Electric forge blower source

Aw Pete, you're in the land of Yank, and have a lot more toys available to you. I reckon the worst American garage sale would put shame on our best hardware store.

I did like the suggestion of the blower extraction from a gas water heater. Is this a certain type of heater, 'cause the ones I've seen in this backwater don't have electrical components :-(

Regards Charles

I'm so poor I can't afford those places, I get my stuff from the scrap yard or shooting ranges. :)

Gas-furnaces here have them but many are 240v so here they need to be checked for that.

I too have never seen a gas water heater with a blower on it. Like he mentioned... has something to do with "venting". Solcialist Republik of Kalifonia? Messychewsets?

Scrap yard! :) I've gotten a couple from there. Also removed some only to turn it over and read it's 240v and then take it and throw it in their motor pile. ;)

Found my best candidate for a newer-slower-setup at the shooting range. :) (along with the 1.2gHz computer I'm using right now;)

That's a used signal-case blower I rescued from the dumpster at work. Lately I've been using it with the baffle plate all the way closed. That supplies two 1/2" pipes closed.

That baffle control beats the dogshit out of any sort of electrical speed control. No kidding. It's quick and precise. BTDT no use you having to mess with it.

For simple heat treating mine is way too strong. Grainger item number: 4C443 $64

Scrap yard's looking pretty good huh? ;)

Alvin in AZ

American scrap yards are waaaaaay better than our hardware stores. A friend of mine used to go to American scrap yards and pick up Trans-Am(sp.?) parts and ship them to Oz as scrap metal in a 44 gallon drum... made a small fortune.

I was lucky enough to get a blower from a pipe organ, a monster of a thing... haven't used it yet, but it works.

When I use air (although for my purposes I don't need air at the moment), I use the dust extractor as previously states and a slide valve, the slide valve doesn't block any air flow, it just re-directs it, so that there is minimal strain on the motor. The valve I use is a pipe with a smaller diameter pipe inside it, a slot cut in the larger pipe, and the inner pipe can slide back and forth.

Here's the blower :

Yes I did do the parquetry myself, and went temporarily insane afterwards ;-)

Here's the valve and a few other bits and pieces :

Definitely not rocket science.

Regards Charles

One of the oddities of centrifugal blowers is that there would be less strain on the fan if the shutter blocked or restricted the flow. The motor will also draw less power. An "unrestricted" centrifugal blower is working as hard as it can possibly work. Some prior poster (here, I think) in the HVAC business claimed that a common cause of blower motor burnout was customers "opening up" a duct system, either to expand coverage or in a misguided attempt to "make less work for the blower", and actually overloading a motor that was specified for a certain degree of duct restriction.

This is interesting, wouldn't restricting the air flow out cause pressure? I always thought this to be a bad thing.

My valve is on the air out not the air in. I can imagine that if you covered the air in this would have a different effect of covering the air out.

Regards Charles

Yep. What the cat eater said. :)

Alvin in AZ

LOL :)

CA you've always cracked me up, Lachlan (r.k) is another one. :)

The scrap yard doesn't have good stuff everytime I go there tho. I collect empty shells and other scrap at the shooting ranges and that's enough to buy gas to go to town and lunch.

Stainless steel, the kind that doesn't stick to a magnet, was 75c a pound last time.

That sucker's a monster too and noisy as anything I bet. :/

No fair using words I have to look up. :/ But really cool work! :)

CA, I didn't know you were Chinese. ;)

I hear that the foundrymen that cast stuff like engine blocks are very well paid and recognized as artists.

Something W.VonBraun couldn't do I bet. :)

Alvin in AZ

I'll ask the guy for more details the next time I see him. Now that you mention it, I do believe that the gas hot water heater we had many years ago (1960's)was as you describe, but I think carbon monoxide concerns have grown a lot here since then. But I do see various blowers at I mentioned. Come to think of it, almost all larger (80,000 btu or more) modern gas furnaces that draw combustion air from the outside have "combustion air blowers", too. The one in our house sure does.

We also have a company called "The Surplus Center" in Nebraska that sells a lot of blowers that would work for these applications.

Some of the blowers that I currently have are from unknown (to me) sources, but as long as they are centrifugal blowers and run on 120 volts ac, they do the job. It's hard to find one that's too small.

Pete Stanaitis

----------------------------------------- Chilla wrote:

The air spins around and around with the blades. No real work being done or can be done. Closing it off completely could be bad too. Less air going over the motor winding depending on design.

Try it, close off the air and listen to the motor wind up, ok? :)

Not really in the short term.

In the long run now... at least on my blower there is air being sucked in through the motor and still-is with the intake-shut.

"shaded pole blower" is the old name for those things.

How cold it get there in the winter? You guys got much in the way of central gas heating?

Those things have little blowers that would be perfect for the size of rig you showed. They are very quiet.

Stuff gives out and gets up-graded etc all the time.

Like a guy on r.c.m said... if you find a good looking electric generator at the scrap yard, grab it. Either the engine or the generator is still good and he'd never found one where both were bad.

The little blowers on the central heat units are still good and thrown out with the rest, see? :) I've seen 'em with bad bearings from lack of oil but they have -always- been loose ones laying in the motor pile. The whole thing don't get changed out because of the little blower.

Talk to the guys at the scrap yard. :) Give 'em a MT&P book. ;) BTDT

You believe you can do better than the "leaf blower;)", no kidding.

Nice and quiet and the little sucker will outlast you too.

"should I ring that up for you now?" ;)

Alvin in AZ

120v :)

I'm wondering if Charles will even have to worry about voltage differences like that? :)

I'm anxious for him to get back on this. :)

That's for-sure in my case. :)

My smallest one will still be close to closed, I'm figuring.

Alvin in AZ

Maybe not. It's a turbine, so when it spins in a closed box, it may just be swirling the same air around and around, without having the extra load of pulling new air in through the center to replace the flow that went through the ducting.

I live in Sydney, New South Wales, and it doesn't snow where I live, so it doesn't get real cold, on the coldest winters day I could run around naked outside (don't ask me how I know ;-)).

Melbourne, Victoria gets cold.

Regards Charles

How about a blower from an old clothes dryer?

Around here, a blower like that is most likely to be seen as a ventilation blower, drying some poor guy's basement as part of flood damage repairs.

It looks a fine candidate for a BIG cupola, but I would not even consider one as big as that for a forge unless I was running some truly BIG steel.

Old (and new, but you probably won't find new on the streetcorner)automatic dishwashers have a nice little blower in them. Many of them have a heating element, too, if that is usefull at all for other things.

Cheers Trevor Jones

Okay, but 'way toooooo big. The last one that I took apart had a purpose-built blower housing that would be tough, but not impossible, to adapt.

Pete Stanaitis

Jim Downey wrote:

Wood? I hear that it doesn't do too well when you try to heat it in a forge..... Didn't you know that you're supposed to leave working with stuff that can't be heated and hammered to the tree mechanics?

Kewl. What were you pouring, bronze?

John

I was almost ten years younger, so basically didn't know any better ;-)

Yes. Bronze is my favorite metal, looks cool and is a lower health risk to smelt/melt than brass.

Regards Charles

I use a real small vacuum cleaner. Uh, on the "blow" side, of course. It has a switch on the top that I control with my boot. Ain't perfect, but it works for me...