Im just a lowly stock removal guy - please help me forge

adammichael

adammichael

Joined
Sep 13, 2004
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I am VERY intersted in forging , I went to a hammerin and made some damascus but i would really like to get my own forge. What do i need to start out. I cant aford a little giant or a $1000 anvil right away.

Are the forges that koval sells worth the money or is there a cheaper way? Propane or natural gas?
Anvil or section of railroad track?

Please help a beginer get set up

Thanks

Michael
 
Well I am just getting started in forging myself so I don't know much, but I built my forge (propane)for about a $100. You can get a Russian made 110lb anvil from Harbor Freight for $89. It is a good anvil, not great, but its better than nothing at all, definetly better than their Chinese cast anvils they also sell. Frank
 
"The 50$ Knife Shop" book by Wayne Godard is a good place to start and a good investment. Showes many cheap ways to get started, and has a good section on forging on the cheap.

All that is need for forging is a heat source, something to beat with and something to beat on, and steel to beat up.

If you can get the Harbor Frieght steel anvil go for it, I look not long back and it looks like they no longer carry it. I'll look again, I'm wanting one myself.

I built my gas forge similar to Ron Reil's, and have a hair dryer to boost the heat for faster welding heat. The Kwool coast around 75$, had to buy a roll but it comes in handy when I need to rebuild the forge from welding flux eating holes in it.

Home Depo now has a decent blacksmith's hammer, or you can do like I did and start with a sawed off sledge and use ball piens as finish hammers.

Good luck and don't be afraid to search through thrift shops and antique stores for old tools, some times you find tongs and such for reasonable money.
 
Why would you call yourself "just a lowly stock removal" maker?

Some of the best knives in this country are made by stock removal, also, some of the most creative. Sure forging is nice, if that's what you want to do, but there shouldn't be this classification of stock removal=bad, forging = good.

Many of the makers on this board use the stock removal(or to get away from the hated PC), grinding method to make knives. Let me tell you that grinding is a part of all knifemaking, and if you're not a good grinder, chances are you won't be a good knifemaker, no matter how you shape the basic blade.

Remarks like that cause rifts in the knifemaking community, which the knife publications, and others, are only too ready to exploit, or I should say, certain writers for those publications, as it fits in with their personal agenda's.

Try to master design, "LOWLY" grinding, and finishing, and then having your knives professionally heat treated, before you judge it so harshly. It's not easy at all. If it was, everybody that likes knives would be doing it.:rolleyes:
 
I decided that size doesn't matter for me, so I got a forged steel stake anvil. Flat squar face, and then bought a separat stake fuller. I have a pair of wolf jaw tongs, and a 2lb and 3lb crosspein, and soon, I should have a 2lb ball pein.

As far a natural gas or propane goes- I think that propane is less expensive (not sure), burns hotter, and for me, is more available. There are so many cool ways to make propane forges out there, it's pretty neat. You can easily make a decent burner, you can also turn almost any metal tubing into a forge. Cut 2 holes, put in the koawool, itc-100, and fire her up [simplified version].
 
Being a complete novice to forging also, I would recomend teh $50 Knife Shop. It's a great book. I would also recomend going to Ron Reil's site and taking a look at the information that he has there. I built my forge and burner for less than $50 total, not including the propane line, and regulator.
 
Mike Hull said:
Why would you call yourself "just a lowly stock removal" maker?

Some of the best knives in this country are made by stock removal, also, some of the most creative. Sure forging is nice, if that's what you want to do, but there shouldn't be this classification of stock removal=bad, forging = good.

Many of the makers on this board use the stock removal(or to get away from the hated PC), grinding method to make knives. Let me tell you that grinding is a part of all knifemaking, and if you're not a good grinder, chances are you won't be a good knifemaker, no matter how you shape the basic blade.

Remarks like that cause rifts in the knifemaking community, which the knife publications, and others, are only too ready to exploit, or I should say, certain writers for those publications, as it fits in with their personal agenda's.

Try to master design, "LOWLY" grinding, and finishing, and then having your knives professionally heat treated, before you judge it so harshly. It's not easy at all. If it was, everybody that likes knives would be doing it.:rolleyes:
Click to expand...

I am not judging anyone, i am very proud of the work i do. I would just like to make my own damascus. I was being sarcastic. Apparently that wasnt obvious to everyone.

Feel free to look at my knives.

www.AdamMichaelKnives.com
 
Oh by the way Michael, you web site is killer. Your knives are awesome, look forward to seeing some forged blades.
 
