Gas Forge Burners

G

GaryPogueCustomKnife

Joined
Oct 8, 2013
Messages
188
I am pretty much done with my brakedrum charcoal forge. It is a absolute peice of junk to me anymore. It is inadequate for my purposes, which are HTing, general forging, and forge welding san mai billets. I am scared to make my own propane burner for the forge I would like to build. I found a torch at Harbor Freight that i would like to know if it would work for my purposes. If it fits my needs, I will buy two for a two burner set up in a old propane tank for the forge body.

http://www.harborfreight.com/propane-torch-with-push-button-igniter-91037.html

If these arent what I need, can someone please recommend my some inexpensive but reliable burners for my forge?

Thanks,
Gary
 
I got the side arm burner kit from High Temp Tools. It's inexpensive, easy to build (you need a drill press and a couple of good taps) and works like a charm. The HF thing won't work according to all the research I did.
 
A burner like the one in the link CAN work, but it will depend on the size of the forge interior, and what the min/max BTU output is. I dunno about the HF one, I've never heard anything very good about much of their stuff. I have one (not a Harbor Freight, though) with about a 2" bell that puts out a max of 500,000 BTU purchased many, many moons ago at Tractor Supply. If you use a pair of weed torches like that, you'll get the most out of them as long as your forge is insulated VERY well. The downside: while you can forge and heat treat with them, you won't ever achieve a welding heat. The upside: you likely won't have to worry about over-heating your steel.

A little something I forgot to mention; If you're planning to do mostly stock removal and not much forging, you could go with either a *good* weed torch or the side arm burners mentioned by kevnkar. If you are planning to forge out most - if not all of your blades or make damascus, then the side arm set or even a single blown burner would be best.
 
I built my blown propane tank forge from a 300,000 btu roofing torch but I had to reduce the orifice size by around 60% just a guess by looking at it, 2" black pipe and a hair dryer motor easy peasy
 
This burner costs almost the same as the weed burner you mentioned. 100K BTU is big enough to run a propane tank sized forge.
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Hey Zaph, no offense at all meant to you or even to Stacy here, but are you sure you are within the guidelines of this forum, posting a direct link to your sales page? This is not the only time I've seen you do it...
 
Thanks Salem - Good point.

We should try and not directly offer products in a discussion thread. A discussion of one burner vs another is fine, but keep any pricing out of the discussion, and links to a sales site in your signature line....and only service provider/knifemaker members can do that.
 
Not to be a jerk, Zaph! That's a good looking burner, I would love to see one in action some time. Good price too IMO, especially with the line and reg.
 
Saalem -That a good way to open a discussion on a burner available from a member.

Charlie, why don't you post one of your burner videos, and give the specs on the burners.


Any knifemaker or service provider member can mention a specific type of product they carry in a discussion as long as they don't directly offer the sale or discuss a price. They can put a link ytto the product or their home page in their signature line.
Bad post - ABC98, I sell a burner for $49 that will work in your forge. abc@def.ghi
Good post - ABC98, Take a look at the Atlas/T-rex/etc burner. It puts out 100BTU and comes with everything you need. Here is video of one in action. abc@def.ghi
And in the signature line (Forge Burners available at AAA@BBB.CCC)
 
You're absolutely correct. I should have given a more fair response earlier. Here are links to 5 popular burners. They range in price from $60 with a regulator to $170 without a regulator. I have personally used both the Atlas and the HighTempTools and find them to be very similar in performance. I've never used or seen any of the others..
http://www.atlasknife.com/atlas-30k-burner
http://www.hightemptools.com/burners.html
http://zoellerforge.com/flare.html
http://www.hybridburners.com/new-ordering.html
http://www.chileforge.com/NewDiablomainPage.html
 
The first thing I noticed in the OP was that the forge/burner combination needs to do both HT and welding.

This is, in my admittedly limited experience, about the most demanding requirement it is possible to have.

It is quite easy to build a forge/burner combination that will handle welding and forging.

It is perhaps a little less easy to build a forge/burner combination that will achieve the soak temperatures for HT of most of the Carbon steels and will also handle forging temperatures.

It is actually quite difficult to build a forge/burner combination that will run stably, and with an even chamber temperature, all the way from perhaps 1450 degF for HT up to perhaps 2350 degF or so for welding. Blown burners make it significantly easier than Naturally Aspirated burners do, but it is still not a trivial thing to achieve.

The ability of a burner to control air:fuel ratio is important. Changing the gas pressure changes how much flame you have. Changing the air:fuel mixture changes the temperature of that flame. It is well worth spending the time to understand what the expensive burners provide that the cheap ones do not. You can then decide what best suits your needs.

I have played around with a few different burners, from cheap import torches, via Naturally Aspirated lash-ups made from pipe fittings with a vague nod to GB Venturi's work, on through Mike Porter's designs, to finish up at burners built using commercial atmospheric injectors. Only the latter have had the adjustment range to go all the way from from HT to welding. It has been an interesting journey so far and I have not yet dabbled with blown burners, but it has taught me that it pays to look beyond the hype.

Jetted correctly and with sufficiently fine and progressive air control, a single suitably-sized burner can certainly do what you want it to do, but I suspect that most of those on offer probably cannot.

Personally, I would advise a single burner for a 300 CI forge: it's only one burner to adjust and I would not look forward to having to match the adjustments exactly on 2 burners, particularly for HT. It also gives you twice the budget for the burner.

I'm in the UK, so have not seen, and cannot comment on, any of the specific burners mentioned in the previous posts. The only advice I can offer is to do your research before you spend your money. That goes for the forge design as well as the burner.
 
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