Makeshift Portable Forge

[Michael Kemp 3]

"Tomfoolery" seems like the appropriate place to post this.

 

Our local knifemakers club (5160 Club) is having a hammer-in tomorrow. I could not resist cobbling together a makeshift forge to take out there. Yes. This is a loose pile of bricks with an internal temperature approaching 2000°F. What could possibly go wrong? (I promise to strap it up with bailing wire tomorrow - don't think the bubble gum would hold up to the heat).

I've been wanting to try this since I spent $40 on a weed burner to warm up the anvil & press dies.

 

[Eric Leonard 1]

I made a few knives out of a pile of bricks, a hairdryer, vacuum hose, some iron pipe, brass fittings, a valve, and a supply of natural gas at house pressure

[Ken Burbank 0]

I've seen folks here trying to tell us rookies that it doesn't really take a lot to get started , but this might be the best example so far , LOL !

[Michael Kemp 3]

Report:

 

The white inner bricks are 2800f insulating fire brick - which work great but crack & break at the drop of a hat. The inside can be glowing orange while the outside is barely hot. A Kaowool/refractory cement lined forge heats up faster - but once this one got up to orange inside it tootled right along. A little small for my liking but larger than the famous 1 brick forge. And the weed burner performed fine. Burned the paint off the gas-mixing can but held up no problem. A fun experiment but I doubt if I'll repeat it (the bricks are back in their respective piles). If you didn't have the time/equipment to put together a fancier forge - this could let you give forging a try!

 

~ Michael Kemp