New Peep steel.

[Mark Green]

Dragon-Fu says "I crap peep steel bigger then you!"

 

 

 

 

Here are the pics. https://picasaweb.google.com/106800196895572422821/NewPeep#

 

Mark

[ZebDeming]

Wow, how much charcoal have you went through this spring? Nice looking piece of steel there!

 

Zeb

[Mark Green]

On my second, 30 bag pallet now, here at home. Sometimes I wish I lived in the outback woods, rather then downtown.

 

Making my own charcoal is likely right out. That is a very smoky, stinky, fire. I have 4 neighbors within 100 ft.

 

I have gotten pretty good at controlling the sparks from the smelts, but a charcoal making fire is tough. And I would have to buy wood anyway, so buying the charcoal is my best bet just now. I get a bit of a break on the price for buying it by the pallet, but it's still very high.

 

The big stack takes near 40lbs, just to fill it up the fist time. Before you add any ore. The 8 in. stack cuts that in half.

 

Mark

[Randy S]

Charcoal is definitely the biggest expense to making a bloom..... but making your own steel is priceless!

 

Thats another great looking chunk .... I gotta get me some of those magical peeps.

 

 

Randy

[John Page]

I gotta get me some of those magical peeps.

Me too! I would love to forge some home made steel or wrought. You're making me jealous again

 

John

[Lee Sauder]

Man, that one looks good- that slag looks like you've nailed the ore blend, huh?

[Jesus Hernandez]

Sweet! And not just the peep.

[Dan O'Connor]

Whoop!

You are a bloom making machine their Mark. Nice job.

 

Have you tried any of the ore I gave you at F&B?

[Mark Green]

I didn't get any of that ore Dan. Jesus may have, and Chris Price. The only ore I brought home from the Hammer-in was some brown ore of unknown quality, from NJ or Pa. I think?

 

I haven't had a chance to break that up, and roast it. I may try to do that tomorrow. While I'm building a new, bit smaller stack.

 

Have you played with your Magnetite much?

 

Mark

[Dan O'Connor]

I didn't get any of that ore Dan. Jesus may have, and Chris Price. The only ore I brought home from the Hammer-in was some brown ore of unknown quality, from NJ or Pa. I think?

 

I haven't had a chance to break that up, and roast it. I may try to do that tomorrow. While I'm building a new, bit smaller stack.

 

Have you played with your Magnetite much?

 

Mark

 

Hmm!

 

Man I thought I gave you a bucket of brown bog ore from East Texas 2 inch or so pieces. I did give some magnetite to Chris.

 

No smelting or charcoal making now. Working on power hammer and the rest of the forge. Everything here is already dry and we are under water restrictions. Unless we get some substantial rain I am not going to chance it. Neither a smelter nor my charcoal kiln produces much of an open flame-no more than a BBQ grill. Still I have plenty of other things to do without taking the chance of being on the evening news.

[Alan Longmire]

You da man, Mark!

 

I wonder, do the Peeps have to be the blue ones, or will the yellow ones work too...

 

To think I thought I was hot yesterday, all I did was weld up some billets in the coal forge. That was still worthy of two quarts of water over four hours (with a beer towards the end), but nowhere near running a smelter at 90 degrees and 90 percent humidity.

 

Stay hydrated, and dang, that's some nice-looking slag.

[dennis mcadams]

Mark,

That's really amazing!! As someone who works alone... well, all the time, and having nearly given myself heat exhaustion once or twice but just managing a good migraine instead. Do be careful that little monster can sneak right up on you and it'd be a shame for the world to lose you too soon. You have lots more to contribute.

Keep smelting,

Denis

[Mark Green]

Alan, I suppose the yellow would work just fine.

 

It was a bit warm yesterday. But not like it will be in July. I keep a gallon of cool water, or a cooler out there with me. And my better half checks up on me lots, to be sure I'm not burning the house down.

