This is the best explanation of how to use a coal forge I've ever seen.

Grew up in a blacksmithing family. Got apprenticed out to a local smith when I was 11. Never worked in anything but a coal forge with a manual bellows. Haven’t done much iron work in years. Always nice to see someone taking about these things.

Such a great, well organized presentation.

I feel like I just walked out of a university master class on blacksmithing and I can’t believe I got so much valuable information for free! Bless you, sir, thank you for taking the time to dive deep and educate the masses in your craft

@blackmetalstudio6425

9 ай бұрын

You are very welcome! Every blacksmith has their approach, whether copied, interpreted or invented, and as I watched their shaping and efficiency, (always trying to keep an open mind), I collected what I thought made most sense out of what they practiced then applied it to my skillset which I feel is important to share. Thank you for the comment.

@chauncey5962

3 ай бұрын

I agree

I’ve been a hobby smith since 2008, just getting into doing this professionally. You are very informative and knowledgeable when it comes to using a coal Forge and it shows. Everything I have learned has been self taught. Your video proves that in this field there is always something you can learn and improve on. Bravo.

What an impeccable video. I learnt more in 70 minutes than in weeks of experimenting in my own forge. I don't understand why you don't have millions of subscribers.

@blackmetalstudio6425

Жыл бұрын

Hi Mike, Thank you for the compliment! Many youtubers including myself can't imagine watching an hour long video...boring! But I posted my videos for viewers like yourself who are interested less in entertainment and more in a densely packed complete process video that contains almost as much as I know about the craft, the rest I've forgotten. I hope to reach people that are dedicated to want to know the whys in addition to the hows. Thanks for your feedback! Will

@theojilderts9729

10 ай бұрын

Its to hard for many I see myself in it but Know that keep going Is always information Ormakes you wonder . Nice word... So bit By bit is the path of life Also in blacksmithing I agree with you... Blacksmith theo jilderts Harlingen holland.... No not Texas. Rachel Mc. Lush... 1980 mis Olympia . Also 1958 Like me... Natural Bodybuilder gone vegan

Fantastic video and information. You didn't waste a second that wasn't important information. Thank you very much. Best to you in the future.

@blackmetalstudio6425

Жыл бұрын

Thank you! Much appreciated!

Well Done! This is a wonderful gift, thank you for being generous with your knowledge.

..Outstanding explanation on the different fuels William !! You taught me some things on packing the fire for sure. Thanks...

This is great. So much info and things that I never thought about. Thank you for sharing your knowledge and making these videos. 👍😎

@blackmetalstudio6425

4 жыл бұрын

Thanks for watching, I appreciate the kind words.

Thank you.

Best channel ever thank you so much

This has to be the most under-rated channel on KZread. I think if you put them into 10 or 15 minute easily digestible videos, you would see your viewership blow up. But then again, it feels like a good secret to have, so maybe we don't want thousands of people joining. :D

@blackmetalstudio6425

2 жыл бұрын

Hi Ashley, Thank you for watching. I take your suggestions to heart, and will try, in addition to comprehensive videos, to make shorter videos. In my teaching experience it was challenging to condense most blacksmithing procedures as there are so many nuances to every process. If you got this far with the series you experienced the same delivery that I utilized in my classes, as these were college credited students and many were looking to be the best prepared to enter the field. I took the responsibility seriously, thus the detail. In the videos I try to exhaustively reveal those nuances but there is a balance to keeping people interested. Stay tuned, I have so much more to share. Regards, Will

@one4320

2 ай бұрын

I understand this pov. But I think the short, digestible content has its own problems. These long, detailed videos are rare and, when the content is of such high standard as this, they are pure Gold. Thankyou for passing on such invaluable knowledge and experience to the world.

This was great! Ime in England and just starting out. I have an old Artillery hand cranked forge I have restored can't wait to fire her up

@blackmetalstudio6425

2 жыл бұрын

Ged, Wow - how cool. Keep in mind due to the portability, there are some limitations on heavier stock, your fire won't have as much heat as you might need, due to a shallow firepot and a small blower. There are going to be some limitations of Btu in a portable forge, but you will still have a lot of fun forging smaller elements and you will get a workout cranking that blower! (Assuming it is a portable battlefield forge...) Best, Will

Thank you for this. So much information! I'm just getting started, and I'm looking forward to watching all your videos.

