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The RECAPITATOR posted:Nah, I drop the piece in the fire, drag the tongs in some snow for a few seconds and then set them aside until I need to take the piece out. You'd be the best judge of whether the tongs are getting properly cooled since it's easy to put your hand near them, but snow is a lousy quenchant. As it melts it leaves a void around your piece, leaving it to cool by radiation and convection rather than the much faster conduction. You'd cool it down much more and faster just by plunging it in some water. I'm really putting the reason for the deformation on your tongs getting and staying too hot.
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Mar 11, 2014 21:09
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The RECAPITATOR posted:I guess rebar is just too drat soft. Some rebar is weldable so the alloy is very close in properties to mild steel, which does not harden with quenching. If you left any of the factory texture you could look up the grade to see what the metallurgical content is.
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Mar 12, 2014 01:44
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ductonius posted:Some rebar is weldable so the alloy is very close in properties to mild steel, which does not harden with quenching. If you left any of the factory texture you could look up the grade to see what the metallurgical content is. Rebar isn't a specific alloy. It's crap metal. Often it does have more carbon than mild steel, but it is not in a reliable quantity nor is it uniform throughout the bar. I am pretty sure just has to pass a test of tensile strength. It's meant for driving into concrete. Although you can forge with it, it really isn't meant for forging.
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Mar 12, 2014 07:19
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The rebar fab plant I worked in had complete certs with an analysis attached to each 10,000 lb. bundle from the mill showing how much of what elements were in the steel. So not all rebar is crap.
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Mar 12, 2014 08:08
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ArtistCeleste posted:True. If cost isn't a thing it's better to buy until you have good experience. I use Billy Tongs. They are about the same price. http://www.piehtoolco.com/contents/en-us/d1409.html I've ordered a few of these: http://kensiron.com/quick_tongs.html Saves me the hassle of making the whole thing from scratch each time.
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Mar 12, 2014 15:44
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halonx posted:I've ordered a few of these: http://kensiron.com/quick_tongs.html Oh snap that's a great idea. Shame he doesn't ship outside North America, maybe I should get my local waterjet cutters to do me a pile of them.
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Mar 12, 2014 15:58
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ReelBigLizard posted:Oh snap that's a great idea. Shame he doesn't ship outside North America, maybe I should get my local waterjet cutters to do me a pile of them. Just google tong blanks. Lots of places make them. Usually $10 to $15 a set. Edit: Unless you know the waterjet place and it will cost less to go through them.
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Mar 12, 2014 19:18
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ReelBigLizard posted:Oh snap that's a great idea. Shame he doesn't ship outside North America, maybe I should get my local waterjet cutters to do me a pile of them. Did you contact him? It looks like he might ship to you, but his cart won't automatically calculate the shipping.
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Mar 12, 2014 19:18
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New forge! Nearly completed in these photos.   Still need to make a cap for the trash pipe, fit a collet or something to attach the bathroom fan/rheostat combo I have, and set it up on some cinder blocks. As you can see from the mountain dew bottle sitting in there, its deep, and its about 3/8ths thick all around. I still need to take a drill and clean up the air holes some since I used a cutting torch (and couldn't get into the fire pot because I didn't plan out my build all that great.) On a related subject, does anybody have an old crucible they no longer need and wouldn't mind letting go for practically nothing? I've got 20 lbs of copper and 3 lbs of tin that are crying out in pain because they really want to be bronze. You'd think I could just go dig up some fireclay considering I live in the brick capitol state (North Carolina), but I wouldn't have the foggiest idea what/where/what else I'd need to go that route. (But I'd enjoy ever minute of making my own)
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Mar 12, 2014 23:26
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Kasan posted:New forge! Nearly completed in these photos. You can get crucibles for not too much on Amazon or I imagine other places. I've got some odds and ends I want to melt down too, plus aluminum casting doesn't seem terribly complex.
