28" wood / coal forge build

[Frank S]

For 55 years I have wanted my own forge for the past 50 years I have made do with either a rose bud on a torch or tossed together small temporary forges when I needed one.
A while back I had to replace one of my 8n tractor rims because the old one would not hold air if I wanted to mount up tubeless.
What better use for an old rim than to make a forge out of it. Actually I don't really have the time to build a forge right now, with trying to mine and haul fill for my shop but I have an excavator with a broken drive and a bent drive sprocket that if I had a forge I could repair the drive then use the excavator to mine with and either the loader of the backhoe or the 863 Bobcat that I am repairing to haul and level the fill with so I said BUILD THE STUPID THING frank and be done with it at the very worst you can use it as a means of heating the shop next winter LOL
Ok 28" tractor rim salvaged from my 8n
the bottom of the forge is a 26" diameter 1/4" plate the previous property owner used as a lid for his burn barrel
the legs were taken from my stock of 100s of salvaged sprinkler down pipes
the apron was made out of a piece of auction scrap I bought years ago
that is the basic list of materials for the forge itself More about the toyere later




It seemed like a good idea to remove the rotted out band

Starting the apron



after welding and grinding the welds I used my needle scaller to give it a hammered effect

drilling the air holes for the toyere I decided that I wanted an iris for air control and flame modulation this is why the holes are drilled in a spiral

Shown here the iris is closed leaving only a single hole exposed

Open phase 1

[Frank S]

Forge post 2
Open phase 2

open phase 3

full open

the blades of the iris are made from bed frame angle left over from the battery box hold down project

The main body of the toyere will be this 14" car rim

with the center removed the iris blades open all the way to the edge of the rim when fully opened

I really should clean the torch tip shown here the second bead of the rim is removed

the center is placed upside down

Requiring a way to open and close the iris blades I selected these used bolts and welded them together to give me the offset I needed to make them center over the pivot of the blades

showing the control rods welded to the iris blades

[Frank S]

Forge post 3
showing how the center is going to be fitted over the control rods

Hammering out the center on Moilneer (Thor's hammer) the name given to what I use for an anvil by my wife

the lug hole welded up and the cone shape started for the center of the toyere

final shape

More to follow tomorrow

[Frank S]

So far not getting much done today
Have the cone welded to the toyere housing and the slots of the rim welded up where the center piece was riveted to it. Everything is roughed together and before I can go further to tube around the iris blade control stems I need to make the bolting clamps to hold things in place then it is all about some much needed clean up to the welds
Initial fit up

welded up

this pic shows a better view of the legs there will be some bracing but this can not be done until I have completed the toyere and the iris controls

[Frank S]

I did get a bit more done in-between having my mechanic neighbor come over for a chat and before the storms started to set in

[Frank S]

quite a bit of progress today all things considered
First off I had to make a retaining ring for the iris blade control disk
the retaining ring is 1/8 by 3/4" flat bar bent the hardway. I used my bender roller to accomplish this
Bender roller combo



setting up for offset drilling of the iris blade stem support sleeve





the retaining ring the stem supports and the control linkages are now in place
I just have to weld on some bolts to the control disk then make a flange and "T" for the air supply and the cleanout of the toyere then the underside will be pretty much done

[Scotsman Hosie]

Jesus, Frank — you da man! There's some serious vision, design, and engineering went into putting that together. Not anything like I'm used to seeing in a "wheel forge."

[Fluffle-Valve]

I had to Google '8n'... And found this.

[Frank S]

Jesus, Frank — you da man! There's some serious vision, design, and engineering went into putting that together. Not anything like I'm used to seeing in a "wheel forge."

I went overboard in some areas and underboard in others.
One thing I would have done differently had I taken the time to think it through while I was building it is the way the iris blades are connected.
At the start while figuring out their placement shape and pivoting at first I had thoughts of simply extending a flat tab out from the end of them but they go through more than 90° of rotation, this would have required some seriously long slots in the perimeter of the toyere housing up next to the bottom of the forge. Had I done it that way it would have been next to impossible to get a reasonable enough air seal in order for the blower to be able to deliver enough air through the bottom of the forge to create a good burn.
Now looking back at it I see it would have been much easier for me to have not mounted their pivots to the forge bottom which inturned caused me to have to make the gilflirted offset control rods so I could make them rotate concentrically to the mounting studs.
Once I struck upon the idea of utilizing the 2nd smaller rim as the housing after I cut out the center I had to figure out how to go from a 9 inch diameter hole down to say 3 1/2 inches for the ash drop and the air delivery this was when I cam upon the idea of inverting the center and welding it back in place but I wanted it to have a continuous inward slope which meant forging it to a cone shape, I think this turned out well in keeping with how I wanted the results to be, the gradual deep cone shape will insure good ash flow downwards the guide sleeves for the iris rods and will allow minimal air leakage.
Where I went radically overboard is in the complexity of the stupid build. first off the mounting of the toyere housing could have just as easily been accomplished with only 3 tabs and 3 bolts I elected to use 6 tabs and 12 bolts simply because I could and besides how else am I ever going to use up over 400 lbs of 3/8 nuts in my life time given that I am not currently involved in production manufacturing any more .
I could have as easily used 7/16 , 1/2" ,5/8 or even 7/8" nuts as I probably have similar quantities of those as well.
After looking at this thing what I could have done was to have mounted the iris blades on a long straight stem then used a loner sleeve and had them mounted to the housing itself this would have greatly simplified the build and if I find out later on the offset stems give me problems it will be easy enough to modify

[JoeVanGeaux]

Awesome piece of work! BUT, I can't tell you how much I was looking forward to seeing a video of your forge in action at the end of your posting!

So.... how about a video?? Please??