Home made forge?

[dewman]

I have a friend who made a home made forge using some fire bricks, some Kingsford Brickets and his wife's blow drier. He made a knife blade from a saw blade, took it to final shape and sharpness, then slipped it into the tiny slot and heated it to white hot color, then quenched it in oil. He sent me the final product for "evaluation" and I must say, it was harder than all get out. He did the final heat treatment in his kitchen over....about 500 degrees for an hour or so.

Any of you "bladesmiths" ever heard of this or tried it?

[Hukk]

Yep, I've heard of it. But Charcoal Briquets are supposed to leave an oliy reside behind, making a contaminent for the steel. I've seen a DVD (Liveley Productions) where that make all their own charcoal. Burn the wood down to large chunk (hunk) size and put it completely out using water. They then sift the charcoal through a loose bamboo mat. Very interesting, knifemaking unplugged or something like that. No electricty at all, makes me appreciate my power tools more!