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Mar 12, 2014 23:45
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Uncle Enzo posted:You can get crucibles for not too much on Amazon or I imagine other places. I've got some odds and ends I want to melt down too, plus aluminum casting doesn't seem terribly complex. Hmm, that's not TOO terrible. Still more than I can shell out of pocket at the moment, but something to think about. Also those are usable with an induction heater, which I can built a pretty drat high heat one out of the scrap electronics I have laying around here. Assuming I want to reduce the amount of bronze I can make  .Should order some zinc and make brass too.
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Mar 13, 2014 01:00
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ArtistCeleste posted:Rebar isn't a specific alloy. It's crap metal. I work at a precast plant and let me assure you that rebar is not "crap" metal. Bundles come tagged with the alloy and the bars themselves are printed with the same information so we don't build cages out of the wrong stuff. Some can be welded, some can't be. The rebar that gets used the most is a low carbon alloy - purely for economy since it's cheap and it works - but by no means is just any old metal of unknown content. At the very least engineering wouldn't tolerate that kind of variability.
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Mar 13, 2014 01:16
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How would I go about smelting a small amount of iron ore relatively easily and/or cheaply? Like a fist sized chunk, if that. My fiance's family's land has an old iron mine on it, and I thought it would be a nice surprise to make her wedding band out of that iron. I would only need about a quarter sized lump of workable iron. I'm not sure I have enough ore available to justify building a smelter like from several pages back unless that's really my only option.
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Mar 13, 2014 20:20
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ItsNotAGirlName posted:How would I go about smelting a small amount of iron ore relatively easily and/or cheaply? Like a fist sized chunk, if that. My fiance's family's land has an old iron mine on it, and I thought it would be a nice surprise to make her wedding band out of that iron. I would only need about a quarter sized lump of workable iron. I'm not sure I have enough ore available to justify building a smelter like from several pages back unless that's really my only option. I hope you plan to give her an actual wedding band as well at some point, leaving aside the whole issue of rust and impermanence. It's nice that her folks have an iron mine, but any personal resonance there is dwarfed by the fact that you're placing a tiny shackle on her finger. e: Jesus, it just hit me that you're asking how to make an iron wedding band cheaply. Eugene V. Dubstep fucked around with this message at 21:07 on Mar 13, 2014 |
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Mar 13, 2014 20:30
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Yeah that'd be ballsy. My wife didn't even want me to make her wedding band from titanium as I did for mine.
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Mar 13, 2014 21:04
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ductonius posted:I work at a precast plant and let me assure you that rebar is not "crap" metal. Bundles come tagged with the alloy and the bars themselves are printed with the same information so we don't build cages out of the wrong stuff. Some can be welded, some can't be. Sorry, I didn't mean that it's content was entirely unknown. I just meant that there isn't one specific alloy. And basically everyone speaks of rebar for it's unreliable quality. Specifically that the quality varies bar per bar and the content throughout the bar can vary as well. Or is this incorrect as well?
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Mar 13, 2014 21:10
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ArtistCeleste posted:Sorry, I didn't mean that it's content was entirely unknown. I just meant that there isn't one specific alloy. And basically everyone speaks of rebar for it's unreliable quality. Specifically that the quality varies bar per bar and the content throughout the bar can vary as well. Or is this incorrect as well? It might apply if you're pulling random rebar scraps from a pile of mixed stuff of unknown origin. It's definitely not true when it's originally sold for a specific purpose at a specific location. I did IT for an engineering firm, and they had catalogs for rebar with all its physical properties listed, alloy, tensile strength, etc.
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Mar 14, 2014 01:46
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ArtistCeleste posted:I just meant that there isn't one specific alloy. And basically everyone speaks of rebar for it's unreliable quality. Specifically that the quality varies bar per bar and the content throughout the bar can vary as well. Or is this incorrect as well? You're right, there isn't one specific "rebar" alloy because rebar is a structural material and depending on what exactly is being built the engineers will call for different types of rebar. It doesn't make sense to me that rebar would be allowed to vary within the bar, or between bars of the same alloy. Steel is made in furnaces that hold up to 400 tonnes; if the carbon and/or alloy content within a rebar stick is inconsistent something has gone terribly wrong at the smelter. I would guess the "unreliable" nature of rebar in a black smithing context occurs because forging rebar is asking the material to do something it was never designed to do. Changes in heating, cooling and working will have unknown, perhaps dramatic effects on the final properties of the metal. At the plant we don't weld rebar unless the job calls for it and we never cut it with a torch. It comes from the supplier in a specific metallurgical state and we're not allowed to alter that in uncontrolled ways. Also, nobody scavenging rebar for smithing in their hobby forge at home is going to be getting a consistent rebar alloy.