Most of a smelt is very relaxing. It's just that last 30 min. or so, when things get very busy. And big-time hot, when you have that door open, and your trying to birth that bloom, that is bigger then the door.

 

It is a bit nicer when you have a gang to help with the stump compacting, and if your trying to cut that puppy, it is near impossible to do that alone, on a solid bloom of any size.

 

Mark

[Randy S]

Mark, how much charcoal did the furnace consume for this smelt?

 

I typically go thru about 75-80 lbs of charcoal in an 8" furnace ... I use small charges of ore (usually less than a pound per charge along with 4" of charcoal in the stack) attempting to get higher carbon material. So far the blooms, although small (10 lb or less), have been in the carbon range I am looking for. Small blooms are a plus when it comes to re-heating and consolidating.

 

Randy

[Mark Green]

I went through about 110lbs. this run.

Yes, I usualy do about 48lbs, in the smaller stack, and use about 70-80lbs of charcoal.

 

And yes!!!!! It does help to make some smaller blooms. Here is what I have been doing all morning.

I got yesterday's bloom cut in half, mostly due to going half way with the axe yesterday. I had to cut the tuyere bowl lip off to get the cut offs in the center. That helped. It looks like mostly iron. Very solid bloom though.

I went through 10 4.5 in. cut off wheels, between this and working on the bloom of Iron I did a few weeks ago.

 

 

This monsterr is being a bugger. I have cut down the tuyere bowl lip, now I'm slicing on the bottom side. It will likely take another 8-10 cut offs. So yes!!!!!! Smaller blooms can save a lot of work if you don't have the heavy equipment to cut them.

 

And I got the stack taken down, and cleaned up a bit.

 

 

Fun morning. Time for a nap!!

 

Mark

[Randy S]

Wow, you've been busy!

 

Nice dense material. Once I get chunks down small enough to fit into my gas forge I put the power hammer to use... getting to that point can be a time consuming challenge tho.

 

Randy

[Mark Green]

OK then,

 

I got a second wind, and went out to roast that ore from the Hammer-in.

Wow!! That is some explosive ore. When it got hot, it was shooting stuff all over the place. I had to put up a screen, to be sure it didn't break any of my windows. But, it's done now. So, anyone else that got some of that ore, BEWHARE!!! At least I hope it was breaking up some of those bigger rocks. That stuff was a bugger to break up for roasting. I sure hope it's softer now.

 

 

While I was out there, I continued on that chunk of iron bloom. I finally cut that sucker up.

 

Nice chunks.

 

 

[Mark Green]

So, I cleaned up the roasting pile. That ore from the F&B hammer-in turned very magnetic, after roasting. That is a very good sign!!!

 

It will be next on the bloom parade.

 

[Lee Sauder]

I think a certain landscaping business might should invest in a wood-splitter. Might come in for hot-cutting blooms every once in a while.

[dustin reagan]

Wow, nice solid bloom...that is exactly what I am going for, and it still eludes me.

 

Can you say a bit about your running parameters for this smelt?

 

Charge rate & ratio? What is the approx. size of this stack (height and diameter)?

 

My hand is healed up and it looks like I am set for my 4th smelt in either 2 or 3 weekends from now. This last weekend I got to prep for it. Did some repair work on my stack (my 2.5 year old son loved helping me patch cracks with freshly mixed clay), and more importantly, I prepared my ore. I'm trying something new this time:

 

I mixed 40lbs red iron oxide powder & 30lbs black iron oxide with 6lbs crushed oyster shell. Then I completely soaked it with water. It formed a clay-like mud which is drying nicely. I can then crush that into pea sized and smaller chunks. I'm hoping this reduces the amount of ore lost from being blown out (the red oxide powder is very light and fine...blows out easily). It should also potentially allow a longer travel time on some of the larger pieces.

[Mark Green]

Hi Dustin, Glad you hand is about better.

 

 

I have my notes here.

