Gas Forge

Well, I've decided to remake my forge into a gas forge. I will be making 2 of these burners, and I will have to find some firebrick. The reason for me using firebrick instead of the granite I already have is that the granite has a very real chance of exploding, and the firebrick insulates better. I have no idea where to find firebrick though. I'll try Home Depot, Lowe's, some pottery stores, and our basement. The challenge after that will be getting steel. I will probably try steel rebar from Home Depot/Lowe's and the scrapyard at the dump. Of course I will also need an anvil. Again scrapyard at the dump may have something I could use as a substitute.

Peace out
-Tristan

Knife

So I just got home from scout camp where knives are your life. Basically, my friend found a Gerber 06 Automatic knife on a stump. It is a $124 knife. Yes, we kept it.

My Forge

So this is my forge. A pile of rocks on top of another larger rock. It serves its purpose though. The inside is about a foot deep and 9 inches wide. The pole you see sticking into it from the left side is for air, and the rod is attached to a pump.

I do not yet have an anvil, so I had to find an anvil shaped object, and this rock seemed to do the trick. It is stable and heavy with a flat top which is just what I was looking for.

Starting the forge with the nail I was trying to melt in the bottom middle. We (my brother and me) went through a lot of wood trying to keep the embers nice and hot.

Later on in the operation of the forge we got some nice embers (which don't show up in this)  and the nail is still there.

At the end of the day, after 4 hours of heating, we were unable to turn the nail glowing. We did get a dull red glow however, but that didn't last. Our main problem is the wrong wood. We were burning pine boards which burned quickly but with not too much heat. The forge was still very hot, we got hungry and made toast in less than 5 minutes a few inches away from the mouth of the furnace. There is a lot i need to learn about using a forge correctly, but I know it will work eventually. When we decided to kill the fire, I got some water on the rocks making up the forge, and the water instantly boiled. Those rocks were hot... I plan to keep experimenting, and I will keep this blog updated.