New gas forge!!!!

Sam Salvati

Sam Salvati

Joined
Aug 6, 2007
Messages
5,060
The gas forge came a day early, picked it up today!!!!! WOOOO! The guy at the local blacksmith supply, (Montague Blacksmith Supply, if you are ever in the tri state area, cool place to stop and shop a bit) Tom the owner and operator ordered it for me. He also kindly offered at no extra cost(on top of a discount on the forge itself too) to help me build it, as he has built MANY MANY that have gone through his store. I happily (and most releived) accepted as I do not know enough about gas lines and stuff like that to have done it safely. As per his advice as well I checked all the joints and lines with soapy water for leaks (there were none), and lit it up. What a joy! get's right up to temperature real quick, no real hot spots either! Heats up a sword length bar of steel nice and evenly no problem drawing it back and forth through the forge, pretty quick too, I look forward very much so to getting to know her more, and do some HT on some of these swords I have had sitting for awhile now ht'd and DONE, and this forge is perfect for just that. Also made my traditional test hook, the first type of basic teaching hook I learned to do during my Apprenticeship, teaches all the basic artistic forging steps, twisting, tapering, scrolling, forming a shoulder and hot punching and drifting. The hook took about as long in the gas forge as it did with my coal forge, both the rivet forge and the big forge I built as well as the brake drum forge. When I empty the tank and have it refilled I will start an hours-PSI log, to figure out how much gas it will use and compare costs of use. An awesome tool, I take back all the nasty things I ever said about gas forges! Here is pictures (sorry they were taken in the dark).

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Oh yeah, also normalised two seaxes/seax (?) and the cutlass.
 
Congrats Sam!

And I know you thought about it, and may have all ready got that cardboard away from your forge, just mentioning it for any 'first forge' owners that might not see that potential.
 
Thanks guys, it's pretty AWESOME. Gonna fill up my tank tommorrow and really put her through her paces this weekend.
 
the NC Tool Co forges are pretty nice, and i love my 1 burner whisper baby for forging blades. For people who don't want to build their own propane forge and want a nice venturi forge, I whole heartedly recommend them
 
Sam, If you get nostalgic for your old coal forging days, just set a couple lumps on top of the forge, and put some small nugget coal underneath the forge. That way you can see the coal, and maybe get a little coal smell, while you work on your blades in your nice new gas forge.

I ,too, heartily recommend the NC forges for easy operation and good workability. You can make a 3" blade EDC, or a 36" katana in one.....and do the HT in it,too. I use a Whisper Low-boy for general forge work, and really like the side door for large and odd shaped items. Their knifemaker forge is excellent for blade work. I suggest running them on a 100# propane tank if you are going to do high temperature and long time forging projects, it just makes life easier.
Stacy
 
I'm assuming from the pics that that forge is much shorter than the length of a sword. How do you manage HT of a blade much longer than the forge body?
 
Looks good Sam i remember how nice and shiny mine was when it was new. A tip that a ferrier friend gave me when i was going to reline mine was turn the insulation inside out and as Stacy said put hard firebrick on the floor.I still have my reline kit but have put three floors in it. Flux still eats it up but it lasts a lot longer than the original floor.:thumbup:
 
PJ234
When forging a sword, you only want to heat a section at a time. The NC forge will do about 10-12", so it is more than needed. When doing the HT, you adjust the forge to run a little above the temp you want ( about 1600-1650F for 10XX steel blades). Take the blade and clamp a vice grip on the tang end at 90 degrees, with the vice grip handle on the edge side ( Tongs work, but so do vice grips. A 16" tong on the end of a 40" sword can get unwieldy.). Start by bringing up the area from the ricasso down the blade to a red heat. Slowly start drawing the blade -slooow out and slooow back in -watching the color as the blade heats up. As it approaches a red-orange color, start checking the tip and ricasso with an extension magnet (HF for about $1). As it crosses critical, and becomes non-magnetic,keep moving it in and out to maintain an even color, perhaps making the tip a little hotter than the blade body (it will cool faster later). You want to rotate the blade from one side to the other as you go. Once the blade is close to ready, turn it edge down ( That is why the grip is on this side)....give it a couple more strokes....bringing it up to about 1450-1500F....if all looks good, pull it out and quench into a 4" quench tank of the appropriate height....all in a smooth and even swing. Practice this move many times before you heat up the blade. It is not necessary (often not desirable) to harden or quench the whole tang. I usually go about 3" beyond the guard shoulder. After about 6-10 seconds, pull it out, wipe it off with a heavy rag ( careful, It is HOT ), and check for warps. Chances are there will be some. Slap it on the anvil, or a heavy and straight board, and hammer it straight with a wooden mallet. Don't be gentle, whack it. you have now spent about another 10-15 seconds straightening it. Take it in your gloved hands and give it any final straightening and twisting. I use the faux-granite surface of my forge side table to lay it on and bend/twist as needed. Put it back into the oil and let it cool down .You have until the blade is about 350F to do this work.Depending on the blade size, metal type, and ambient temperature...that comes to about 20-40 seconds.You will feel the blade stiffen as the martensite forms. Once the martensite starts to form ,the blade will be hard and brittle....don't try any more straightening until after tempering at this point.
Temper in the kitchen oven at 400-450F for two hours,cool,then temper again. If the blade is too long, stick part of it out the oven door (top side corner), turning it around after one hour, tempering the other end for the next hour....cool...repeat. On over length blade ( more tan 36" for the average home oven) a third temper may be a good idea. Building a 48" tempering salt pot would be good if you are going to temper a lot of long blades. They are far tamer than an austenitizing salt pot.
Once a blade is tempered, gentle straightening of minor bends and twists is pretty easy.
Stacy
 
What he said /\ :D . Except that I quench into park's #50 specifically, and I use the vice to straighten.
 
sweet forge!
i cant wait to see those seaxes.
it is nice to have a good reliable forge.. and one that runs of propane and no coal!
take care
~chris
 
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