First forge: 20# propane tank using a ribbon burner | The Forge Fire | Forum

Was web surfing one night & came across Ric Furrer’s web site.  He wrote something about Louie Mills that impressed me so much I had to meet Louie.  Got to know Louie.  He invited me for 9 days at his place in Ann Arbor to watch him make his own steel over a charcoal fire & forge a tanto.  

Louie is a traditional Japanese bladesmith.  He first makes & cuts his own charcoal.  He doesn’t own or use a belt sander- just a sen, files, sandpaper, & stones.  I fell asleep standing up as I watched him polishing the tanto he forged- just lulled me to sleep.

Louie introduced me to friends he ran around with in the 80s- Al Pendray and Daryl Meier.  This past March, Daryl showed me his forge & a strange burner that looked like a brick filled with holes.  I figured if this burner  was good enough for him, it was good enough for me.  Besides, it looked simple enough & didn’t use much propane.  I fail to understand the reason most smiths using gas prefer venturi burners.  

My blacksmithing experience is limited- all three times were in classes with Howard Clark.  First time was in Sturgeon Bay in 2014 with Ric Furrer.  Went to learn how to create  hamons with no intention of forging- wrong.  Had never touched a piece of red hot steel & had no intention at the time to forge, just heat treat  

To heat treat a blade, one first needs a blade.   Neither Ric nor Howard had any blades- this was a task for the students, of course.   My lack of experience my me the first ‘volunteer'.  Have years experience in swinging  a hammer & following instructions.  

With 7 guys watching, performance anxiety was not an issue.   I did what had to be done & never missed the steel.   Voila, forged my first blade.  Left arm was useless for  the next couple days.  One should never use a 5# hammer with a 2# arm.  

In March made my first knife: a hidden tang knife at Howard’s.   Just completed a metallurgy class with him last month learning about steel (structure & grain size), heat treating, and understanding one must understand to use the Heat Treater’s Guide & understand the diagrams.

Followed John Emmerling’s instructions on making a ribbon burner & Chris Price’s video on making a forge.   Ric provided the Mizzou- actually drove it 1100 miles from Sturgeon Bay, WI to Olivebridge, NY for Ashokan 2016.  Louie welded the burner last month for me after showing me how to weld & use a cutting torch.

Asked Al  where I could find a blacksmith blower & not pay $retail$  for the 164 CFM blower recommended .  He suggested a bounce house blower which many guys are using.  Scored a used 1/2 HP one on Ebay for $50.  

Made a manometer & tested that  blower: 7.5” W.C.  That was easy.  Remembered I have a central vac motor: a Lamb 117507.  Bought it years ago when I was into making cyclone dust collectors.  Had gotten dark, so moved the test set up into kitchen.  Was using two 24” clear 1.5” tubes, a plastic U and about a quart of water.  

Hooked up the output of the vacuum motor & turned it on.  Immediately all the water evacuated the tubes, was up on the ceiling & then down on me.   My wife yelled down, “Tony, are you okay?”  “Yes dear...”  Knew the pressure had to exceed  48” W.C. from that ‘experiment’.  Just found out that the Lamb motor is actually rated 134.1” W.C.  

Now in the process of tuning the ribbon burner.  Been using the bounce house blower & it seems okay.  For some reason, not all the holes have a blue flame & seem empty or blocked.  I missed the sentence about removing the paper off the crayons.  Will have to look tomorrow.   Can't not open the air ball valve all the way as it’s too much pressure with the bounce house blower.  But in the interest of science, had to try the Lamb blower.  Place your bets. 

No more bets.   The output port of the Lamb motor fits snuggly in a 2” PVC pipe.  With the motor on & the air ball valve open wide, it blows much harder than the bounce house blower.  No surprise there.   Had to really shut the ball valve to light the gas.  With only .5 PSI gas, was making the Mizzou glow red in no time.  Seems I can use either blower/motor.  Could of saved $50...  

I’m wondering  how to properly ‘tune’ the burner & recognize when I have a reducing atmosphere.   Thanks