Amazing amount of great information in this video. Thanks so much for sharing what you have learned

Hi Master Will, Thank you so much for creating what should be considered the “KZread Bible of Blacksmithing”. You are my Hero, it is awesome to find someone with genuine knowledge, who can eloquently share your wisdom in a structured and understandable manner. I have been watching your videos over and over, every time learning new vital snippets of information. Being in the early stages of blacksmithing, my skills are gradually improving. My new Blacksmith shop (shed) is nearing completion and will be able to forge out of direct sunlight and the elements. It has a charcoal forge with a new firepot. The firepot is 12 inches square and 3 inches deep, with a removable insert to give 4 inches depth if my oxygenated layer climbs to high in the fire. It has an electric blower like the one on your larger propane forge, controlled by air gates which impede flow to the firebox and also separately bleed away excess air from the blower. Living in suburbia (Sydney, Australia) coal is not an option, and have a desire to learn to smith “Old School” with a solid fuel forge. Charcoal is manufactured at home using free scrap timber. • Will you do a video on charcoal forges? There is not a lot of QUALITY information online on management of charcoal forges. • Your thoughts on wetting charcoal with water into a slurry? • There is no clinker breaker, (clickers are rare in you setup) I have a removable grill separating the tuyere from the charcoal. In that grill, would slots like on your coal forge or drilled holes be better? If slots, what dimension for the opening in the slots would you suggest.? Smaller opening in the slots will give faster air speed but less volume of air. I am having trouble getting my head around the correct ratios of air speed / volume of air / pressure. • Does the sweet spot (neutral layer) and the height of the oxygenating layer get higher in the fire with increased in airflow? • What tips do you have for conservation of fuel for a charcoal fire? • Best way to extinguish a charcoal fire? Your edification of the people you have inspired you from is honorable and appreciated. I am so excited, of being to be able practice, the skills you are teaching. Thank You Reg

@blackmetalstudio6425

2 жыл бұрын

Hi Reg, Thank you for watching the videos, they are my knowledge dump of a career of collecting technique and practice that I shared and improved upon while teaching beginning blacksmithing students. I weighed my approach by my student's understanding, often having to modify the demos because of the previous class unable to grasp the concept. It was a very active teaching approach. And you are precisely the type of beginning blacksmith that I am trying to communicate with. You are right, in your shop you need daylight but out of direct sunlight, to gauge the heat. Our forging range is between 1450 degrees F and 2400 degrees, the heat is a tool and every 100 degrees is a different tool. I have forged in direct sunlight and there is a lot of guesswork. The more variables the trickier it makes. Regarding charcoal, no it will not coke like coal, so it does not need the wetting or slurry. Most importantly is to control your blast to get the most out of your fuel. Charcoal is like coke, (though much more will be required for the same quantity of heat), it is piled up, the fuel will concentrate the heat where the air blast is most directed. In a coal or coke or charcoal forge the clinker breaker not only lifts up the clinker but is part of the intended engineered direction flow of the blast, so if your firepot does not have a clinker breaker and frustum shape of the birdsnest (exit hole) then make sure that you have with your drilled or slotted grate a pinpoint focus of the air, and heat your iron in this foci. (Even if you only forge charcoal a clinker breaker is handy because although you may not have mineral byproducts in the fuel you may still create clinker by burning steel or accumulated flux from welding). Clinker, regardless of cause, can be cleaned by dipping your poker directing toward the birdsnest and following the contour of the firepot and lifting from the tuyere/birdsnest. Lift with the poker, clear the obstruction to the surface and remove. If the charcoal lifts you know you have an obstruction, that obstruction will clog your airblast and cool your fire and disrupt your focal airpoint. Don't be surprised if you have to do this every 15 minutes. Build a deep fire to avoid oxidation, with a controlled blast you can have efficiency as well as the heat you need. The key is the focus of the blast particularly if you want efficiency. You will know if you are obstructing airflow because you won't get the heat you need for the application, remember every stage of the heat is a tool. If I am tempering I don't need a welding heat, but if I am shaping I want it hot and now. So make sure you have the nozzle, opening, tuyere, birdsnest etc that can provide the air for the combustion and resultant heat. Your blower should provide at least 300 cfm. The blast should be able to lift your hand at full, lift the charcoal out of the firepot, and should be concentrated right in the middle of the firepot. Forge nearer the top of the fire in charcoal, otherwise you may risk oxidation from the blast. I would still try to bury the iron at least superficially, especially when welding or yellow heats, to have embers on top of the iron, so the heat is conducting from all sides. You can tell if you are oxidizing, the blast will cool instead of heat or worst it will burn the steel, so watch as you heat with tinted lenses and adjust your blast, fire depth, iron depth and placement accordingly. The higher the blast, the deeper the charcoal should be, the more intense will be the heat, will be probably the least efficient, and you will experience the most variables at once. To extinguish your fire, separate your embers. You'll rescue some of the whole charcoal and sprinkle water on what remains. Though, when water is added to ash it will create potash (caustic soda). And that is a very corrosive base, so be careful with over saturating it. So avoid breathing the fumes and avoid any remaining wetted ash. Have fun. Stay in touch. Regards, Will

