DIY

WORKSHOP

$30 MICRO FORGE

Make your own nails and other small iron parts. By Len Cullum

I am a woodworker by trade and spend my days building Japanese-style architectural elements and structures. Because of my chosen niche, I occasionally need a piece of hardware that’s impossible to find in this country. Sometimes I ask friends in Japan to track it down. But other times, if the piece isn’t too complicated, I’lI make it myself.

Photography by Len Cullum

Recently, I needed to make 500 old-style Japanese nails. In the past I would simply fire up a propane plumber’s torch, hold each piece over it until it was glowing, and then hammer away. That was fine when a dozen nails were all I needed, but this time I knew I needed a more efficient way to heat all those nails, so I built a micro forge.

1. Drill the brick.

Firebricks are really soft and easy to cut. So soft, in fact, that you can dig into them with a fingernail, but

they are still rated to 2,300°F. Ordinary wood/metal drill bits go through them like butter.

The nails I was making were 2½" long, and I wanted to keep the forge chamber as compact as possible, so I used the brick’s biggest face ( 4½"× 9") as the front, which allows for the shallowest chamber. Make a mark on the front face, 2¼" in from one end, and centered 2¼" from either side (Figure A, following page).

Wear a dust mask. Set the drill press to its lowest speed (mine was 250rpm) and drill a hole 21" wide and 2" deep, centered on your mark. Drill slowly — you don’t want this stuff flying all over the place (Figure B). With a slow speed, most of the dust should stay in the hole until you dump it out.

Locate and drill the ¾" flame hole, which comes in from the side. I chose to locate it at the top of the forge chamber (Figure C) so that the curved sides

Make: 127