alternate method maybe?

[sherpa]

I was just thinking about forges and the associated work in making one and maintaining it. For the folks who do not have alot of shop space and such, could an oxy acetelene torch be used to heat the steel? Im ignorant on the subject, but thought it might be worth asking. Thanks.

[BEAVERMAN]

Depends on what your going to make with it and thickness, an oxy will heat most any steel to the melting point in a small area, but if your thinking about forging a good size knife blade with it... it will be challenging as you cannot keep the entire length of the blade glowing at once, in a small shop space you may want to consider a knifemakers forge that uses propane, hopefully wally will see this and post a pic of his.

[sherpa]

Yeah I can see your point. I wonder if it woul dbe useful for making stuff like patch knives, buttons, vent picks, or perhaps making hawks from ball peen hammers?

[BEAVERMAN]

Small stuff would be just fine, lets see what Wally and Rick Evans chime in with!

[viking-sword]

To forge anything but very small knife blades this would be a very expensive way to go, and not that controlable as oxy/acc at it's lowest temps is much more heat than you need. Many are using whats refered to as a one brick forge and doing good things with them. They are basically one large firebrick with the center bored out of them and a side port hole so that a simple propane or mapp gas torch can be set up as the heat sorce. These will get very hot and do a great job without taking up much space or expence, and there very portable. I think you can find more detailed info on them in a book by Wayne Goddard. A lot of knifemakers even use this setup for heat treating there blades. Wes

[rickevans]

Yes, as said above the OA torch is WAY hotter (and more expensive) than one needs. Check the Blade forums, do the Google on "propane forge" or the same search on You Tube for examples.

If you are starting small, as in patch knives or vent picks, then a one brick forge with a propane torch will work wonderfully.

There are also some examples of stacked fire brick forges that don't take up much space at all.

[FG1]

I saw a small simple forge made with a few fire brick and a propane torch and IIRC you could use two torches to up the heat . It was being used for knives .

[Mitch]

last issue of BackWoodsman had a good article on build a firebrick forge..check it out...