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howdy, lately I've been thinking about building a propane forge but before I start I thought i'd better check and make sure I was on the right track. first, is a smaller forge more efficient than a larger forge? common sense would say yes but what do I know lol. originally I was planning to use an old propane tank or a 5 gallon air tank for the forge body but got to thinking they may be larger than I need right now. I have some 8" wide pipe and I think some 6" or 8" wide tubing that might be a better starting option for me. second, not having any experience with burners i'm having a hard time deciding what would be best one to use. atlas forge sells a 100k btu burner with a 30 psi regulator for around 70 bucks which looks like a good option. and I was also thinking about the venturi burner kit from high temp tools. by the time I got that and then a regulator i'd be looking at about $80 to $100. another option I just discovered here on the forum is the turkey fryer burner. looks like I could get a burner and regulator combo on amazon for around $30. any suggestions on what to go with? third, if I did go with the 8" pipe for the forge body would 2" of inswool coated in satanite be a good combo? or is there something better? my main interests right now are 10" to 15" Bowies and fighters and eventually trying my hand at Damascus so i'd like to build a forge that could handle all of that without being overkill. thanks in advance! Zane.

Beginner's Place seemed appropriate for this. So I'm in the process of planning out my next forge. I'm not completely new at this game, I'm already made a small charcoal forge (which ended up failing) and a venturi gas forge (which works). All my tool and equipment before were mostly cheap tools or improvised, so now I'm slowly working at buying/making proper bladesmithing gear. The next on the chopping block is my forge. Now my other isn't bad, it's actually a pretty nice little forge, was even able to do some forge welding with it. The problem is that it isn't the most well-put together forges and internal temp isn't quite as high as I would like. I don't have anything put together yet, just some concepts drawn up on Paint. Beware, the photos are pretty high quality. The body I'm making is from a steel tube I got from a buddy. A little overkill but its free. The rest of the dimensions are in the pictures and the burners I'm planning on making forced air this time around. I feel like I've got the main concepts down, but there are some questions I have that I can't seem to find after hours of searching. -1 burner should be enough in this case to maintain forge welding temperatures, correct? I saw somewhere to make it one burner for every 350 cu/in, this one comes up to 340 (3" radius & 12 long chamber)(the image above in incorrect with the volume, that was before I planned on trimming the size of the tube down) -Do I need the flair at the end of the burner for a forced air burner? Is so what size would I need from a 1" pipe or does it not really matter? -for the fuel jet I was planning on using a brass plug with a hole drilled in it. It's a 1" pipe, and I've seen people mention using a #57 drill bit for the hole. Does this sound right? If not what size should work for this size burner? So yeah. If anyone's willing to give me some direction with this, help's always appreciated. Also if anyone sees anything wrong with the design and is willing to point it out, I'm not the kind to disregard bad advice. And before I forget, I intend on using this forge mainly for making small and large knives and to do some forge welding, therefor its important for me to make a forge than can hold forge forge welding temps. EDIT: Yeah, so as it turns out Photobucket charges users a premium for third party hosting. Anyone looking to share their images just use cubeupload instead.

Hello everyone, im brand new to this site so if this is a dumb question please tell me. I need a couple fire bricks for end caps for my propane forge. Unfortunately in my area (SW Florida) it is impossible to find fire brick within 150 miles. I’ve found a few recipes for refractory cement but again the only materials I can find around here are Portland cement I-II, perlite, crushed silica, hydrated lime. Has anyone experimented with this recipe and would it suffice as a temporary fix until I can build a new forge properly?

I'm making my new forge and I'm thinking of using insboard as a sacrificial floor on top of 2" thick inswool. The typical hard firebricks I find that I used for the floor of my last forge aren't long enough for this one. Would insboard make a good replaceable floor, should it be coated, or is this a bunk idea entirely? Thanks for any help you can give.

Good evening everyone, I am getting ready to start a forge build this weekend, the body of the forge will be an 11 gallon compressed air tank ( I only chose this over the 5 gallon because I am hoping to work on some wider pieces that might not fit in the narrower body after insulating) My current plan is -a rectangular door in the rear with angle iron top and bottom so that I can slide a brick in to block the hole. -larger rectangular door on the front, also with angle iron so that I can close most of it off to allow higher temps. -I currently have 2" ceramic wool, 10 x 1/2 cut bricks, and hercules brand furnace cement (home depot's only refractory cement, but it is listed as a "3000 degree cement") The plan is to start with the wool, paint 2-3 thin (and thinned) coats of the cement, followed by a couple of slightly thicker coats (hoping for 1/2-3/4 inch?), and use a row of 1/2 bricks to line the bottom. Total should be around 540-600 cubic inches. I have looked at both of these double burner setups ( both from ebay ) as well as a ribbon burner ( I decided against the ribbon so that I am not tied to an outlet for the blower ) Any recommendations, suggestions, things that I am doing completely wrong etc... suggestions are appreciated. My other concern is, how necessary is an IR reflective coating? (plistex, metrikote, ITC100) Can it be added later?

