My coal forge was smoking me out until I tried a simple brick trick

Last week in my backyard shop, the wind shifted and my coal forge just filled the whole area with thick, nasty smoke. I was about to pack it in for the day, but I remembered something an old guy at a demo in Toledo said about air flow. I grabbed two spare firebricks and stacked them on the side of the forge table where the wind was coming from, making a little wall. It sounds too simple, but it totally worked. The bricks broke the wind just enough that the smoke started drafting straight up the hood again instead of blowing back in my face. I got another solid three hours of work done. It made me wonder what other little physical tweaks people use to control their forge environment without buying new gear. Has anyone else found a cheap fix like that for draft or smoke problems?

3 comments

3 Comments

derekward2mo ago

That's actually a wind break, not a draft fix.

derekl792mo ago

The Toledo demo guy was onto something. That brick wall is fixing the draft by changing the air pressure around the forge opening. It is not just a simple wind break like a sheet of metal would be. The bricks create a low pressure zone that pulls the smoke up the hood. A wind break just blocks the breeze, this actually helps pull the smoke out. It is a smart physical tweak for sure.

murphy.val2mo ago

My buddy did something like that with a sheet of scrap metal, and derekward is right, it's just a wind break.