@reggie050

2 жыл бұрын

@@blackmetalstudio6425 Master Will, Thank you for your prompt and detailed reply. Your advice is very much appreciated. Your description on how to manage charcoal, filled in a lot of gaps for me. My tuyere is 3-inch square pipe with the sloping slats on my birds nest. At 3 inches high in the firebox this gives me a heat about 1 inch wide but 3 inches long. The birds nest will remade to a frustum shape, to increase heat intensity and reduce fuel consumption. (Thank you so much for that advice, it would have taken me years to figure that out) I need to understand how to accurately control heat, to this end, I devised an experiment. • I drilled a series of holes across my air gate, as the air gate was pushed further across an extra hole was exposed to airflow. I ran the following test with 3,4,5,6,7,8,9, and 10 holes exposed. • At night, ignite the forge and let it heat up till a ½ inch square stock gets to orange yellow heat. Heat colors are assessed with no artificial light, (complete darkness, other than the glow/fire of the forge) then compared to a chart printed from the net • The air is switched off wait until the stock return to a black heat. • Air on. Three holes opened on air gate, heat for exactly 2 minutes, remove steel inspect for color, magnetism, scale and sparks and make notes. Stock is brushed, birds nest cleaned, charcoal repacked, insert stock, cover with 1 ½ “ charcoal, poke flue near stock, and heat with same airflow for another two minutes. Same inspection and notes. If the stock has not changed color from the previous heat, then an extra hole is opened on the air gate and the process repeated. The aim was to quantify the amount of air needed to achieve different heats. Temperatures from 1200F to 2000F were achieved. However, some temperatures were skipped over within that range and sometimes the temperature remained the same after the addition of additional airflow. Perhaps my reading of the colors was not precise, or I need to do further work on the graduations in the airflow. I am not worried about the inconsistent temperature results; I feel they will improve with practice and tweaking hole sizes. I was thrilled when a higher temperatures the steel bent just under the action of brushing the steel. Unfortunately I did not record at what temperature this occurred. Under 1500F no scaling was seen immediately after removal of stock from the fire. At 1700F and above scaling of the stock was present immediately on removal. I understand that stock at higher temperatures will scale AFTER removal from the fire and gets exposed to oxygen. Do you think; • the scaling is just due to the temperature and is normal • or is the oxygenating layer rising due to increased airflow (therefore needing to place my stock higher to keep in the neutral zone)? If this is the case, should I automatically place my steel higher in the fire when scaling occurs in the fire? Sorry for being so longwinded with my question, I wanted to give you an indication of where I am at in my Blacksmith journey and to explain my method in trying to understand how to properly control my heat. These experiments will be repeated with my frustum birds nest. I will also experiment with inserting my steel at different heights in the firepot. Thanks again for your generosity and inspiration. Reg

You need more exposure. You are the man on the silver mountain. I will do what I can to promote your work.

@blackmetalstudio6425

3 жыл бұрын

Hi Jon, Thank you for your comment, it sounds like a compliment! I will be producing more videos in early December, if you enjoyed the tongs, then tune in I will discuss making various hammers including a chasing hammer and my own forging hammer. Best regards, Will

@brittinghammerforge9441

3 жыл бұрын

@@blackmetalstudio6425 yes, it was a complement. I just couldn’t believe you didn’t have more subscribers considering your vast knowledge of the craft. May God richly bless you brother!

Cant belive so few subscribers! Excellent content!

@blackmetalstudio6425

2 жыл бұрын

Thank you gmoney for taking the time to comment, I hope to produce more soon, the videos are long is what I have been told is why few subscribers, but I am putting content out not for the impatient but for those that can dig in and want to learn a system beyond the glamor of a forge weld to find the nuances that make blacksmiths more like masters and not production workers, hell, my classes were 2 1/2 hours long! Regards, Will

Thank you so very much for the video this is exactly what I want to do with my life

you are great! surely if it was me having an open fire next to a wall, actually it doesn't matter i would've burnt the whole smith down. somehow.

Hello sir, we have very expensive coal in Ukraine, I have to make charcoal myself. I would still forge and forge on your waste after forging))

Your hearth or fire is Really neat. Is a beauty Lots of extras...mine Is very basic i see but Also do some nice Blacksmithing. So Thats oke to....but Very nice information Blacksmith theo Harlingen holland...