I began making knives one year ago. I didnt thought about stock removal (i wasnt aware that a knife would be made just by grinding and cutting). I firstly bulit caharcoal forge and made my own charcoal, got a piece of rail made my own anvil. I didnt make any damascus but i am sure the charcoal is very hot (melted three knives by mistake in the beginning) and clean (it is messy Ok, but for steel it is healhy I want to say). It is too easy to build that since then I have 4 charcoal forges (for different purposes - 1 welding & melting furnace, 1 sword forge, 2 portable forges). In 3 months, continously hammering I was pretty good at shaping metal. But when I wanted to propetly HT modern alloys the propane forge was the most proper answer to the problem, as with the char/coal heating blade evenly is damn hard. So I decided to buld my own Propane forge and in 3 days it was working. I made (forged at my portable coal forge) my burner parts as the bell reducer and pipe with flare was not available for me. The forge is clean (not only for steel but for my shop) and quickly reaching to desired heat. The only problem was adjusting the temp so I modified my burner from atmospheric to forced simply adding a pipe, choke and blower to the system. Now I can forge at any temp I want.

Summing up:

Propane is the most effective solution for a decent knive-maker shop, you wont mess the shop with smoke, ash etc. I say go for a forced burner as you can adjust the fire easily (you can make it carburizing, reducing, rich ect.).
Horizontal furnace is OK for forging, but If I were you I would build mine vertical since you will use it at welding temps. Any anvil would do the job but i am not happy with my 200 pound since the surface of it is soft, in time the surface will be bumpy therefore I would go for lighter and harder anvil (say 120 pound). You will need chisels, tongs and hammers, but they are fun to make and it is very beneficial to get experienced in forging.

I hope this will help...

Best wishes, Emre KIPMEN....
 
I did stock removal my first two years, alot of great knives are made that way and I still do a few myself, as such. Indian George's forge plans are inexpensive and easy to make. I have two now, one for forging and one for damascus welding. If he doesn't pop up here, let me know and I'll send you the parts list and drawing/design.

Here are mine...http://www.mountainhollow.net/shoptour.htm
 
I just checked out your knives, Very nice work. I too used to use others damascus and evenually started making my own damascus. I still do stock removal for blades and gun/knife parts and pieces. Its good to know how to do both methods and "sole authorship" can be very rewarding.

I suggest researching and spending enough money to make your own propane forge. Remember it needs to reach 2300 f to reach welding heat for damascus making. Most have no trouble getting to that temp but unless you have a good arm it is hard to make the advanced patterns. I like a press because Im lazy.
 
Michael it's going to be great to see what you do with damascus! There's plenty of inspiration to be had in this forum, for sure.

Personally I've never been able to kick up any enthusiasm for forging even though the couple of small knives I've hammered out have been great performers. That's because I'm lazy. You still have to grind the knives after they're forged (typically) and for me all the forging turns out to be a lot of extra work. :rolleyes:

There are many smiths who can forge to near final dimension and do only a bit of cleanup grinding, and if one were to get to that point I think it'd be a great way to make knives.

But with today's fine steel much of the benefit of forging, which would be steel refinement, is no longer necessary to make a good knife. That's my excuse anyway, and I'm sticking to it. :D

All that being said, my Ron Reil freon tank mini forge gets plenty hot for welding; I've welded up a bit of cable a couple of times and had I known what I was doing it would have been totally satisfactory. I think it cost me about $150 to build that thing and if you need some kaowool I think I still have enough left to line another small forge.
 
The forging vs stock removal BS is not OT so save that for the other place please.

If you have a junkyard near by, go have a look at anvil like objects. You can get some very nice pieces for pennies on the lb that will serve you well.

Take a look at Darren Ellis's website for a great deal of forge making info and supplies.
 
Michael,
Others have given answers to you for forge ideas, so I will address the issue of an anvil. It is not necessary to purchase a new, or even a used anvil. There are steel suppliers and scrapyards all over this country where you can purchase large blocks of steel. I bought a mild steel block 4x4x12 welded some ears on it and secured it to an 8x10x24 wooden block to use an anvil for forging demos at outdoor shows. Along with my small forge I have used to forge knives and swords. It would be of sufficent size to forge small billets of damascus as well. I forge sitting down with this setup, but you may want to mount it to a higher block. A steel-faced anvil is nice, but not a necessity. The japanese smiths use an anvil similar to the one I described. Early smiths in europe used anvils of stone before large blocks of steel or iron were readily available.
Delbert Ealy
www.ealyknives.com
 
Call darren ellis and order up one of his forges you won't regret it and they flat out work!!!!!!!!!!!
 
Thank you all for the wonderful suggestion so far. I have one more question.

I am the Director of Engineering at a metal fab shop in Milwaukee WI. That being said, I have acces to a variety of items that your average person would not have access to. For instance, 16" diam. tube. 3/4" wall and about 20" long. Would that make a good forge?

How about thick plate steel, 2" thick x 4" wide by 30" long. there is also a variety of other thick bar stock. My question is this, could those materials be used to weld up some sort of structure that could be used as an anvil?

I am also a certified welder so constructing this makeshift anvil shoulnt be an issue if you guys think it would be worth the trouble to do it.


Thanks for your imput

Michael
www.AdamMichaelKnives.com
 
adammichael said:
16" diam. tube. 3/4" wall and about 20" long. Would that make a good forge?
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That'd make a heck of a forge, well, a heck of a heavy forge anyways. most folk's will tell you about 1/4" thick is thicker than you'll ever need for a propane forge body, I'd agree.

Tony
 
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