thinking of building a forging furnace

C

chucktilbury

Guest
I am thinking of building a forging furnace. Since I have a background in electronics and software design, I am thinking of also making a computer controlled thermostat for it as well.

Here is what I have in mind. It will be a closed-loop thermostat system. There are 7 settings for the burners from high to low. That will be done with solenoid valves and preset orifices to control the flow. The timer will be 24 hours and will programmable to different heats in 10 minute increments over that time. It will be programmable with an external computer and some easy to use software that is designed to make very smooth and accurate temperature transitions. It will also have an external alarm interface that you can hook a light or a bell up to.

I want to know if anyone would find that useful enough to buy a kit or a complete system. I kind of want to get an idea of the interest before I invest time and money into the idea. I am thinking that it would cost on the order of $300-$400 for a complete regulator system, but with no burners or firebox. Does that seem reasonable?

Thanks everyone!
Chuck Tilbury
 
Chuck, that sounds like a pretty neat idea but I think you may be trying to over-engineer a forge. Please don't misunderstand what I'm saying as this is just my humble opinion and I hope that more experienced folks than I will chime in here. As I understand it, a temp probe with a readout can be adapted to a forge fairly easily and this will help keep from over heating your steel. The desired upper temp can be controlled with air and gas flow and that will stay pretty constant once the forge comes up to temp and that's about all the control a guy really needs while forging.

As someone else said about other things, your mileage may vary.

Carey
 
For a forging furnace, that's deffinantly over engineered. You don't need that degree of heat control for forging. You don't really need that level of control for heat treating either unless you are building a salt pot or an electric heat treating oven that's programable. Go to www.zoellerforge.com or www.elliscustomknifeworks.com and take a look at the page of forges other people have made to get an idea of how they can be built.

Doug Lester
 
Good idea BUT.

With the cost of a $30 PID, a thermocouple and a 110V gas valve you could do the same thing (I think).

For a forge it is nice to know what temp you are at so a PID that can open and close a gas valve will keep the temp constant to your setting. Simple to make and no computer close by to be damaged.

As for heat treat furnaces the PID that operates a contactor and some heating elements will accomplish the same thing with manual changing of the temps at timed intervals. There are also controllers that let you program all your set points and times in and it will do it all without additional input.

To me you will be reinventing the wheel. Not that it is a bad thing as your wheel will have different rims but will roll just the same.

I cannot think of an option I would want in a software program that I can't get with a good controller. If you can add features that will eventually become popular, this is a great idea.
 
Bob Warner said:
Good idea BUT.
With the cost of a $30 PID, a thermocouple and a 110V gas valve you could do the same thing (I think).
Click to expand...

So, maybe the question I should be asking is if anyone has ever been in a situation where you wanted to "cook" something for a long time at different temperatures. I have been reading a lot, but I have little practical experience with different kinds of heat treatments for different steels. Some of the annealing or stress relieving procedures seem pretty complex.

I also make things out of aluminum. I need to gain the ability to anneal and harden small aluminum parts. (http://whistlemaker.com) The formula for annealing and hardening 6061 requires a "smart" electric oven as far as I can tell. (see http://www.suppliersonline.com/propertypages/6061.asp) I do not have the patience, time, or attention span to cook a piece of metal for 8 hours. :)

Here is a little more detail about what I have in mind. You would use any old outdated PC to be the "controller". It would be able to control many slaves at the same time. The slave and the controller would be connected by a serial cable. A slave would be a very simple device that would allow the PC to set the temperature and read the thermocouple. Maybe it would have a button or two. (definitely an emergency cutoff) All of the display of temperature and setting would be on the PC. The thing that sets the temperature could be about anything from a 2A SSR to control a solenoid valve to a 40A chopper to control a electric oven or a fan. All of the hardware is pretty easy. Most of the time and effort will go into the software to make it robust and easy to use. You would be able to set up a job that runs for any arbitrary amount of time (including "manual" control) and set the temp to any arbitrary setting during that time, as long as the device at the other end can deal with it.

The question is whether that sounds useful? Or just a over-engineered toy? No doubt, that a good PID and a timer with an alarm can do that same thing. A PC would cost around $100. Each slave would be around $40. The switch connected to the slave could be anywhere from $10 for an SSR to $150 for a 40A chopper, depending on what you want to control. A PID with an SSR would cost around $50. I am sure that I -can- make this. I am trying to figure out if I -should- do it.

Cheers!
-=chuck=-
 
Last edited by a moderator:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top