Some of you may remember the coffee can propane forge I built last year, it worked pretty well but was just way too small and quite expensive to run. I was using Mapp gas because it gets so much hotter than propane, but even propane is more expensive than coal. So anyway I decided to break down and build my own coal forge. I started with an old propane BBQ grill and did some modifications. Bought a few pieces of 1 1/2" black iron for the blower (an old hair dryer with the heating element disabled). Cut the cooking grid to fit down into the bottom of the grill and removed all of the extraneous stuff from the grill. About an hour later I had a pretty good facsimile of a forge and needed to do a test burn. Got some wood and charcoal lit in it and turned on the blower and it worked great. Went out today looking for coal, stopped at the local pellet stove dealer and was happily surprised to find they actually carried smithing coal. So today I fired it up with coal for the first time and I am absolutely thrilled with how well this thing works. I know it won't last forever and I'll probably end up either building a better one or beefing this one up a bit but this will do for now.
The test burn
Here's how it works with coal.
To be continued.....