Great video and great instruction, I'm re storing a Buffalo 243E forge with electric blower and downdraft hood. Vulcan firepot and clinker breaker. I'm to the point where I need to clay the hearth, what should I use? I've heard of a mix of plaster of Paris, sand and perlite. will that work? and do I clay the firepot as well?

I just found you! So informative...I've been blacksmithing 305+ yrs. And I don't use KZread much...but I was trying to find some blower advice... My Western Chief (about 100 yrs old and was in beautiful shape till the main gear got stripped!!!)went out for restoration right as pandemic hit and here we are in Oct. and there has been one block after another to the shop doing the restoration... I am fortunate because I have the portable forge we used outside and I just got a new propane forge set, so we can work outside and inside. We use blacksmithing coal and your explanation is so clear. I have always taught and mentored young smith's (start average 10 yrs. Old) and will share this with my guys. Looking for a hand crank blower...what, of the modern builds, would you recommend? Thanks, again!

@m.anastasia3679

3 жыл бұрын

I meant 35+ yrs.!!!

@blackmetalstudio6425

3 жыл бұрын

Hi Anastasia, Thank you for your interest in my videos. Your Western Chief blower is worn out from use and abuse, probably after an undisclosed period of no lubrication. If you must hand crank your blower due to lack of electricity or reenactment and you want your blower repaired then seek a job shop machinist who may be able to build up or duplicate worn out gears with a mill and indexer. At $100 per hour this could be a costly option. The old blowers worked well because of the flywheel effect,especially the Champion 600, the weight of the compound cast iron/bronze gears gave smooth centrifugal force. Modern hand crank blowers will not have this quality, they are direct drive or worm gear drive and need to be vigorously cranked. Centaur sells one for $150 and if you lower your expectations and switch arms a lot then it will suffice .I think a fun project would be to duplicate the flywheel action with a crank on a steel flywheel or jackshaft driving a flywheel that is in turn connected to a modern blower, perhaps with a lovejoy connection or small u joint. IT would be fun to operate and glorious to watch the machine. Good for you that you are teaching blacksmithing to young people, we need to keep the legacy alive, the information is too precious to lose. Regards, Will

Thank you, very instructive. Rarely people explain in detail how to operate a forge. Now I realize my errors, why my metal is burning. I go to try as explained in the video. I have a question. If I am using charcoal, should I brake it into pieces, as little as your coal pieces?

@blackmetalstudio6425

Жыл бұрын

Hi Sigma, Sorry about the delay, the smallest size of fuel will give you the most surface area as fuel, and will provide more heat as long as you supply the air needed. So if you are not able to melt your steel, which you should whether using coal, charcoal, coke or wood, then make the pieces smaller and increase your blast. I heard you can get a welding heat using cow manure. If hand cranked then crank harder, if you have an electric blower you may need a bigger one. I use one that has a minimum 200 cfm. Heat is a tool, and if you are not getting enough heat then you are working harder. Soft steel is a joy to shape, warm steel will dampen your enthusiasm and make you feel unworthy. Best, Will

@Sigma-sj7mq

Жыл бұрын

@@blackmetalstudio6425 Thank you! I am using the output of a vacuum cleaner as a blower, perhaps it is too strong. I will continue to experiment. Warm regards!

👍✌️⚒️

what kind of blower do you have? can you show me in detail? the components, the brand etc. thank you!

@blackmetalstudio6425

7 ай бұрын

Hi Sylvia, On my coal forge I use a Champion 400 antique hand operated blower, I found it in working condition in a Memphis flea market. It has enough air volume for a large fire and forge welding as well has great flywheel effect when the handle is released. Regarding the coal forge electric blower, I am using an antique champion blower, hard to find, the modern electric Centaur blower has similar volume and pressure but is pricey. As long as you don’t have more than one bend in the ductwork any shaded pole electric blower with a minimum 150 cfm can be run with a rheostat and will provide an average size fire pot enough air to weld. I have used with success as a bare minimum a Dayton 150 cfm 115v blower with a rheostat, available from Grainger. On my ribbon burner forge I am using a Sunlar 115v and running a rheostat, which provides more than enough air for the interior gas forge volume.

Is the Blower a Buffalo Forge Model 300? I use one looks very similiar. Great video for pros and cons of a hand operated blower.

Read us some usa news mate while startingthe fire... Greetings blacksmith Theo harlingen holland Good education... Or...reminders...thanks

That word, “hearth” sounds like heart, not like herd.