Kaowool

J

jdh4659

Joined
Jul 30, 2013
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5
So I'm making a small hobby forge out of a maxwell house coffee can.

I want to go with kaowool as an insulator but every single place that has it will only ship in large amounts from what I've found.

Does anyone have any spare sitting around? Or know of where I can get just a tiny amount for this forge?

Thanks!
-jim
 
I got my stuff to make a small forge on hightemptools.com. I think I used 2 sq ft and it was just enough to make my forge.
http://www.hightemptools.com/inswool.html

from what I understand Kaowool and Inswool are basically the same thing. You can also get the refractory cement and other items in small quantities there.

Also, a bunch of people sell the stuff on ebay. You might find someone selling a couple of square feet on there.

My recommendation if you're going to do it is to make it a little bit larger than a coffee can. I used a 8" stove pipe(about 14" long) that I got from Tractor supply for cheap which you can get in a little bit longer lengths than a coffee can and you can also get caps to put on each end. That will give you more flexibility and you've probably got to buy exactly the same amount of materials either way due to min order sizes so you might as well do it a little bigger for about $10 more.
 
Welcome to Shop talk.
The stickys has info on building forges, where to get supplies, etc.

HTT&R is the place to get your forge and oven stuff.

I would seriously consider making a bigger forge than a coffee can. That will give you more frustration than joy. Any 6" round by 12" long tube is good enough for a shell. Try a piece of scrap pipe, a piece of stove pipe, an old oxygen cylinder, an old soda syrup canister, a small trash can, etc. Many of these can also make a good quench tank.
 
Do you have any pottery / ceramics supply places around you? They would be worth checking out, too, since pottery kilns are made with most of the same stuff. I picked up a small piece of Kaowool at such a place.
 
Also, if you insist on making a forge that small, consider using soft refractory bricks or castable refractory cement (Both are at HTT&R).
 
First off, fill out your profile and include your location so people can better help you.

Shoot me an email if you can't find it locally, and I will send you a flat rate box of your choice full of some for the price of shipping it. I have a local supplier that will sell me a scrap box full for a very good price. I have a good amount of it left after building my forge and I won't be building many more for myself to put it all to use. If you were local to me I would say come on over and we would put one together!

I also agree with Stacy, coffee can forges are very limited in use and I used mine all of one time before deciding to build a real forge and throwing that thing in the garbage. I still would have done a few things differently on mine, and I may rebuild it in the near future, but it's a lot better than that silly coffee can I put together. I purchased a burner and it is excellent, but they are easy enough to build cheaply from pipe fittings and a little bit of time. The shell can be anything, like Stacy said, but I just used a HF 5 gallon air tank. Many ways to skin this cat, but seriously consider stepping it up a bit as you will be so much happier in the long run.

Justin
 
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