Wish me luck....

cangooner

Cheese enthusiast
I’m sorry it did not work. I’m willing to bet your next swing will be much better.
+1 to that! Sorry to hear it didn't work out, but happy that it didn't fail in a way that sprayed molten copper in your direction. I found some copper sheet in the shop while looking for handle material for another couple of knives, so now I have this nagging at the back of my mind more than ever. :) When I get around to trying it, I'll share my process and results here on WSW. Hopefully one of us will get it to work soon.

Also, you have me thinking that a thermocouple and needle valve might be a useful addition... Do you find you make use of them often? I'm totally old school and judge temp by colour and a magnet, but am happy to make additions if they're useful.
 

Shawn

Member
Do you find you make use of them often?
Absolutely. I have the needle valve mounted to the leg of the table/stand my forge is on. It is easily accessible yet out of the way. I turn it down before opening to take a piece out so I'm not getting a face full, and I can fine tune it with very minimal effort. I just fully open my pressure regulator (mine has no gauge) and then fine tune my flame by opening or closing the needle valve. Much easier and more precise than a ball valve.

The thermocouple is great for thermocycling and heat treating. I don't have a fancy heat treat oven, but I can fine tune my burner with the valve and hold a temperature. If I want 1500 for thermocycling, I tune it in to where it reads 1500, then just let the piece match the forge color and soak for whatever time I need. Same with heat treating. I know I need to hit a temp from the chart for whatever alloy, and I set it and let it get to the forge color.

I open it fully to bring the forge to whatever temp I am needing, then tune it down to hold. So for normal forging I'm not wasting gas holding the forge at welding temps the entire time.

I think I posted the link to the thermocouple I have in my shop thread somewhere, and the needle valve I got from Wayne Coe when I ordered my satinite and plistex from him. I just ran my braided line from my regulator to the valve, then used copper tubing to go from it to the burner. I belive the fittings are just 1/4 inch NPT. Maybe 1/8, but I am almost sure they are 1/4. (Been a while, but either way, they are standard fittings.)
 

Shawn

Member
I am thinking my copper melting may have been because I layered some thin sheeting instead of having a thicker piece. Maybe? And I also think I got a little bit of inclusion into my welds. I know the one end for sure had a bit of copper tinge to the weld. So that may have contaminated the 15n20 enough to allow the splitting.
Possibly anyhow. Those are things that I can think of where it may have gone wrong.
 

cangooner

Cheese enthusiast
I think I posted the link to the thermocouple I have in my shop thread somewhere...
Found it - thanks!
Here's the post with the link in case anyone else is looking:

 

Bruno

Administrator
Staff member
Where do you measure the temperature? Just from the color alone i know that some parts of my forge are much hotter than the rest.
 

Shawn

Member
You can see it here in the bottom left corner. Other than directly in the flame or close to the opening, mine stays fairly even.
I'm sure there are some variances, but if I keep a blade out of the direct flame it seems to stay pretty consistent in color with the insulation on the back wall where the probe is.
 

Attachments

cangooner

Cheese enthusiast
I think I got it to work...
80Crv2 core, copper, and 15n20/1084 outer layer.
I still have to finish shaping it, heat treat, etc., but it is solid. :)

I welded around the outside, lost some copper from one end through a crack in the weld (the weld cracked like crazy, my guess is from loads of contamination with copper in the weld?) but for the most part it worked. I should be able to make another thing from the other end of the billet.

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2069
 

Victor Creazzi

King of Bondo
I've heard that if a piece of copper is thrown into a coal forge it makes it impossible to do a steel to steel forge weld. A billet might be different than a jump weld though. I've also heard that it is very difficult to get rid of the contaminant by just cleaning the fire.
 

Shawn

Member
That looks awesome. Need to get my shop back up to a usable condition so I can try this again. I ran into the welds cracking horribly also.
 

cangooner

Cheese enthusiast
I've heard that if a piece of copper is thrown into a coal forge it makes it impossible to do a steel to steel forge weld. A billet might be different than a jump weld though. I've also heard that it is very difficult to get rid of the contaminant by just cleaning the fire.
I hadn't heard that before. I use a propane forge, but that's good to know in case I'm able to run coal at some point.
 

Bruno

Administrator
Staff member
I've heard that if a piece of copper is thrown into a coal forge it makes it impossible to do a steel to steel forge weld. A billet might be different than a jump weld though. I've also heard that it is very difficult to get rid of the contaminant by just cleaning the fire.
Reminds me of that time we thought we had tossed a piece of aluminium in Charlie's forge, after he thought it was stainless :D
I think we got everything out before it started seeping into the liner.
 

Bruno

Administrator
Staff member
I hadn't heard that before. I use a propane forge, but that's good to know in case I'm able to run coal at some point.
Why would you want to run a coal forge? I worked with charcoal for a long time and once I switched to propane I didn't look back.
 

cangooner

Cheese enthusiast
Why would you want to run a coal forge? I worked with charcoal for a long time and once I switched to propane I didn't look back.
Nostalgia, really. It is what I learned to forge on and I just like it. It will never happen where I live now out of consideration for my neighbours and not wanting to inflict coal smoke on them. But maybe one day.

I also appreciate the ability to control the fire, have some parts hotter, other parts cooler, etc. But if I had to choose only one kind of forge to use, I'd stick with propane.
 

Victor Creazzi

King of Bondo
Why would you want to run a coal forge? I worked with charcoal for a long time and once I switched to propane I didn't look back.
Try heating just the center of an 8' bar, or better yet do a forge weld on a 36" diameter 'tire' for a wooden wheel, for just a couple of examples where coal is the right approach. I mostly use propane, but there are plenty of things that are easy with coal that are totally impractical with a propane.
 

cangooner

Cheese enthusiast
I have to say I'm really happy with how this turned out. It's a medium-sized chef's knife with a blade made of an 80CrV2 core, copper, and low layer 15n20/1084 Damascus. Handle is stabilized bog oak and camatillo, which was a wood I had never even heard of before spotting some off-cuts in my local fancy wood dealer. Really beautiful stuff.

So give it another shot for sure Shawn! It looks way cooler in person than in the pics, so it's well worth the effort.

I made this as a gift for a friend's landmark birthday, and I find myself wishing I had made it for myself. :) Ah well... A couple more coats of oil on the handle and I'll be sending it on its way soon.

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2081
 

Shawn

Member
Definitely looks awesome!
Once I get back up and running I am going to for sure. Have that new forge on the way, anvil for the Mrs on the way, and some 1084 and 15n20 coming also.
The next time I am going to order some actual copper sheet instead of trying to use layers of shim stock. I will most likely hit you up for a few pointers before I start too.
 
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