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Mar 14, 2014 02:01
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ItsNotAGirlName posted:How would I go about smelting a small amount of iron ore relatively easily and/or cheaply? Like a fist sized chunk, if that. My fiance's family's land has an old iron mine on it, and I thought it would be a nice surprise to make her wedding band out of that iron. I would only need about a quarter sized lump of workable iron. I'm not sure I have enough ore available to justify building a smelter like from several pages back unless that's really my only option. Yeah, building a bloomery is probably your only option. You could probably attain the needed temperature on a small scale by sticking carbon gouging rods in an arc welder, carving a consumable "crucible" out of a firebrick and blasting the ore with the arc, or mayyyybe with a decent-sized acetylene torch, but you're missing the vital reduction aspect to turn it into wrought. Virtually all ironmaking processes except for the bloomery are multi-stage and involve producing pig iron which is then made into wrought or steel, which isn't doable at a small scale.
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Mar 14, 2014 03:45
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ItsNotAGirlName posted:How would I go about smelting a small amount of iron ore relatively easily and/or cheaply? Like a fist sized chunk, if that. My fiance's family's land has an old iron mine on it, and I thought it would be a nice surprise to make her wedding band out of that iron. I would only need about a quarter sized lump of workable iron. I'm not sure I have enough ore available to justify building a smelter like from several pages back unless that's really my only option. How long do you expect this marriage to last? I'm only being partially facetious. What do you think happens to bare iron that's in contact with human skin 24 hours a day? I mean if it were a silver mine or something and you are a jeweler, cool. But iron? Really?
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Mar 14, 2014 05:59
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Sagebrush posted:How long do you expect this marriage to last? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_ring  (albeit most engineer's rings are stainless nowadays) If he's willing to perform a little bit more maintenance than is generally expected from jewellery it should work fine, I'd think. Lay into a lifetime stock of renwax or something.
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Mar 14, 2014 14:49
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I'm an Australian engineering undergraduate and I really like the idea behind the Iron Ring. As I'm already essentially practising (by conducting studies) I'd like to get my own ring made in the same vain to remind myself of my responsibilities as an engineer, especially when such responsibilities can be easily forgotten when working in a field very close to science. Would I be best speaking to a local jeweler, or would one of you perhaps even be interested in making one under commission? I think it was you Ambrose who was doing some cool stuff with patterns on rings and acid treatments not too long ago? (PS; I am a long time lurker and very infrequent poster)
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Mar 14, 2014 15:24
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You have to be careful with that. The Iron Ring is a legal trademark, and jewelers can get into trouble if they make them on their own. As far as I know, no licensed jeweler will alter an iron ring for someone personally, you have to get it done through the provincial engineering association. E: Just in terms of getting the ring made by someone from Canada, I don't think Australia has an equivalent thing.
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Mar 14, 2014 18:18
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Ambrose Burnside posted:Yeah, building a bloomery is probably your only option. You could probably attain the needed temperature on a small scale by sticking carbon gouging rods in an arc welder, carving a consumable "crucible" out of a firebrick and blasting the ore with the arc, or mayyyybe with a decent-sized acetylene torch, but you're missing the vital reduction aspect to turn it into wrought. Virtually all ironmaking processes except for the bloomery are multi-stage and involve producing pig iron which is then made into wrought or steel, which isn't doable at a small scale. Thanks, that's kinda what I had figured. Hopefully I have enough ore that I'll have extra that I can play with. And the engineer's ring is what gave me the idea.
