The Famous 10 Minute Forge

Back in January of 1998, Grant Sarver mentioned that he had built gas forges in as little as ten minutes. According to Grant, "A chamber built from half a dozen fire brick, a 1/4 copper propane line and a 1 1/4" pipe hooked to an old hair dryer and you're in business!!"

Well, about that time I had to put in my two cents worth . . .

Many of you may think Grant is full of it when he says he's built a gas forge in 10 minutes but it is the absolute truth! OF course, I helped! AND we were at a friend's that has the mother of all junk piles! I scrounged materials and interjected a few ideas while wiring a 3PH blower motor as Grant threw together the plumbing and stacked the brick. It was all Josh could do to get a regulator on the propane cylinder by the time the forge was finished. Not only was it finished but it is still in operation today.

When I wrote that, the forge was still in operation. A year later when I took these photographs the blower had been put to use on another gas furnace and the gas line removed. The red circle on the top image is where the gas was connected and the one below shows where the blower went. I can't remember if the valve was just part of the scrap plumping or if it was used to control the air by bypassing the extra. I think both cases may be true! The forge is sitting on top of a pile of coal in one of the shop's extra coal forges! Hey, the hood and vent were there and it was in the right spot next to the 4B Nazel!

It was my idea to build the forge on a piece of bar grating since that's the way I build mine AND there just happened to be a scrap piece in the pile! The stock support on the front was added later as were the bent lifting bars. This forge was lit and worked right the first time. No changes were made to the burner.



This sketch shows how the bricks were stacked. The bottom row should have been set on edge to make a thicker floor but we were short bricks. The actual forge has some angle iron helping hold it together (but not much). The operation of the burner is similar to my "really stupid gas burner" posted here also.

This is NOT a small forge. It was designed to heat the ends of a dozen heavy jack-hammer bits at one time. The trough forge works well for this purpose but is lousy for general work. But, then, it only took 10 minutes to build!

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