My Large Forge
I am now constructing a large indoor forge. I have gathered most of the required materials, and only a few details of the design haven't been finalized. When completed, this forge will normally be used with an airgrate/tuyere of about 4" X 4". The airbox will allow that size to be adjusted (in 4" to 8" increments) up to about 24" X 12" or (for heat treating very long pieces of steel) 4" X 5 feet.
After hearing a few questions/comments about the ability to expand the airgrate of this forge, I think I should clarify the intended use of the large airgrate. For normal forge work, I have serious doubts that the airgrate will ever need to be larger than 6" X 6". The larger dimensions will be used for heat treating large, long, or odd shaped pieces. I decided to build these capabilities into this forge, because I have an interest in learning to do a few very specialized types of work that make the large heat treat capacities a necessity.
This design started when I was looking at the drawings for a sword forge in "The Complete Bladesmith" by Dr. Jim Hrisoulas. I was trying to find a way to combine that type of forge with a small forge for ordinary work. I didn't want to have a separate forge sitting around and doing nothing but taking up space 99.9% of the time. After workng out the basic concept, I remembered that Ron Reil had a smaller forge based on a very similar concept (his design was probably bouncing around in the back of my head, when I started the basic design). I discussed the design with him and his input resulted in several improvements.
I will be posting pictures as various construction stages are completed.
(2/16/99)
Below is a picture showing how far the forge construction has
progressed. I have the hole just about dug to pour the slab
foundation. The blocks are temporarily in place to check the
dimensions of the hole. The forge has grown larger than I
originally intended (the base is 4' deep X 5'4" wide), but it's
better to have more capacity than needed, than to have it the
other way around. The wooden wall behind the forge will be
covered with sheet metal (held away from the wall by spacer
blocks) to reduce the chance of a fire.
(10/14/99)
Sorry for the long delay in getting the page updated. Things have been busy for the last several months, and the forge keeps
being moved to a low priority.
I've gotten most of the wall behind the forge covered with metal roofing. The foundation has been poured and is ready for the brickwork to be started. Hopefully, I'll get some brick laid in the near future.
And I thought I would have this done by last spring... :-/
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