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Mar 14, 2014 18:19
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Jewcoon posted:You have to be careful with that. The Iron Ring is a legal trademark, and jewelers can get into trouble if they make them on their own. As far as I know, no licensed jeweler will alter an iron ring for someone personally, you have to get it done through the provincial engineering association. Whaaaaaaaat? That sounds like bullshit. I mean I believe you, but "you can't make an iron ring because ™" is just 
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Mar 14, 2014 18:41
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Bad Munki posted:Whaaaaaaaat? That sounds like bullshit. That's probably because it is.
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Mar 14, 2014 19:21
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I have no idea what's going on.
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Mar 14, 2014 19:34
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Could always make your own. Make a tapered ring gauge, mark it with the correct location for the size ring you want, then take a piece of SCH40 black iron pipe slightly smaller than your finger, cut a 1/4inch thick piece, chuck it in a fire, and use the ring gauge to slowly spread the ring interior to the right diameter. Then just use some jewelers tools to decorate it how you'd like it. You said you're in engineering. Assuming you have access to an equipped shop, you should have a <Can't recall the name of it but turns in 30 degree blocks and we use it to make hexagonal or octagonal flat bits on round drill bits> that you can get precision flat spots on, similar to what the pictures of the Iron Ring looks. The sides look more milled than hammer tho based on the whorls in the iron. (Acid etched I think to make them show better) I could also be wildly off base, but most of the above works when taking iron pipe and converting it into rings.
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Mar 14, 2014 21:36
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Jewcoon posted:You have to be careful with that. The Iron Ring is a legal trademark, and jewelers can get into trouble if they make them on their own. As far as I know, no licensed jeweler will alter an iron ring for someone personally, you have to get it done through the provincial engineering association. What the gently caress are you smoking?
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Mar 14, 2014 21:48
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I had an idea while at work. Instead of me telling a blacksmith about forging rebar, how about the blacksmith tells me about forging rebar. I picked up some rebar cutoffs out of the scrap bin: regular 400W steel (W means weldable, so low carbon), some higher carbon rebar (markings: mmfx C 5 cs 100) and a couple of pieces of coil rod which if heated to red hot and quenched in water, turns as brittle as glass. I got enough so for two packs, each with one stick of the low carbon, two of the "higher carbon" rebar and one stick of coil rod. I would be willing to mail these to any enterprising goon who wants to experiment. Preferably in Canada, preferably closer to Vancouver than farther, but whatever. Getting the rebar is conditional on reporting the results, of course. Because 
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Mar 15, 2014 00:09
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Bad Munki posted:Whaaaaaaaat? That sounds like bullshit. I mean I believe you, but "you can't make an iron ring because ™" is just You can make all the iron rings you want. The Iron Ring is a specific style of ring worn on a specific finger by engineers in Canada after it is bestowed on them in a solemn and private ceremony. I doubt it's actually trademarked or illegal to make a lookalike, but asking a Canadian jeweler to do so would be sort of like asking them to make you a copy of a military decoration. It's not a thing outside of Canada as far as I know though so make all the Iron Rings you want in other countries. Sagebrush fucked around with this message at 05:33 on Mar 15, 2014 |
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Mar 15, 2014 05:26
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It's a cockring and they rivet it on, that's why there are no female engineers in Canada.
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Mar 15, 2014 11:14
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Sagebrush posted:It's not a thing outside of Canada as far as I know though so make all the Iron Rings you want in other countries. The US has been doing something similar since the 70's, directly based off the Canadian ritual. It's a stainless steel ring worn on the pinky finger of the dominant hand, so the ring touches the work surface of everything the engineer has his hands on. There are a couple pictures of engineers who've never removed their rings and their fingers have started to grow over the ring as they got fat.
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Mar 15, 2014 14:53
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Kasan posted:The US has been doing something similar since the 70's, directly based off the Canadian ritual. It's a stainless steel ring worn on the pinky finger of the dominant hand, so the ring touches the work surface of everything the engineer has his hands on. There are a couple pictures of engineers who've never removed their rings and their fingers have started to grow over the ring as they got fat. eeewww For what it's worth, I've worked with and around engineers my entire professional career and have never seen one of these. Maybe the tradition just hasn't spread to the South yet.
