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I finally gave up on my coal rake after a forge swap meet in Akron
At the Buckeye Blacksmith swap meet in Akron last Saturday, an old guy named Walt watched me fight a clinker for 10 minutes with my flat rake and just shook his head. He handed me a bent-up hook rake with a 3/8 inch rod welded on and said "try scraping the firepot toward the tuyere, not across it." Two passes and the whole clinker came out in one piece, no poking, no swearing. I've been doing it wrong for 5 years and now my hook rake lives on the anvil horn. Anyone else get schooled on fire tending by a stranger at a meet like that?
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rowan_hayes5d ago
doing it wrong for 5 years" is a bit much for me. It's a firepot, not a piano. Scraping toward the tuyere instead of across it is a decent tip, sure, but half the old guys at these meets treat their own method like it came down from the mountain. Walt's hook rake worked because he knows that fire, and probably because the rake was built for it. You'd have likely gotten the same clinker out with the flat one after another minute. Glad it worked, but I wouldn't file the last 5 years under wasted.
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gonzalez.alice5d ago
half the old guys treat their own method like it came down from the mountain" is dead on, had a guy at a meet grab my tongs mid-heat and show me a grip that changed how I hold stock forever.
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