Never knew how much scale buildup changes my forge welding until I cleaned my firepot

I've been forging out of my garage in Portland for about 3 years now, and I always figured my welds were hit or miss because of my technique. Last Tuesday I finally scraped out this thick layer of rust and scale that had built up in my coal forge firepot over time. The difference was night and day - my first weld after that came together clean on the second heat instead of the usual fourth or fifth try. Has anyone else noticed a big change just from keeping the firepot cleaner?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_ben13d ago

Wait is that really all it took for you... I've been fighting with my welds for like a year and a half now and never thought to check the firepot that deep. I always scrape the top layer off but never went digging down into the bottom. That thick crust of old ash and scale probably messes with the air flow way more than I realized. Now I'm wondering if my fire just wasn't getting hot enough in the middle because of all that junk blocking the tuyere. I'm gonna go scrape mine out tomorrow morning and see if it fixes my stubborn billet welds.

gavin_clark13d ago

My old mentor used to say a clean firepot was worth fifty pounds of coal.