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Mar 15, 2014 15:21
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So I finished out my forge as I think I posted about somewhere above on this page. I lit that sucker on fire last night and proceeded to burn through 50lbs of charcoal. Not a huge amount to show for it, but I wanted to practice a couple techniques and see what kind of heat I could crank out of my forge. Pictures, write up, etc: ferrumetlucem.tumblr.com So I was easily able to get aluminum to pouring temp, but when I stepped up to bronze (was the next metal I had on hand) I couldn't get more than about a silver dollar's worth to reach pouring temp, and the rest of it sort of brazed itself to my crucible. How can I get more heat out it? I'd really like to at least get the bronze out of my crucible, but I'd like to be able to crank out more heat, especially since I'm having some issues getting the right heat out of it to get railroad spikes up to a good forging orange. Not enough airflow? (5 holes, 29/64 dia) (Its a 90CFM bathroom fan (I think)) Too much ash from the charcoal causing the holes to get blocked? (I SEE airflow, but that doesn't mean I'm getting enough I think) at the date posted:The South Yeah I deal with engineers on a fairly regular basis and I don't think I've ever actually SEEN a ring either. Kasan fucked around with this message at 15:29 on Mar 15, 2014 |
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Mar 15, 2014 15:27
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Kasan posted:There are a couple pictures of engineers who've never removed their rings and their fingers have started to grow over the ring as they got fat. I can provide way worse pictures of people wearing rings while working machines (or just jumping from trucks or tractors). My dad was a pretty well known hand-surgeon. If anybody in this thread want NMS unrepairable finger injuries I can provide. Think about bananas dressed in blood with visible skeleton parts before you ask. I'm a mechanical engineer that'll never wear a ring like my silly Canadian(tm) brothers.
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Mar 15, 2014 16:17
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Kasan posted:
If there's any serious amount at the bottom don't try. The expanding metal can crack the crucible as it heats. If it's only a fraction of the area of the bottom of the crucible you should be ok. In the future when you're pouring and a little inevitably gets left behind, make sure to hold the crucible sideways at the end so the metal freezes along the side where its eventual expansion will be harmless.
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Mar 15, 2014 17:03
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door Door door posted:If there's any serious amount at the bottom don't try. The expanding metal can crack the crucible as it heats. If it's only a fraction of the area of the bottom of the crucible you should be ok. In the future when you're pouring and a little inevitably gets left behind, make sure to hold the crucible sideways at the end so the metal freezes along the side where its eventual expansion will be harmless. Most of it did exactly that. There is a big long booger of bronze with about 2/3rds of the bottom covered (there is definitely room for the metal to expand.) Still doesn't solve the heat issue. I drilled a couple more holes to both increase airflow, and give more places for ash, clink and small charcoal particles to fall, but I managed to snap a drill bit just as I broke through on on of those, so I need to haul the thing into the machine shop monday and mill out the drill bit. Since I'm out of charcoal til monday (when I'm getting 1/2 ton of coal delivered for a whooping $60) I guess I can mull over it this weekend and hopefully get some good responses.
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Mar 15, 2014 17:37
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Other than a larger fire a pretty standard way to achieve higher temperatures in furnaces etc is to preheat the air feeding your fire, I have experimented myself with an electric hot air gun and it made a noticeable difference until it started melting, a long term solution would be an air to air heat exchanger to recycle otherwise wasted exhaust heat
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Mar 16, 2014 09:22
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Hi goons. I'm having some trouble controlling warping. Using 1/16" 6011 rod on 16 ga. positive electrode at around 35 amps. What are your ways around this? I've heard of placing a peice of wire underneath to "pre-bend", or shimming it. I think I'm just going to preheat the whole thing with a torch. I'm making a table for my bandsaw, so I need to make it straight as possible. The problem is the whole thing is warping in contortions I never thought possible, if it were just 90 degrees I would be fine.. Here's the band-saw in question, I built a hitch-style reciever for both ends, so I can quickly take off the base and table.  While I'm at it here's another picture. I welded a piece of unistrut to a microphone stand and welded a mount for the lights.  Unistrut is SO cool. porcellus fucked around with this message at 21:28 on Mar 16, 2014 |
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Mar 16, 2014 21:26
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