the front but keep it plugged with wool coated with satinite it works just as if it was a solid back plate but with the option of removing the plug and forging longer material if i desire.
Click to expand...

Good points, bb. I have some bubble alumina and thought about maybe making a removable floor coated with the stuff for forge welding. As for the back door, I think I'll probably do exactly what you described. Makes perfect sense.

Now as far as showing off knives, the bulk of my efforts thus far have centered on making knives that work. The vast majority of what I've made has either been left unfinished, has been destroyed in testing, or has been stuffed in some dark corner of the shop never to be gazed upon by another pair of human eyes. I've been experimenting a bit with different steels, techniques, heat treatments, etc., and I'm just now at the point where I can comfortably say I can make a knife that will cut, and do a reasonably good job of doing so as well.

testknife10.JPG


So now I suppose can focus more of my efforts on making some knives that actually look pretty too.
 
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