I needed a decent set of furnace tongs that didn’t need to be forged (my forge isn’t set up yet). So I grabbed some flat stock, an angle grinder, my arc welder and some re-bar and got to work.
I built this set of furnace tongs so that I could easily get the crucible out of the furnace without turning to ash.
Basically, the tongs are a couple of lengths of steel re-bar welded to a couple of bits of angled steel.
The hinge in the middle is simply made from a welding a bit of flat stock in the middle of the re-bar so that I could pass a bolt through the middle.
Not terribly pretty, but the tongs work very well.
I needed to be able to position myself over the furnace and lower the tongs, grip the crucible (without crushing it) and then lift. I also wanted to give myself enough distance between my face and the furnace, so the tongs had to be long enough that I could do the whole thing standing up.
I still need to make a crucible cradle that I can use to hold the crucible and pour the molten metal into the flask. I can do that with the tongs, but it gets a little difficult … different design needed to do that.