That stack was a 12 in. bore, and about 38 in high.

 

Like I normally do, I started out with 2lb ore charges, and 4 lb, charcoal.

With these last few smelts, I quickly (after 2 charges) moved up to 2.5, and after 2 of these to 3, and 3.5lb charges. All along keeping with the 4 lbs of charcoal.

Then I continued with the 3.5lb charges until the end. During the burn-down, I sprinkled in another 3+lbs.

The first tap, with only 20 or so lbs in, I thought was a bit early, but all the taps after that were very nice, and mostly timed when I want it to happen.

 

My airflow, was just my normal speed, with the valve at about 90% open. I have no idea what the vpm is???

 

It was burning at a near perfect 10 min. burn rate.

 

My tuyere angle was a fraction steeper then usual.

 

My nice slow burn-down got shortened, when I was cleaning out under the fat bloom, and a big pile of charcoal came crashing down one of the furnace sides. So, the 30 min. burn down I had planned was more like 20 min.

 

Keep working at it. You will get the nice solid blooms. It's not something you can learn, without just doing it over and over.

 

Best of luck with your next run.

 

Mark

[Lee Sauder]

Hey Mark- How much does that bloom weigh?

[dustin reagan]

Hi Dustin, Glad you hand is about better.

 

 

I have my notes here.

That stack was a 12 in. bore, and about 38 in high.

 

Like I normally do, I started out with 2lb ore charges, and 4 lb, charcoal.

With these last few smelts, I quickly (after 2 charges) moved up to 2.5, and after 2 of these to 3, and 3.5lb charges. All along keeping with the 4 lbs of charcoal.

Then I continued with the 3.5lb charges until the end. During the burn-down, I sprinkled in another 3+lbs.

The first tap, with only 20 or so lbs in, I thought was a bit early, but all the taps after that were very nice, and mostly timed when I want it to happen.

 

My airflow, was just my normal speed, with the valve at about 90% open. I have no idea what the vpm is???

 

It was burning at a near perfect 10 min. burn rate.

 

My tuyere angle was a fraction steeper then usual.

 

My nice slow burn-down got shortened, when I was cleaning out under the fat bloom, and a big pile of charcoal came crashing down one of the furnace sides. So, the 30 min. burn down I had planned was more like 20 min.

 

Keep working at it. You will get the nice solid blooms. It's not something you can learn, without just doing it over and over.

 

Best of luck with your next run.

 

Mark

 

What was the approximate height of the tuyere above the inside base of the stack? I am thinking of lowering my tuyere relative to the bottom of the stack [by adding more pounded ash to the inside of the stack] by an inch or two. Right now it's at 8" - 9" high. I've recently read some advice that it should be more in the range of 6" to 7" above the floor of the stack.

[Mark Green]

The bloom was just under 18 lbs. With another 3-4 lbs of magnetic fluff.

 

On this run, the tuyere was a bit lower then usual. I think, that was why I had to do the early tap.

The slag was lapping at the tuyere with 20 lbs in. That is way to early. It likely started at about 3 in or so.

I like to start the tip of the tuyere at about 5-6 inches above the fines. The times I have been higher, I get a taller/thinner bloom.

 

I don't like to do a tap earlier then 30+ lbs in. Later if I can.

 

I try to make a bit of a bowl out of the ash&fines. This seems to help keep the slag moving around to feed and purify the bloom.

[Mark Green]

Hi Gang.

 

Here is a short vid of yesterdays bloom pressing fun.

 

The 50/50 peep steel wanted to be a bit difficult, but Jesus Hernandez is the pro, at sticking these home made steels together.

It got better with every fold. It was just tricky.

I need a press bad!!!

 

Most of my bloom chunks wouldn't fit into the forge. I guess I will do some more cutting.

 

This piece will be my Anglo Saxon hammer for my SCA blacksmith display at Pennsic this summer.

I'm making a whole kit from my bloom material.

 

Mark