So I decided to be a bladesmith. The first thing that I find to be important is having the right equipment. I wont argue that amazing works can be made with a file, but I'm lazy. Over the coming months, I'll be building my own forge, 25 ton forge press, 2x72 belt grinder, tempering oven, tool cabinet, and probably some other stuff along the way. I'm very tempted to start with the belt grinder and tempering over. I could pretty much make a ton of good knifes with just that, I imagine. But I digress, project 1; Propane Forge! I've done a ton of research and learned a few things. Things I want to run by you guys as I explain my design choices. First off, I decided that the thickness of the metal encasing the forge is less important and it wont really get too hot if properly insulated. *except around the openings. So for the body, I'm going with .03" sheet steel tac welded to a fame of corner bar. As far as the door, imagine the whole thing as a block with the last 2.5 inches cut off, reinforced if necessary, and hung to another reinforced plate with 2 hinges. I'm going with a magnet and metal rod to open it and keep it closed. I figure I'll also put a harder holding hook on there when I wont be using the door, but rather the door vents. As far as insulation, I'm going with 2 inches of high temp ceramic wool and about .5 inches of high temp refractory. The floor I'm planning on lining with fire brick (2.5 inches) and about .5 inches of casted refractory. I am going to make the total inside area right around 800-850 cubic inches. The inner chamber dimensions will be 17 inches deep, 8 inches wide, and 6 inches tall. I plan on have a removable ceramic board wall dividing the chamber in half for the 95% of the time when I'll be using only 1 burner. I'm going with 2 venturi burners running on propane. For the vents, on the door I'm planning on a half circle 6" wide and 3" tall and on the back and dividing board, half circle 3" wide and 1.5" tall. That's pretty much it. What do you guys think?

I've recently learned from fellow bladesmiths on this forum that forced air burners are more economical than their venturi counterpart. After tearing my hair out about thinking that I'd have to buy new burners, I also learned that you can possibly put a blower onto a venturi via the large orifice on the T-pipe that the burner sucks air through. Does anyone know which blower is best, how to attach it, and if this is really possible? If it helps to have the info, I'm using two side arm burners from Zoeller Forge. Would I need a blower for each burner, or is one for the front burner enough? I heard of a smith using a big shop vac motor as a blower, but I also know that a small hair dryer works for a coal forge. Any thoughts on that? I know this is kind of scattered, so thanks for the help in advance.

Hello Everyone, I am establishing a new shop in Toronto. One of the last things I need to do is run my propane from the bottle outside, to the forge. The propane forge will be outside in a cage, the forge will be roughly 60' away, inside. The burner is a blown burner, I got the idea from Geoff Keyes. My question is how to run the propane from the bottle to the forge, what should the propane run in (rubber or black iron pipe?). What diameter of pipe is needed? Where would pressure valves and other devices be located? Last question, I know this will vary by local but does this sort of thing normally need to be looked at and approved by an inspector? Thank you, Paul (Forge burn chamber is 6''x6''x12'', less once the floor is put in)

Last weekend I made my first attempt at trying to forge weld. I've been wanting to learn for quite a while, with the intention of working my way up to welding up some billets eventually. I decided to start by trying a few chain links. Out of five links that I attempted, I may have gotten one to stick. Couldn't knock the joint apart with a hammer like the other four, so it might have actually welded, but I'm not sure. It seemed like the forge was not getting hot enough. I've read elsewhere about people forge welding billets at 5 psi with the same forge, but mine was just not getting there. I cranked it up to 15 and left my steel pieces under the back burner for a good 15-20 minutes, but they never got to anything that looked like a welding temperature to me, a middling to bright orange at best, while inside the forge. I was hoping to see the yellowish, wet-looking surface that I've seen described so often, but no luck. Also, the front burner is definitely not as hot as the rear one. When I bought the forge 8 years ago, it came with a paper that described how to set up and tune the burners, but I have long since lost it and can't find any info online about tuning it. After reading the pinned "Buying a Gas Forge?" thread, I'm realizing that NC Tool forges and atmospheric burners in general are not the best way to go. I'm starting to look into building my own blown burner forge, but in the interest of working with what I've got in the meantime, I was hoping that someone out here might also have an NC Tool Knifemaker and could give me some tips on getting it to run better.