Is this what I think it is? | "Traditional" Blacksmithing | Forum

Years ago I got some wrought iron rods/bolts from shipwreck/barge from the Washington coast, small stuff about 3/4" in diameter, when heating it to a forging heat, it really stunk and bothered the lungs, good ventelation behind the forge helped. Anybody have experienced this??

Gene C

Yep, looks like a bit of wrought iron. Got any plans for it?

have you ever forged wrought iron before?

yah my old man lives in poulsbo, and my shop is at his place still as I have no place to set up at the house im renting.

wrought iron is a tricky material to forge do to its grain structure. also if in not mistaken if you forge across the grain such as to make a sholder it can not be sharp it needs a nice large radious or it will literally fall off. its kindof hard to explane perhaps someone with more forge time with wrought could help more. also you will want to work it at basically a welding heat or it will de-lamanate.

goodluck!
Ryan

New kid on the block here so if this idea has been discussed prior, you'll just have to forgive my brashness.

Lately, I've been experimenting with an old process called electrolysis. If you are not familiar with it, I'll tell you just how simple it is. For pieces as shown in the first photo, all you need is a plastic 5 gallon pail, 3 metal rods such as rebar, a common battery charger that puts out 10 amps but isn't one of those that needs to "see" a battery before it puts out juice, 4 gallons of water, some zip ties and a box of Arm and Hammer washing soda.

Drill some holes in the bucket near the top edge so you can zip tie the three pieces of steel rebar equally space around the outer edge of the bucket. Add the water, stir in a cup of washing soda. Use a piece of 10 gauge copper wire to join the 3 pieces of rebar together electrically and hook the positive lead from the charger to it. Use a grinder to clean a bare spot on the item you want to de-rust and use an old C-clamp to hold a length of steel coathanger wire to it. You can now use the coat hanger wire to suspend the chunk of steel in the bucket so it does not touch any of the rebar. The negative lead from the charger gets hooked to the coat hanger wire.

Turn on the charger and you will start to see some bubbling starting to happen around each rod. A white froth will start to appear and then you will see the colour of rust appear on top of the white froth. You might have to leave it in there for a day or two but so what? The electrolytic action will pull the rust of the piece you are cleaning and deposit it on the rebar just like electroplating but in reverse. You piece will come out black when it's done but it will scrub up clean with minimal effort. Only the rust will be removed, no good metal. I have now built a tank that is 8 feet long, 42 inches wide and 30 inches high so I can strip paint and remove rust from garden tractor parts with this method. I am now able to drop a GT frame totally into the tank and leave while I go about other work.

Yes, I also own a sand blasting pot, a cabinet blaster plus various angle grinders with wire cup brushes, grinding and sanding discs but all those methods are messy, require a lot of my time as well as using up "consumables" that cost money to buy.

Just a suggestion..